What Does Renewed Mean on Amazon—a Definitive Seller Guide

When done right, selling used items makes for a win-win situation. It lets sellers profit from whatever sources are available. On the other hand, it allows customers to purchase items they want without breaking their bank.

eBay has managed to get the commerce of used/renewed items right. That’s why it has transformed into one of the most reliable platforms for buying and selling those products. The website registers one of the highest sell-through rates for used products globally.

Amazon also caters to buyers and sellers interested in items other than brand-new through its Renewed Program. However, the program has a lot of potential that is yet to be tapped. In other words, there is a huge opportunity for sellers on the platform dealing in used items.

If you want to enter this territory on Amazon and make the most of it, continue reading on. In this piece, you will learn all about what does renewed on Amazon mean.

What Is Amazon Renewed Program?

Amazon Renewed program allows the trade of used items on the platform. You can sell refurbished, open-box, and pre-owned products under this program. However, Amazon Renewed doesn’t work like the majority of used items marketplaces where quality assurance is not always up to the mark. 

At Amazon Renewed, you can only sell fixed-up, tested, and certified products that look and act like new. Amazon has laid out extensive product and seller criteria to enforce that quality control (more on it later). 

What Is Amazon Renewed and Refurbished?

It is important to remember that Amazon doesn’t have separate “Renewed” and “Refurbished” programs. There is only one Amazon Renewed program through which you can sell refurbished products (besides open-box items). Any pre-owned product that has been fixed up to work and looks like a new counterpart can either be termed as “renewed” or “refurbished”.

What Is Amazon Renewed Premium?

Amazon Renewed Premium is at the top tier of the Renewed Program. Products sold under this sub-category are done up by the original manufacturer or Amazon instead of third-party sellers. In addition, they come in deluxe packaging with a full-year warranty, unlike the standard 90-day Amazon Renewed Guarantee. 

Amazon Renewed Premium is not for third-party sellers. It primarily caters to big brands with universal appeal and a loyal consumer base (e.g. Apple, Dell, Samsung, etc). Small brand owners will find a little luck in selling their pre-owned and open box items as Renewed Premium. 

What Items Can You Sell As Amazon Renewed?

Amazon Renewed program doesn’t extend to every product category that you can sell on the platform otherwise. Amazon maintains that you can only sell those products through the program that possess “repair/refurbish capacity”. 

In other words, you can sell items featuring mechanical or electrical components that can be refurbished, repaired, replaced, or upgraded to their optimal state.

Amazon has made 12 products categories that can fulfill the criteria mentioned above.

Smartphones, Computers, Home & Kitchen, Tools

Smartwatches, Gaming, Tablets, Cameras

Lawn & Garden, Office Products, Home Entertainment, Headphones

Under these 12 categories, you can sell the following products on Amazon as renewed and refurbished.

• Air conditioners
• Audio receivers and amplifiers
• Audio-video selectors
• Blu-ray and DVD players
• Cameras
• Car stereos, security, video, and radar detectors
• Chain saws, pole saws, and log splitters
• Chippers, shredders, and mulchers
• Computer internal hard drives
• Connected home modules
• Dehumidifiers
• Digital antennas
• Digital musical instruments
• Electric ceiling fans
• Electrical floor cleaning devices
• Embroidery machines
• External hard drives
• External solid-state drives
• Fitness machines
• Fitness watches
• Generators
• GPS devices
• Graphing and scientific calculators
• Headphones
• Headsets
• Space heaters
• Home stereo equipment
• Home theater systems
• Irons
• Electric kitchen appliances
• Powered lawn mowers, hedge trimmers, and edgers
• Media players
• Microphones
• Monitors
• Outdoor blowers and vacs
• Personal computers (PC)
• PC graphics cards
• PC keyboards, mice, gamepads, and webcams
• PC motherboards
• PC digital internal power supply
• PC processors
• PC servers
• PC monitors
• Routers
• Modems
• Cell phone devices
• Pneumatic tools
• Portable media players
• Power tools, power drills, and power saws
• Pressure washers
• Printers
• Projectors
• Refrigerators
• Scanners
• Security cameras and systems
• Sewing machines
• Shredders
• Smartwatches
• Snowthrowers
• Sound and recording equipment
• Soundbars
• Speakers
• Tablets
• Televisions
• Thermostats
• Universal remote controls
• Vacuums
• Video cameras
• Video game consoles and controllers
  

Product Qualification Criteria for Amazon Renewed

As mentioned earlier, Amazon has set out very detailed and stringent qualification criteria for products sold under the Amazon Renewed program. Here, we will briefly outline those requirements that you need to fulfill with your used/refurbished inventory if you want to sell it through Amazon Renewed.

• A renewed/refurbished product should get Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) parts in the refurbishment process. The OEM parts can be new as well as refurbished.
• A renewed/refurbished product should not have any noticeable cosmetic damage. Cosmetic damages include scratches, scuffs, dents, etc. By noticeable, Amazon means it should not be visible when the product is held 12 inches away.
• A renewed/refurbished product (if applicable) must have a battery capacity of more than 80% of similar new equipment. 
• A renewed/refurbished product (if applicable) must be upgradeable to the latest OEM firmware update.
• A renewed/refurbished product must have all accessories that come with a brand-new equivalent. Also, these accessories should be from the OEM (new, like-new, or refurbished).
• A renewed/refurbished product (if applicable) must get complete forensic destruction of all Personally Identifiable Information (PII) of the last user. PII includes but is not limited to: name, DOB, biometric data, street address, email address, SSN, bank account details, etc.
• A renewed/refurbished product must come in the original or new cardboard box packaging along with an Amazon Renewed Insert (a brochure that contains information about the program and customer service contact information).
• Affix the “Renewed”, “Remanufactured”, or “Refurbished” labels on at least two sides of the packaging.

How to Start Selling on Amazon Renewed

Even if you are already an Amazon seller, you won’t be automatically qualified to sell on Amazon Renewed. Instead, Amazon has established a multifaceted qualification process for those who want to sell renewed and pre-owned products on the platform. 

First, you need to qualify for the program by fulfilling certain conditions. Then, you need to comply with a list of requirements on an ongoing basis to stay in the program.

How to Qualify As a Seller for Amazon Renewed 

If you can take care of the following requirements, you can sell renewed and refurbished products on Amazon.

• You need to submit the supply invoices showing that you have bought $50,000 worth of qualified refurbished products in the previous 90 days. For some product categories (Lawn & Garden, Home, Tools, and Kitchen), the purchases can be from the last 180 days.
• You must have an Order Defect Rate (ODR) of 0.8% or less in the last 90 days. ODR is a percentage of orders with one or more indicators of poor customer service during a given 60-day time period. These indicators are the A-to-z guarantee claim rate, negative feedback rate, and credit card chargeback rate.
• You have to submit eight images of a sample unit for review that you need to list as renewed/refurbished. These images will show the product from all four sides as well as top and bottom. Moreover, these images should also show the shipping box and inside packaging and padding.
• You have to back all your listed renewed products with an Amazon Renewed guarantee. You will also be responsible to entertain all the claims made under that guarantee.

ISO-90001 compliance is not a requirement to sell on Amazon Renewed for now. However, Amazon encourages sellers to meet that ISO standard. Having ISO certification might help fast-tracking your application to sell on Amazon Renewed.

How to Stay in the Program?

You need to maintain the following key performance metrics to remain in the Amazon Renewed Program. 

• Maintain Perfect Order Percentage (POP) of 85 or above. Amazon calculates POP by dividing the total number of “perfect orders” by the total number of orders in the last 90 days. A perfect order is the one that is shipped on time, doesn’t get a refund or canceled, doesn’t receive negative feedback or a-to-z guarantee claim. 

• Maintain Order Defect Rate of 0.8% or less.
• The number of 1- and 2-start reviews on your renewed listings should be 10% or less than the total number of reviews on those listings.
• Maintain Renewed Quality Score (RQS) of 98% or more. RQS is a metric that shows the percentage of orders without any reported defects in the last 13 weeks. Amazon measures RQS by factoring in the customer complaints through product reviews, emails, and customer service calls. 
• Maintain an Average Product Rating (APR) of 4 or more for the listed renewed item. APR is the average star rating that a product gets in the last 30 days from buyers.

You can see that consistency is the key to stay in the Amazon Renewed program. You can achieve that by continuously maintaining product quality and delivering good customer service. 

How to Create Amazon Renewed Listing

You can list Amazon renewed items the same way you do regular product listing while taking care of the following points.

• List the product under the original brand/manufacturer without including any reference to the seller’s name or brand on the listing page.

• Don’t list in bundles (e.g. a mobile device with a protective cover).
• Must include the term “Renewed” in parentheses at the beginning of the product title when creating a new renewed ASIN.

Benefits of Selling on Amazon Renewed

Amazon Renewed Program can be a lucrative prospect for many sellers due to these reasons. 

Exclusivity

You may have already gathered from the above discussion that not everyone can become an Amazon Renewed seller. You need to bring in good upfront investment and then put up a consistent performance to keep selling on Amazon Renewed. These strict criteria make Amazon Renewed sellers a member of an exclusive club of sorts where only they can sell the refurbished/renewed products on the world’s largest e-commerce platform.

An Opportunity to Scale Up

If you’re already selling refurbished and pre-owned products, you can scale your business several times while using the global outreach and excellent logistical expertise and muscle of Amazon.

Reaching a Bigger Brand Conscious Audience

Price proves to be a deterrent for a number of brand-conscious consumers when it comes to buying new products. Many of those customers look forward to affordable renewed and refurbished variants that are new-like. You can reach out to that considerably large consumer base by enrolling in Amazon Renewed Program.

Guarantee on Amazon Renewed Products

Amazon covers every renewed, pre-owned, and refurbished product selling on its platform through Amazon Renewed Guarantee. It works just like a regular product guarantee i.e. an unsatisfied customer can return the product within 90 days of the purchase. 

Renewed products fulfilled by Amazon automatically qualify for Amazon Renewed Guarantee. Meanwhile, if you are fulfilling the orders yourself, you will have to choose pre-paid return labels within your Seller Central account. Without doing this opt-in, your products won’t get eligible for Amazon Renewed Guarantee. 

Pricing of Amazon Renewed Product

It is only natural that customers expect renewed products to cost less than their brand-new counterparts. Therefore, Amazon has set a minimum discount of 5% for all the refurbished/renewed items. This percentage is calculated by factoring in the price tag of the similar new items listed on Amazon.

You can also provide bigger discounts. However, if the discount on refurbished products is less than 5%, you can face these unwanted consequences.

• Loss of Amazon Renewed selling privilege 
• Permanent loss of selling privileges for the given ASIN
• Disqualified to get the featured offer place on other listings

What is the Referral Fee for Renewed Product?

Before we wrap up this guide, it is essential to answer this question. 

Besides the standard category referral fee, you will have to pay an additional referral fee for selling renewed/refurbished products.  For all renewed categories except smartphones, you will have to pay an additional 1% referral fee on every sale. For renewed/refurbished cell phones, the additional referral fee is 2% per sale.

Final Words 

Selling on the Amazon Renewed Program shows great prospects if you can make a large upfront investment and maintain good seller performance. The program gives you access to a large base of consumers looking to buy original products and brands at a reasonable price. 

Whether you’re just starting your Amazon journey or been in the game for a while, ZonGuru has just what you need to improve your business. Sign up for a FREE trial today, cancel any time.