Amazon private label brands: Energy drinks are only the latest

Today we're going to go over the current list of brands Amazon owns, showing you which products you might think you're buying from someone else. We'll begin with the brand "Solimo", the brand that sells the energy drinks that are making the rounds in the viral share-zone today. This is just one product in a collection of products sold by Amazon's various private label organizations.

You're likely an Amazon customer, and you've likely purchased a product or two from a company you'd not heard of before said purchase. Let me tell you about your potential future. One day you'll find yourself surrounded by products you believe are made by a wide variety of differing companies, all of which sell their goods through Amazon. But they're actually all manufactured by one company. That company is Amazon.

Most big retailers do it. They sell products in their store that they, themselves, have manufactured. Where in the distant past, these products might've been labeled with the same brand as the store, or labeled "generic" to some degree, now they've got private label brands.

According to the December 2018 (latest available) Nielson Total Consumer Report, private label product growth in the USA was at 4.6% year-over-year, well and above that of the closest store brand category. Nielson monitored the different sorts of private label products in the 52 week period ending in October of 2018 and found the following products growing fastest: Grass Seed, Antiseptic, Pollock (Seafood), Insect Repellent, Pet Beds, Snack Combos, Fragrance Oils, Lunch Combos, Meal Kits, and Dessert Bars.

private label brands are the fastest growing and most effective way in which retailers like Amazon are directing cash toward themselves exclusively. You might want to take a peek at the big Amazon private label brands list at This Just In to start to wrap your brain around the scale at which Amazon is operating this project.

As of January 8th, 2019, TJI Research reported that Amazon had at least 135 private label brands. They also found Amazon working with over 330 Amazon exclusive brands.

You're not just seeing this now because you've not been paying attention. It's really, truly, just taking effect recently. Look at the chart above, also from TJI, showing the number of Amazon private label brands, starting in 2007 and really ramping up in a MAJOR way in late 2016.

This is only the beginning. Given Amazon's place as most successful online retailer and one of the top five retailers (online or off) worldwide, we'll feel the squeeze soon. Or maybe since the number one retailer worldwide (Walmart) already had private label brands for a while, everything will be just fine. Stay tuned and we'll just see.