I remember being on a webinar last year with Vanessa Hung and Chelsea Cohen from Carbon6 with them explaining the ridiculousness of the new Amazon fees for using FBA.

We were all frustrated and curious at what the new fee structure meant for our businesses and margins. But here we are, with no more "minimal split" options (only single facility or Amazon Optimized Splits) where out of the box (see what I did there) thinking kicked in.

📦 Amazon's Fee Games Just Got Outsmarted — Kind Of

At Prosper, I came across a logistics setup that actually made me pause — not because it was gimmicky, but because it was smart.

If you’re already using a 3PL to ship into FBA, here’s a simple but powerful idea:

Lean into Amazon-optimized placement. Let Amazon split the shipments however they want — and let your logistics partner handle it, flat fee style.

✅ No Amazon placement fees
✅ No annoying per-unit relabeling or FNSKU upcharges
✅ No guessing which FC your boxes are going to this time
✅ One flat fee per pallet: $175

Let’s break this down.

🧮 The Math That Makes It Work

Say Amazon splits your inbound into 5 different fulfillment centers — TX, PA, GA, NV, IL.

If you're sending freight to each FC on your own, that's $200–$250 per lane, conservatively. You're easily staring down $1,000–$1,250 just to move inventory into the system.

Now with this model?
Ship once to your 3PL → they prep and ship to all 5 FCs → you pay $175 per pallet flat.

If your pallets are packed with units, the per-unit cost drops fast — and you dodge the placement fees entirely.

👎 Why I’m Not Using It — and Why You Might Want To

Here’s the thing:
I run everything in-house.
No 3PL. No offsite prep center. Inventory ships directly to me, gets processed here, and then goes to FBA.

If I were to use this model, I’d first have to pay to ship the inventory to the 3PL, then pay $175 per pallet to get it from the 3PL to Amazon. That’s two freight legs — and suddenly, the math breaks for my setup.

But for most sellers?
That’s not the case. Most are already shipping to a 3PL anyway. Which means for you, there’s no extra leg — just a smarter, simpler way to move inventory that’s fully in line with how Amazon wants to receive it.

📦 Bottom Line

If you’re sending volume and using a 3PL, this is a very seller-aligned way to get around some of Amazon’s worst fee decisions — especially the 5-box split rule.

Since Prosper, I’ve seen more companies start offering this. That alone tells you: it works.

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If you want the name of the one I liked most, DM me. Not shilling anything until I test it myself — but it’s a clever model worth keeping an eye on.