October 1, 2025 • 24 mins
Looking for Amazon reselling strategies that actually work?
In this 203rd episode of The E-Comm Show, host Andrew Maff sits down with Charles Chakkalo, partner at Joey’s Shopping and author of Just a Seller, to share how he built a profitable Amazon reselling business while scaling private label brands at the same time.
From running his own warehouses to predicting Amazon’s next big moves, Charles breaks down the unorthodox tactics that helped him stand out in a crowded e-commerce space.
What You’ll Learn
- Amazon Reselling vs. Private Label: Why hybrid models build both cash flow & long-term brand equity
- Logistics Advantage: How in-house warehouses cut costs & boost margins over 3PLs
- Agency Real Talk: When outsourcing works, and when it doesn’t
- Amazon’s Next Moves: Predictions on Buy with Prime, TikTok Shop & fulfillment trends
- Building Differently: Why breaking the “e-comm rules” can give you a competitive edge
CONNECT WITH US!
📱 Facebook: / bluetuskr
📸 Instagram: / bluetuskr
📻 LinkedIn: / bluetuskr
🐤 Twitter: / bluetuskr
📧 Email: info@bluetuskr.com
CONNECT WITH GUEST:
📻 LinkedIn: Charles Chakkalo
📧 Newsletter: Just A Seller
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Charles Chakkalo (00:03):
Entrepreneurs, by definition, in my opinion,
are people who don't follow thebook, the rule, the orthodoxy.
Andrew Maff (00:10):
Welcome to the E comm Show podcast. I am your
host. Andrew Maff, owner andfounder of blue tusker, from
groundbreaking industry updatesto success stories and
strategies, get to know the insand outs of the e Commerce
Industry from top leaders in thespace. Let's get into it.
Hello everyone, and welcome toanother episode of the E comm
show as usual. I am your host,Andrew Maff, and today I am
(00:31):
joined by the amazing CharlesChakkalo, who is a partner over
at Joey'z shopping. Charles, howyou doing? Buddy? Ready for good
show?
Charles Chakkalo (00:37):
Thank God.
Healthy into one piece. Imagineif I said two.
Andrew Maff (00:40):
Yeah, dude, I love it. I'm so excited to have you
on the show. I know you and I,we met at the MDS group and had
a very interesting conversationwith you. Ton of stuff to get
into, but I always kind of liketo like, let's, let's just clear
the air. Give you the land. Telleveryone a little bit about your
background, how you got startedwith Joey shopping, and we'll
take it from there.
Charles Chakkalo (00:59):
Sure. So back in college, I was, I was going
to go to, I was a pre lawstudent. I was going to law
school, and my brother tapped meon the shoulder one day. He
goes, Hey, you know this thingthat we've been doing since
elementary school? You know, Iwent into Best Buy, getting
things on sale. He went intoanything from Bass Pro Shops or
fishing related stores, justresold things for just a modest
(01:24):
markup. You want to try that forreal? I go, What do you mean for
real? He goes, you know, put ourheart and soul into it, not just
stick to Best Buy in fishing,but but to do it on a larger
scale. So we did. And mind you,this is the brother that I was
partners with selling Coca Colais in elementary school, quote,
unquote, against the rules. Soit wasn't something I was
(01:46):
unfamiliar with. I took my LSAT,submitted my law school
applications, and just neverwent to law school. I said to
myself, I'm not getting back 22to 25 those age those age
ranges, ever again, but if Ineed to, I'll go back to law
school later on, and here I amnot a lawyer. That's how that
started. We started in a room ina basement, reselling light
(02:09):
bulbs. Light bulbs weresomething that just had a great
margin when, when he got me onthat shoulder, and we graduated
from a room in a basement to afull basement, and then to a
sidewalk, and then to awarehouse, and then to a second
warehouse this year.
Andrew Maff (02:26):
Wow. And primarily marketplaces. I know you've got
your own website, but is itmainly?
Charles Chakkalo (02:32):
It's the conventional split of, I would
say most Amazon sellers, or ifthey consider themselves an
Amazon seller, it's aconventional split of, like 99
to one half a percent being DTCand a half percent being
Walmart, something like that.
Andrew Maff (02:45):
So, just kind of reference. So you and I
mentioned we met at MDS, and theconversation with you, I loved
every minute of it, justbecause, like, you're one of
very few people that will justbe like, so, so straightforward,
and just, you know, stick it towhoever thinks they're doing
things correctly or incorrectly.
And just no bullshit. I knowyou've also got your own
(03:07):
newsletter and stuff that's kindof got that same.
Charles Chakkalo (03:10):
I shoot for it. Listen, it's the person I
am. I mean, entrepreneurs bydefinition, in my opinion, are
people who don't follow thebook, the rule, the orthodoxy
and and because I don't have anagency, I don't have a bottom
line, and I like to think that Ihave a mouth on me. I'm not
(03:30):
afraid to use it. And I just Isaw this huge movement in
Orthodoxy, in the Amazon ecomspace, of you have to have your
own brand. You have to have yourown brand story, your own unique
value proposition, your ownprivate label. You have to sell
off using some sort of M and Afirm, and and and multiples, is
(03:53):
what you live in, live andbreathe by. And it's just not
necessarily the case. I mean, ifthat's how you function, all the
power to you, but it's not anecessary condition of being in
this industry. That's, that's,that's a big part of what I
think stuck with you.
Andrew Maff (04:09):
the specifics of it. That's different from kind
of the typical, like, privatelabel brand story, that typeof
thing.
Charles Chakkalo (04:19):
So not to say we don't do private label. It's
a significant part of ourbusiness. It's actually it
ranges on year on year from 60to 50% of our gross revenue. We
started that in about 2020, butwhat's particular to our
businesses, we engage in resale,which, by the way, can, in my
(04:40):
opinion, has a bunch of otherterms associated with it. People
differentiate between retailarbitrage, wholesale resale, so
I just consider it all resale.
We have resale operations goingon. That's immediate profit. So
if I buy, if I buy a tube oftoothpaste for $2 I sell it for
$3 that's immediate profit thataccess. Sort of like a profit
funnel and an engine to theprivate label endeavor where
(05:02):
everybody knows cash flow is notas immediate. So that's that's
really the unique element of it.
And the part that gives us acertain leg up is that we run
our own logistics. Because wedon't, we don't use any 3ls. The
furthest extent of a 3PL that wedo use is FBA. So by us owning
our logistics, yes, that meanswe deal with HR, that means we
(05:24):
deal with utility bills, thatmeans we deal with repairs, that
means we deal with three sets ofparents dying when it's the nice
weather outside. That issomething we all handle in
house, and enables us toactually operate at better
margins than many others could.
Andrew Maff (05:40):
Yeah, I say, Do you I know your I know your feelings
towards agencies. But evenoutside of that, just in any
general service at all, is thereanything that you outsource?
Charles Chakkalo (05:49):
Sure, yeah, there's plenty that we
outsource. Listen, I havenothing against agencies. I just
have something against whenagencies overdo things and and
just treat their audience as abottom line. No no shame to
them. They have to. That's whatthey're there for. But I mean,
just, just for example, uh,Amazon announced about a month
(06:11):
ago that they're deprecating afeature where where sellers can
reach out to people who leavenegative product reviews on
their branded goods. Theyannounced that they're
deprecating that feature at theend of July, earlier this month,
they announced that, and we'rerecording this September 10,
they announced that they're notgoing to be deprecating that
feature due to seller feedback.
There was an agency owner whospecializes in removing negative
(06:35):
reviews, or that's their niche,and they set up this whole many
chat funnel on LinkedIn you haveto reply to give their posts
more engagement. And there was awhole big sense of urgency
because Amazon, quote, unquote,was so deprecating the feature,
but that entire funnel and thedeliverable that they promised
you was still based on outdatedinformation, and either that
(06:58):
seller knew that the featurewasn't going to be deprecated,
or they just want, they just setup the whole apparatus, and
didn't want to let all that workgo to waste, and wanted that
post to get more engagement, andwanted an email list, and wanted
more engagement with themselves,to be viewed more as an
authority in the space, andmaybe land more clients. Yeah,
that's my pitch. Just somethinghappened yesterday. Anyway. Yes,
(07:18):
there's plenty I outsource toagency, yeah, be it creative
work, be it repricing, be itPPC. Yeah, we, I mean, we can.
We tried an era of handling PPCin house. It took it 30 hours a
week of a partner, and 30 hoursof a partner is not, is not
where we want to spend our time.
(07:41):
So, yeah, there's plenty that weoutsource. And I was, actually,
I was talking to somebody elseabout this. It's amazing to that
agencies run on a churn model,like, it's inevitable that
somebody will leave you, andit's inevitable that more people
will come in. Like, the wholeidea of leads and chasing and
and churning is just, it's abusiness model that wouldn't get
(08:04):
me too excited, but I guess itwas.
Andrew Maff (08:07):
Yeah, look, I'm an agency owner, and I don't
disagree. It's it, you know,it's a I knew having you on the
show is like, All right, we'regoing to end up having
conversations about the cons ofagencies. And even a part of me
was like, Is it smart for me tohave my show because of what's
going to happen. Here I go. Butyou know what? It's it is, it is
reality, right? Like, it is afact. Like, look, if I said I've
(08:29):
never lost a client, I would belying straight to your face. Of
course, it's absolutelyhappened. There's a lot of times
where I think there's a bigdifferentiate, differentiator of
agencies that lose clients, andthey're just okay with it, and
so they just move on to the nextone, and they, you know, to your
you know, to your point, it'slike a churn model. I try to
look at it more like, Okay, howdo we keep that from happening
next time? The problem is, is,no matter how many things you
(08:50):
put into place, you still end updealing with some people that
just like to run their businesscompletely differently, or they
have cash flow issues that youdon't have control over, or
inventory issues or tariffissues or whatever. There's 500
other things that happen. So toyour point, yeah, point, it does
become a problem of constantchurn, but you know, there's
also, I think the other issuewith the agency space is it's so
(09:10):
easy to start an agency, it'sreally hard to create a good
one, and so it just becomes thisobnoxiously crowded mess where
it makes it really hard for evenbrands to figure out, like, who,
who's worth working with and whoisn't. But to your point, like
it doesn't make sense for apartner to be doing 30 hours a
week on advertising. It justdoesn't. But at a certain point,
(09:32):
it does make sense for prettymuch everything to eventually be
brought in house, once you getto a certain size.
Charles Chakkalo (09:37):
I don't know, I don't know about that, maybe
just because I'm not that atthat level, but maybe, maybe, I
mean, I guess if you developyour so you're, built for it.
Andrew Maff (09:51):
Let's say 30 you're 30 hours a week for a partner
for paid ads, right, right,right. Why not hire someone
internally to just run that foryou? Put your own. SOP together
and have them do it. So you'renot paying an agency?
Charles Chakkalo (10:03):
Because the SOP is not free. The SOP and the
especially the way you want it,is going to take time and
development.
Andrew Maff (10:10):
True, but if you put, if you put the effort into
putting that SOP together, youcan eventually let your agency
go. You're now saving the moneyon not only the retainer of the
agency, but potentially the timeof dealing with the agency, and
if they've got you as apercentage of spend, kind of
makes your margins a little bitbetter as well.
Charles Chakkalo (10:26):
Yeah, but a price, a price that, again, we
can't put dollar amount on,because everything is different,
is the development of that SOPpotential errors because of
developing that SOP, as opposedto just keeping it with somebody
who has a lot more experiencethan you do in the field and
letting them handle it. Yeah?
That's, that's, that's myfeeling. That's my feeling.
Andrew Maff (10:46):
I look, I'm, I'm all for it. I'm an agency.
Charles Chakkalo (10:49):
Yeah, nothing against them, nothing against
agencies, just something againstagencies claiming to deliver
value and just treating you asanother number. That's that.
That was my whole pitch, thatthat is my whole pitch. I'm just
a seller. And I just, you know,I like to adopt a sort of grow
in public mentality out there ofsaying, This is me as a seller,
(11:13):
and this is stuff that pains,that I that I hit this week. And
it may not be relevant toeverybody, but something that
they do know is I'm not going totry to try to get you on a
discovery call.
Narrator (11:22):
Is your E commerce business experiencing falling
revenue? Bluetuskr has helpedmany brands like yours excel.
Unlike other marketing partners,Bluetuskr leverages a team of
specialists to ensure everystrategy is created and executed
toward your business growth. Asan extension of your marketing
team, Bluetuskr prides itself onhelping to fill in the gaps and
develop strong omnichannelstrategies to diversify your
(11:43):
business from the rest. Ready toscale your marketing
initiatives? Visit theirwebsite, bluetuskr.com, that's
B, l, u, e, t, u, s, k, r.com.
Andrew Maff (11:54):
So you mentioned today's the 10th so you and I
are at accelerate next week.
This won't air until afteraccelerate. So assuming that
you're accurate, what do youthink any new stuff you're
expecting them to discuss nextweek that they'll be launching
soon?
Charles Chakkalo (12:11):
Well, you know, I've been selling on
Amazon 15 years. I'm 29 yearsold. I've been selling on Amazon
15 years. The first time I'mgoing is next week, which is
pretty exciting.
Andrew Maff (12:20):
Oh, really?
Charles Chakkalo (12:21):
Yeah, all it took was for them to sponsor my
ticket. But that's a good cherryon top. Am I expecting them to
announce anything in particular?
So it's been, it's been a longtheory of mine dating back to
the announcement of buy withprime, and then even this year,
in February or so, featuringoutbound links on Amazon
(12:42):
directly to DTC sites as farback even two years ago. I'm
remembering now, when theyupdate, updated the entire
storefront to just be more to bemore graphically engaging and
and a lot more brand centric,that all of this is building up
and mounting a defense againsttheir their antitrust,
monopolistic practices lawsuit.
(13:07):
I think we're going to see moreof Amazon trying to make it like
they're empowering brands totell their own story and to make
it a brand centric platform. Idon't think it'll be anything
significant. I think it may belike will allow you to put a
logo on the top left corner ofyour main image. Or, you know,
(13:30):
they'll it'll just be beefing uptheir case to say that we allow
brands more differentiation.
Again, I don't think it'll beanything substantive, because in
the end of the day, they want tokeep you on platform and keep
those referral fees. Yeah, I dothink we're going to see a
deepening of of their connectionto, let's say, Tiktok shop. They
they announced last year thatbuy with prime is going to have
(13:51):
a direct integration, but Ihaven't seen a platform wide
rollout. Tiktok shop isbasically, undeniably taking
over a lot of market share. Ithink they're also going to be
going even more into the supplychain side of things. They're
trying to own the entire Indiasupply chain, and they just got
tacked with those 50% tariffsjust about three weeks ago now.
(14:14):
So that was a blow to their tocomplete supply chain dominance.
I mean, they already control.
What is it, from the port to aWD to FBA. Now they're going for
the holy grail of the factory,to the port to a WD to FBA. So I
(14:35):
think that, I think we're goingto see another widening of that
sort of grasp Amazon wants. Andmaybe something, maybe something
on the intellectual propertyfront, because I've been seeing
a lot of that activity now ofyeah, there. I think Amazon as a
platform is leaning more towardsevery seller has to meet a
(14:58):
higher level of need to sellanother brand. I think that
we're either going to see adeath blow in that every seller
needs explicit permission tosell another brand, or just more
of an inching towards if you arethe brand owner, you can get
your own brand, at your ownrisk, at your own at your own
will, at your own whatever itis. And they may even seek to
(15:22):
make a quick buck out of it,like they do now, if you want a
blanket gating of your brand,and I'm talking like Nike level,
they charge, they charge a goodchunk of change to do that, they
may, they may announce that.
They may announce that they'reall things I'm looking out for.
Andrew Maff (15:37):
Yeah, interesting.
You know, the I know last year,at least on my they announced a
ton of stuff. Last year. The bigthing on my end was the Buy with
prime side of them now allowingyou to run DSP ads back to your
site. And I thought that waskind of interesting, that
they're now allowing you tostart to kind of sort of earn
that data back. Now DSP hit ormiss on how good it can be for
some brands, but I thought thatwas interesting. So you think
(15:58):
that they may open that up toactually potentially including,
like, a DTC link on thelistings.
Charles Chakkalo (16:08):
Yeah. I mean, they've already featured DTC
links on search results. Again,my conspiratorial mind is
thinking they only show sitesthat have buy with prime on
them, so that Amazon is gettingsome sort of kickback, or at
least have multi channelfulfillment, or at least have
(16:29):
their prices matched or moreexpensive than they would be on
Amazon. Yeah, again, I don'tthink Amazon's giving charity
traffic to DTC sites. I thinkthat if they're giving charity
traffic, it's just charitytraffic to give themselves a
defense on the monopoly case orthe anti competitive case. But I
(16:50):
do also think they'reprioritizing links that they
still have a financial interestin facilitating, like a link
with buy with prime, or a DTCsite with MCF. One of the other
Andrew Maff (16:58):
Yeah. See, one of my theories was, the you you've
had, you know, FBA increases,fees increase, however, what
percent over the past, like fiveor six years, CPCs have gone up
like 8% year over year. I know,competitions increasing by about
6% but a lot of them are comingfrom overseas, so you're seeing
reduced product costs, and soit's making it really difficult
(17:20):
for sellers to be able toincrease their costs for their
products, so it's just crushingthese margins, because fees are
going up, but it's really hardto charge more. And so I feel
like the marketplace is gettingso competitive and so expensive,
it's making margins so thin thatAmazon's now realizing we should
lean in heavier on fulfillment.
So that's when they started toopen up, like, buy with prime
(17:42):
and allowing them, like, how canwe kind of dip our toes into the
rest of their business? Becausewe're kind of hitting a wall
with the marketplace. Now Idon't think that, like, the
marketplace isn't growing atall, but I think that even
Amazon is starting to look athow they can diversify the
marketplace business in itselfand the fulfillment business,
just because they're kind ofseeing that same issue, and
(18:03):
they've made it almost too easyfor sellers to just come on and
start throwing product up there,and they don't really know what
they're doing.
Charles Chakkalo (18:11):
Yeah? Well, I mean this, yeah. This morning, I
saw a post by Steve Pope, myAmazon guy, and he was saying
that peak in an FBA business isactually on the decline since
2023 and he cites a GoogleTrends report to substantiate
that. And I don't think thatinterest has declined as much as
(18:31):
difficulty has increased. Thedifficulty is now ranging from
you have to understand placementfees, you have to understand
that it's not throwing a productup and hoping that it just takes
off. It's understanding thatthere's a lot of variables, like
the logistical cost of things,what a referral fee is that the
(18:52):
fact that storing something inyour basement is not
theoretically free, it does costyou something to occupy that
space. So when, and on a secondpoint that you said how Amazon
is leaning more into thelogistical side of things, that
was always their strength, yeah,Amazon deprecating Amazon posts
(19:12):
was, you know, writing on thewall. They are not a social
marketing selling platform. Andby them, you know, in business,
there's a rule of do more ofwhat works. And what always
worked for them was thelogistical side of things.
That's why, I think, I mean,they do have the best logistical
framework in the country,probably in the world. And a
(19:35):
different tangent, if you wantto take this route, I think the
only threat that that logisticalapparatus takes is Walmart.
Walmart, with their locations, Ithink, holds the only lever to
put Amazon's logisticaldominance at risk right now,
they either not doing it or notdoing a good job at all in doing
(19:57):
it. But, yeah, those are twothoughts that I have on that
spiel.
Andrew Maff (20:03):
Well, Walmart's always been like the redheaded
stepchild. They're always like10 steps behind amazon. So you
think that Walmart will start togive Amazon a run for its money,
at least from a fulfillmentperspective?
Charles Chakkalo (20:13):
No, no, no. I don't think they will. I think
they can. Or if there's anybodywho can, it's them and them
only, because right now, they'redoing a horrible job if you want
to go down the Walmart route, Idefinitely can. Yeah, that's
giving me my fair share ofheadaches.
Yeah, interesting. So you, youknow you're, you're pretty big
name in space, specifically inthe E comm space, obviously. But
(20:36):
obviously, you're talking tosomebody last week saying,
I'm I'm a nobody.
Andrew Maff (20:42):
You're here.
Charles Chakkalo (20:43):
I'm here.
Andrew Maff (20:45):
So you're, you also have your, uh, Just A Seller
newsletter.
Charles Chakkalo (20:48):
Yeah.
Andrew Maff (20:49):
And so what's the, what's your focus? What's your
goal? Like, going forward, areyou looking to continue scaling
up Joey'z shopping? Are you kindof looking to get into, like,
you know, more of brand space?
Charles Chakkalo (21:01):
There's no doubt, there's no doubt that
that that Joey's is my redbutter focus, heart, soul and
blood that and that is, and thatis priority number one. I don't,
I don't dare put an extra letterin my newsletter before my
Joey's work is complete. And thepoint of that newsletter was
exactly what I was referring toearlier in that there's no
(21:24):
seller out there saying what theday to day grind is. There's no
seller out there that that is,that is saying things about,
let's say I didn't call out thatagency earlier with the with the
whole review deprecationfeature. But there's no seller
out there willing to say, I usethis agency because they
actually care about theirclients and deliver value on
(21:45):
such and such niche. There's noseller out there saying that
this conference is a completewaste of time and a money grab,
which I've done. I've ruffledfeathers, and people have gotten
pretty pissed at me, to say theleast about it. So that's,
that's, that's the point ofthat. I just seek to deliver
value. What I plan on doing withit? I have no idea. I mean,
maybe I'll offer some coachingif people, I mean, some people
(22:07):
ask me from time to time, butthat's really it. And I don't
really want to monetize that.
There are affiliate links, butthat's basically the extent of
it. And I guess I just, I wantto. I like this. I like I like
presenting, public speaking.
It's always been a passion ofmine, and the fact that I'm
(22:30):
doing it within my field is justeasier. And I like it. It's
just, it's engaging and and,yeah, it's just, that's just a
feature of one of my passions,learning, public speaking,
presentation, and especiallythinking about it among people
who are not so fixed again,entrepreneurs questioning the
(22:52):
status quo and actually actingon it. Those are things that
always intrigue me, andespecially with people that
think the same way.
Andrew Maff (22:59):
Yeah, amazing.
Charles. Really appreciate ithaving you on the show. I don't
wanna take up too much more yourtime. I'd love to, yeah, I'm
gonna give you the floor. Telleveryone more that where they
can find out more about you,and, of course, more about
Joey'z Shopping.
Charles Chakkalo (23:12):
Sure, JustAsellernewsletter.com. Is
where you could sign up for thenewsletter. Again, my North Star
is just delivering value, notlooking to get you on a
discovery call, unlike almostevery other. And yeah, from
there you can see, from thereyou'll find everything else.
Just sign up for that. I'm onall the socials and LinkedIn.
(23:33):
LinkedIn is a pretty good spotfor me, just because, because of
the interaction so they werethere.
Andrew Maff (23:39):
Love it. Charles, thanks so much, buddy. I'll see
you next week. For everyone whotuned in, thank you as well.
Please make sure you do theusual thing, rate review,
subscribe all that fun stuff onwhichever podcast platform you
prefer, or head over to theEComm show.com to check out all
of our previous episodes. But asusual, thank you all for joining
us. We'll see you all next time.
Charles Chakkal (23:55):
Thanks, Andrew.
Narrator (23:58):
Thank you for tuning in to the E comm show. Head over
to e commshow.com to subscribeon your favorite podcast
platform or on the BlueTuskerYouTube channel. The E comm show
is brought to you by BlueTusker,a full service digital marketing
company specifically for Ecommerce sellers looking to
accelerate their growth. Go tobluetuskr.com now for more
(24:21):
information, make sure to tunein next week for another amazing
episode of the E comm show!
Entrepreneurs, by definition, in my opinion,
are people who don't follow thebook, the rule, the orthodoxy.
Andrew Maff (00:10):
Welcome to the E comm Show podcast. I am your
host. Andrew Maff, owner andfounder of blue tusker, from
groundbreaking industry updatesto success stories and
strategies, get to know the insand outs of the e Commerce
Industry from top leaders in thespace. Let's get into it.
Hello everyone, and welcome toanother episode of the E comm
show as usual. I am your host,Andrew Maff, and today I am
(00:31):
joined by the amazing CharlesChakkalo, who is a partner over
at Joey'z shopping. Charles, howyou doing? Buddy? Ready for good
show?
Charles Chakkalo (00:37):
Thank God.
Healthy into one piece. Imagineif I said two.
Andrew Maff (00:40):
Yeah, dude, I love it. I'm so excited to have you
on the show. I know you and I,we met at the MDS group and had
a very interesting conversationwith you. Ton of stuff to get
into, but I always kind of liketo like, let's, let's just clear
the air. Give you the land. Telleveryone a little bit about your
background, how you got startedwith Joey shopping, and we'll
take it from there.
Charles Chakkalo (00:59):
Sure. So back in college, I was, I was going
to go to, I was a pre lawstudent. I was going to law
school, and my brother tapped meon the shoulder one day. He
goes, Hey, you know this thingthat we've been doing since
elementary school? You know, Iwent into Best Buy, getting
things on sale. He went intoanything from Bass Pro Shops or
fishing related stores, justresold things for just a modest
(01:24):
markup. You want to try that forreal? I go, What do you mean for
real? He goes, you know, put ourheart and soul into it, not just
stick to Best Buy in fishing,but but to do it on a larger
scale. So we did. And mind you,this is the brother that I was
partners with selling Coca Colais in elementary school, quote,
unquote, against the rules. Soit wasn't something I was
(01:46):
unfamiliar with. I took my LSAT,submitted my law school
applications, and just neverwent to law school. I said to
myself, I'm not getting back 22to 25 those age those age
ranges, ever again, but if Ineed to, I'll go back to law
school later on, and here I amnot a lawyer. That's how that
started. We started in a room ina basement, reselling light
(02:09):
bulbs. Light bulbs weresomething that just had a great
margin when, when he got me onthat shoulder, and we graduated
from a room in a basement to afull basement, and then to a
sidewalk, and then to awarehouse, and then to a second
warehouse this year.
Andrew Maff (02:26):
Wow. And primarily marketplaces. I know you've got
your own website, but is itmainly?
Charles Chakkalo (02:32):
It's the conventional split of, I would
say most Amazon sellers, or ifthey consider themselves an
Amazon seller, it's aconventional split of, like 99
to one half a percent being DTCand a half percent being
Walmart, something like that.
Andrew Maff (02:45):
So, just kind of reference. So you and I
mentioned we met at MDS, and theconversation with you, I loved
every minute of it, justbecause, like, you're one of
very few people that will justbe like, so, so straightforward,
and just, you know, stick it towhoever thinks they're doing
things correctly or incorrectly.
And just no bullshit. I knowyou've also got your own
(03:07):
newsletter and stuff that's kindof got that same.
Charles Chakkalo (03:10):
I shoot for it. Listen, it's the person I
am. I mean, entrepreneurs bydefinition, in my opinion, are
people who don't follow thebook, the rule, the orthodoxy
and and because I don't have anagency, I don't have a bottom
line, and I like to think that Ihave a mouth on me. I'm not
(03:30):
afraid to use it. And I just Isaw this huge movement in
Orthodoxy, in the Amazon ecomspace, of you have to have your
own brand. You have to have yourown brand story, your own unique
value proposition, your ownprivate label. You have to sell
off using some sort of M and Afirm, and and and multiples, is
(03:53):
what you live in, live andbreathe by. And it's just not
necessarily the case. I mean, ifthat's how you function, all the
power to you, but it's not anecessary condition of being in
this industry. That's, that's,that's a big part of what I
think stuck with you.
Andrew Maff (04:09):
the specifics of it. That's different from kind
of the typical, like, privatelabel brand story, that typeof
thing.
Charles Chakkalo (04:19):
So not to say we don't do private label. It's
a significant part of ourbusiness. It's actually it
ranges on year on year from 60to 50% of our gross revenue. We
started that in about 2020, butwhat's particular to our
businesses, we engage in resale,which, by the way, can, in my
(04:40):
opinion, has a bunch of otherterms associated with it. People
differentiate between retailarbitrage, wholesale resale, so
I just consider it all resale.
We have resale operations goingon. That's immediate profit. So
if I buy, if I buy a tube oftoothpaste for $2 I sell it for
$3 that's immediate profit thataccess. Sort of like a profit
funnel and an engine to theprivate label endeavor where
(05:02):
everybody knows cash flow is notas immediate. So that's that's
really the unique element of it.
And the part that gives us acertain leg up is that we run
our own logistics. Because wedon't, we don't use any 3ls. The
furthest extent of a 3PL that wedo use is FBA. So by us owning
our logistics, yes, that meanswe deal with HR, that means we
(05:24):
deal with utility bills, thatmeans we deal with repairs, that
means we deal with three sets ofparents dying when it's the nice
weather outside. That issomething we all handle in
house, and enables us toactually operate at better
margins than many others could.
Andrew Maff (05:40):
Yeah, I say, Do you I know your I know your feelings
towards agencies. But evenoutside of that, just in any
general service at all, is thereanything that you outsource?
Charles Chakkalo (05:49):
Sure, yeah, there's plenty that we
outsource. Listen, I havenothing against agencies. I just
have something against whenagencies overdo things and and
just treat their audience as abottom line. No no shame to
them. They have to. That's whatthey're there for. But I mean,
just, just for example, uh,Amazon announced about a month
(06:11):
ago that they're deprecating afeature where where sellers can
reach out to people who leavenegative product reviews on
their branded goods. Theyannounced that they're
deprecating that feature at theend of July, earlier this month,
they announced that, and we'rerecording this September 10,
they announced that they're notgoing to be deprecating that
feature due to seller feedback.
There was an agency owner whospecializes in removing negative
(06:35):
reviews, or that's their niche,and they set up this whole many
chat funnel on LinkedIn you haveto reply to give their posts
more engagement. And there was awhole big sense of urgency
because Amazon, quote, unquote,was so deprecating the feature,
but that entire funnel and thedeliverable that they promised
you was still based on outdatedinformation, and either that
(06:58):
seller knew that the featurewasn't going to be deprecated,
or they just want, they just setup the whole apparatus, and
didn't want to let all that workgo to waste, and wanted that
post to get more engagement, andwanted an email list, and wanted
more engagement with themselves,to be viewed more as an
authority in the space, andmaybe land more clients. Yeah,
that's my pitch. Just somethinghappened yesterday. Anyway. Yes,
(07:18):
there's plenty I outsource toagency, yeah, be it creative
work, be it repricing, be itPPC. Yeah, we, I mean, we can.
We tried an era of handling PPCin house. It took it 30 hours a
week of a partner, and 30 hoursof a partner is not, is not
where we want to spend our time.
(07:41):
So, yeah, there's plenty that weoutsource. And I was, actually,
I was talking to somebody elseabout this. It's amazing to that
agencies run on a churn model,like, it's inevitable that
somebody will leave you, andit's inevitable that more people
will come in. Like, the wholeidea of leads and chasing and
and churning is just, it's abusiness model that wouldn't get
(08:04):
me too excited, but I guess itwas.
Andrew Maff (08:07):
Yeah, look, I'm an agency owner, and I don't
disagree. It's it, you know,it's a I knew having you on the
show is like, All right, we'regoing to end up having
conversations about the cons ofagencies. And even a part of me
was like, Is it smart for me tohave my show because of what's
going to happen. Here I go. Butyou know what? It's it is, it is
reality, right? Like, it is afact. Like, look, if I said I've
(08:29):
never lost a client, I would belying straight to your face. Of
course, it's absolutelyhappened. There's a lot of times
where I think there's a bigdifferentiate, differentiator of
agencies that lose clients, andthey're just okay with it, and
so they just move on to the nextone, and they, you know, to your
you know, to your point, it'slike a churn model. I try to
look at it more like, Okay, howdo we keep that from happening
next time? The problem is, is,no matter how many things you
(08:50):
put into place, you still end updealing with some people that
just like to run their businesscompletely differently, or they
have cash flow issues that youdon't have control over, or
inventory issues or tariffissues or whatever. There's 500
other things that happen. So toyour point, yeah, point, it does
become a problem of constantchurn, but you know, there's
also, I think the other issuewith the agency space is it's so
(09:10):
easy to start an agency, it'sreally hard to create a good
one, and so it just becomes thisobnoxiously crowded mess where
it makes it really hard for evenbrands to figure out, like, who,
who's worth working with and whoisn't. But to your point, like
it doesn't make sense for apartner to be doing 30 hours a
week on advertising. It justdoesn't. But at a certain point,
(09:32):
it does make sense for prettymuch everything to eventually be
brought in house, once you getto a certain size.
Charles Chakkalo (09:37):
I don't know, I don't know about that, maybe
just because I'm not that atthat level, but maybe, maybe, I
mean, I guess if you developyour so you're, built for it.
Andrew Maff (09:51):
Let's say 30 you're 30 hours a week for a partner
for paid ads, right, right,right. Why not hire someone
internally to just run that foryou? Put your own. SOP together
and have them do it. So you'renot paying an agency?
Charles Chakkalo (10:03):
Because the SOP is not free. The SOP and the
especially the way you want it,is going to take time and
development.
Andrew Maff (10:10):
True, but if you put, if you put the effort into
putting that SOP together, youcan eventually let your agency
go. You're now saving the moneyon not only the retainer of the
agency, but potentially the timeof dealing with the agency, and
if they've got you as apercentage of spend, kind of
makes your margins a little bitbetter as well.
Charles Chakkalo (10:26):
Yeah, but a price, a price that, again, we
can't put dollar amount on,because everything is different,
is the development of that SOPpotential errors because of
developing that SOP, as opposedto just keeping it with somebody
who has a lot more experiencethan you do in the field and
letting them handle it. Yeah?
That's, that's, that's myfeeling. That's my feeling.
Andrew Maff (10:46):
I look, I'm, I'm all for it. I'm an agency.
Charles Chakkalo (10:49):
Yeah, nothing against them, nothing against
agencies, just something againstagencies claiming to deliver
value and just treating you asanother number. That's that.
That was my whole pitch, thatthat is my whole pitch. I'm just
a seller. And I just, you know,I like to adopt a sort of grow
in public mentality out there ofsaying, This is me as a seller,
(11:13):
and this is stuff that pains,that I that I hit this week. And
it may not be relevant toeverybody, but something that
they do know is I'm not going totry to try to get you on a
discovery call.
Narrator (11:22):
Is your E commerce business experiencing falling
revenue? Bluetuskr has helpedmany brands like yours excel.
Unlike other marketing partners,Bluetuskr leverages a team of
specialists to ensure everystrategy is created and executed
toward your business growth. Asan extension of your marketing
team, Bluetuskr prides itself onhelping to fill in the gaps and
develop strong omnichannelstrategies to diversify your
(11:43):
business from the rest. Ready toscale your marketing
initiatives? Visit theirwebsite, bluetuskr.com, that's
B, l, u, e, t, u, s, k, r.com.
Andrew Maff (11:54):
So you mentioned today's the 10th so you and I
are at accelerate next week.
This won't air until afteraccelerate. So assuming that
you're accurate, what do youthink any new stuff you're
expecting them to discuss nextweek that they'll be launching
soon?
Charles Chakkalo (12:11):
Well, you know, I've been selling on
Amazon 15 years. I'm 29 yearsold. I've been selling on Amazon
15 years. The first time I'mgoing is next week, which is
pretty exciting.
Andrew Maff (12:20):
Oh, really?
Charles Chakkalo (12:21):
Yeah, all it took was for them to sponsor my
ticket. But that's a good cherryon top. Am I expecting them to
announce anything in particular?
So it's been, it's been a longtheory of mine dating back to
the announcement of buy withprime, and then even this year,
in February or so, featuringoutbound links on Amazon
(12:42):
directly to DTC sites as farback even two years ago. I'm
remembering now, when theyupdate, updated the entire
storefront to just be more to bemore graphically engaging and
and a lot more brand centric,that all of this is building up
and mounting a defense againsttheir their antitrust,
monopolistic practices lawsuit.
(13:07):
I think we're going to see moreof Amazon trying to make it like
they're empowering brands totell their own story and to make
it a brand centric platform. Idon't think it'll be anything
significant. I think it may belike will allow you to put a
logo on the top left corner ofyour main image. Or, you know,
(13:30):
they'll it'll just be beefing uptheir case to say that we allow
brands more differentiation.
Again, I don't think it'll beanything substantive, because in
the end of the day, they want tokeep you on platform and keep
those referral fees. Yeah, I dothink we're going to see a
deepening of of their connectionto, let's say, Tiktok shop. They
they announced last year thatbuy with prime is going to have
(13:51):
a direct integration, but Ihaven't seen a platform wide
rollout. Tiktok shop isbasically, undeniably taking
over a lot of market share. Ithink they're also going to be
going even more into the supplychain side of things. They're
trying to own the entire Indiasupply chain, and they just got
tacked with those 50% tariffsjust about three weeks ago now.
(14:14):
So that was a blow to their tocomplete supply chain dominance.
I mean, they already control.
What is it, from the port to aWD to FBA. Now they're going for
the holy grail of the factory,to the port to a WD to FBA. So I
(14:35):
think that, I think we're goingto see another widening of that
sort of grasp Amazon wants. Andmaybe something, maybe something
on the intellectual propertyfront, because I've been seeing
a lot of that activity now ofyeah, there. I think Amazon as a
platform is leaning more towardsevery seller has to meet a
(14:58):
higher level of need to sellanother brand. I think that
we're either going to see adeath blow in that every seller
needs explicit permission tosell another brand, or just more
of an inching towards if you arethe brand owner, you can get
your own brand, at your ownrisk, at your own at your own
will, at your own whatever itis. And they may even seek to
(15:22):
make a quick buck out of it,like they do now, if you want a
blanket gating of your brand,and I'm talking like Nike level,
they charge, they charge a goodchunk of change to do that, they
may, they may announce that.
They may announce that they'reall things I'm looking out for.
Andrew Maff (15:37):
Yeah, interesting.
You know, the I know last year,at least on my they announced a
ton of stuff. Last year. The bigthing on my end was the Buy with
prime side of them now allowingyou to run DSP ads back to your
site. And I thought that waskind of interesting, that
they're now allowing you tostart to kind of sort of earn
that data back. Now DSP hit ormiss on how good it can be for
some brands, but I thought thatwas interesting. So you think
(15:58):
that they may open that up toactually potentially including,
like, a DTC link on thelistings.
Charles Chakkalo (16:08):
Yeah. I mean, they've already featured DTC
links on search results. Again,my conspiratorial mind is
thinking they only show sitesthat have buy with prime on
them, so that Amazon is gettingsome sort of kickback, or at
least have multi channelfulfillment, or at least have
(16:29):
their prices matched or moreexpensive than they would be on
Amazon. Yeah, again, I don'tthink Amazon's giving charity
traffic to DTC sites. I thinkthat if they're giving charity
traffic, it's just charitytraffic to give themselves a
defense on the monopoly case orthe anti competitive case. But I
(16:50):
do also think they'reprioritizing links that they
still have a financial interestin facilitating, like a link
with buy with prime, or a DTCsite with MCF. One of the other
Andrew Maff (16:58):
Yeah. See, one of my theories was, the you you've
had, you know, FBA increases,fees increase, however, what
percent over the past, like fiveor six years, CPCs have gone up
like 8% year over year. I know,competitions increasing by about
6% but a lot of them are comingfrom overseas, so you're seeing
reduced product costs, and soit's making it really difficult
(17:20):
for sellers to be able toincrease their costs for their
products, so it's just crushingthese margins, because fees are
going up, but it's really hardto charge more. And so I feel
like the marketplace is gettingso competitive and so expensive,
it's making margins so thin thatAmazon's now realizing we should
lean in heavier on fulfillment.
So that's when they started toopen up, like, buy with prime
(17:42):
and allowing them, like, how canwe kind of dip our toes into the
rest of their business? Becausewe're kind of hitting a wall
with the marketplace. Now Idon't think that, like, the
marketplace isn't growing atall, but I think that even
Amazon is starting to look athow they can diversify the
marketplace business in itselfand the fulfillment business,
just because they're kind ofseeing that same issue, and
(18:03):
they've made it almost too easyfor sellers to just come on and
start throwing product up there,and they don't really know what
they're doing.
Charles Chakkalo (18:11):
Yeah? Well, I mean this, yeah. This morning, I
saw a post by Steve Pope, myAmazon guy, and he was saying
that peak in an FBA business isactually on the decline since
2023 and he cites a GoogleTrends report to substantiate
that. And I don't think thatinterest has declined as much as
(18:31):
difficulty has increased. Thedifficulty is now ranging from
you have to understand placementfees, you have to understand
that it's not throwing a productup and hoping that it just takes
off. It's understanding thatthere's a lot of variables, like
the logistical cost of things,what a referral fee is that the
(18:52):
fact that storing something inyour basement is not
theoretically free, it does costyou something to occupy that
space. So when, and on a secondpoint that you said how Amazon
is leaning more into thelogistical side of things, that
was always their strength, yeah,Amazon deprecating Amazon posts
(19:12):
was, you know, writing on thewall. They are not a social
marketing selling platform. Andby them, you know, in business,
there's a rule of do more ofwhat works. And what always
worked for them was thelogistical side of things.
That's why, I think, I mean,they do have the best logistical
framework in the country,probably in the world. And a
(19:35):
different tangent, if you wantto take this route, I think the
only threat that that logisticalapparatus takes is Walmart.
Walmart, with their locations, Ithink, holds the only lever to
put Amazon's logisticaldominance at risk right now,
they either not doing it or notdoing a good job at all in doing
(19:57):
it. But, yeah, those are twothoughts that I have on that
spiel.
Andrew Maff (20:03):
Well, Walmart's always been like the redheaded
stepchild. They're always like10 steps behind amazon. So you
think that Walmart will start togive Amazon a run for its money,
at least from a fulfillmentperspective?
Charles Chakkalo (20:13):
No, no, no. I don't think they will. I think
they can. Or if there's anybodywho can, it's them and them
only, because right now, they'redoing a horrible job if you want
to go down the Walmart route, Idefinitely can. Yeah, that's
giving me my fair share ofheadaches.
Yeah, interesting. So you, youknow you're, you're pretty big
name in space, specifically inthe E comm space, obviously. But
(20:36):
obviously, you're talking tosomebody last week saying,
I'm I'm a nobody.
Andrew Maff (20:42):
You're here.
Charles Chakkalo (20:43):
I'm here.
Andrew Maff (20:45):
So you're, you also have your, uh, Just A Seller
newsletter.
Charles Chakkalo (20:48):
Yeah.
Andrew Maff (20:49):
And so what's the, what's your focus? What's your
goal? Like, going forward, areyou looking to continue scaling
up Joey'z shopping? Are you kindof looking to get into, like,
you know, more of brand space?
Charles Chakkalo (21:01):
There's no doubt, there's no doubt that
that that Joey's is my redbutter focus, heart, soul and
blood that and that is, and thatis priority number one. I don't,
I don't dare put an extra letterin my newsletter before my
Joey's work is complete. And thepoint of that newsletter was
exactly what I was referring toearlier in that there's no
(21:24):
seller out there saying what theday to day grind is. There's no
seller out there that that is,that is saying things about,
let's say I didn't call out thatagency earlier with the with the
whole review deprecationfeature. But there's no seller
out there willing to say, I usethis agency because they
actually care about theirclients and deliver value on
(21:45):
such and such niche. There's noseller out there saying that
this conference is a completewaste of time and a money grab,
which I've done. I've ruffledfeathers, and people have gotten
pretty pissed at me, to say theleast about it. So that's,
that's, that's the point ofthat. I just seek to deliver
value. What I plan on doing withit? I have no idea. I mean,
maybe I'll offer some coachingif people, I mean, some people
(22:07):
ask me from time to time, butthat's really it. And I don't
really want to monetize that.
There are affiliate links, butthat's basically the extent of
it. And I guess I just, I wantto. I like this. I like I like
presenting, public speaking.
It's always been a passion ofmine, and the fact that I'm
(22:30):
doing it within my field is justeasier. And I like it. It's
just, it's engaging and and,yeah, it's just, that's just a
feature of one of my passions,learning, public speaking,
presentation, and especiallythinking about it among people
who are not so fixed again,entrepreneurs questioning the
(22:52):
status quo and actually actingon it. Those are things that
always intrigue me, andespecially with people that
think the same way.
Andrew Maff (22:59):
Yeah, amazing.
Charles. Really appreciate ithaving you on the show. I don't
wanna take up too much more yourtime. I'd love to, yeah, I'm
gonna give you the floor. Telleveryone more that where they
can find out more about you,and, of course, more about
Joey'z Shopping.
Charles Chakkalo (23:12):
Sure, JustAsellernewsletter.com. Is
where you could sign up for thenewsletter. Again, my North Star
is just delivering value, notlooking to get you on a
discovery call, unlike almostevery other. And yeah, from
there you can see, from thereyou'll find everything else.
Just sign up for that. I'm onall the socials and LinkedIn.
(23:33):
LinkedIn is a pretty good spotfor me, just because, because of
the interaction so they werethere.
Andrew Maff (23:39):
Love it. Charles, thanks so much, buddy. I'll see
you next week. For everyone whotuned in, thank you as well.
Please make sure you do theusual thing, rate review,
subscribe all that fun stuff onwhichever podcast platform you
prefer, or head over to theEComm show.com to check out all
of our previous episodes. But asusual, thank you all for joining
us. We'll see you all next time.
Charles Chakkal (23:55):
Thanks, Andrew.
Narrator (23:58):
Thank you for tuning in to the E comm show. Head over
to e commshow.com to subscribeon your favorite podcast
platform or on the BlueTuskerYouTube channel. The E comm show
is brought to you by BlueTusker,a full service digital marketing
company specifically for Ecommerce sellers looking to
accelerate their growth. Go tobluetuskr.com now for more
(24:21):
information, make sure to tunein next week for another amazing
episode of the E comm show!
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Cardiac Cowboys
The heart was always off-limits to surgeons. Cutting into it spelled instant death for the patient. That is, until a ragtag group of doctors scattered across the Midwest and Texas decided to throw out the rule book. Working in makeshift laboratories and home garages, using medical devices made from scavenged machine parts and beer tubes, these men and women invented the field of open heart surgery. Odds are, someone you know is alive because of them. So why has history left them behind? Presented by Chris Pine, CARDIAC COWBOYS tells the gripping true story behind the birth of heart surgery, and the young, Greatest Generation doctors who made it happen. For years, they competed and feuded, racing to be the first, the best, and the most prolific. Some appeared on the cover of Time Magazine, operated on kings and advised presidents. Others ended up disgraced, penniless, and convicted of felonies. Together, they ignited a revolution in medicine, and changed the world.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.