Amazon and eBay slowly banning gun parts?

[Darth_Uno]

I was searching for a place that has the Magpul K2 MOE grip in stock.

https://www.primaryarms.com/magpul-m...tol-grip-black

[LittleLebowski]

Neither has offered grips or stocks for a while now, that I’ve seen. Every now and then you get some oddball airsoft or homebrew junk that slips past the censor.

It’s not a nefarious conspiracy. You can buy and sell plenty of other parts. As said, it’s such a tiny fraction of their sales that it’s not worth the headache when someone orders an “assault weapon” part in California.

I don't think it's a conspiracy, but I definitely think it's some sort of directive against perhaps AR-only parts or something like that.

[LittleLebowski]

https://www.primaryarms.com/magpul-m...tol-grip-black

Boom, done. Outfitting my daughter's rifle is fun.

[CleverNickname]

I was searching for a place that has the Magpul K2 MOE grip in stock.

This is the best search engine for gun stuff that I've found: https://gun.deals/search/apachesolr_search/MAG522-BLK

[archangel]

I don't think it's a conspiracy, but I definitely think it's some sort of directive against perhaps AR-only parts or something like that.

A couple years ago I tried to list a troy battle rail on ebay. There were others like it listed at the time, and there still are today. But something in the description got flagged by their algorithm, the auction got pulled, and I ended up on the phone with someone from their support. As it was explained to me, any parts for an assault weapon (as defined by CA law, as ebay is based in CA) they will not allow for sale. Doesn't matter if it is a part that will also fit non-assault weapons, if it fits an assault weapon it is banned by their terms of service. BUT, the exact same part, if the description does not contain any mention of said assault weapons (terms like ar-15, m4, etc) then it's ok, apparently. It struck me more as a legal CYA by ebay than a political move by them.


I've also heard that the amazon marketplace can be a pain to deal with. Fees, shipping costs, liability for returns, etc. Gun stuff tends to have slimmer margins than chinesium, and I know a couple gun-related vendors have voluntarily stopped selling on amazon because it wasn't worth their while financially, or other hassles, to do so anymore. Ebay is probably pretty similar in that regard.

[Rick R]

FWIW, I usually go to DSG for Magpul stuff. Great people to work with, they helped me a lot when I was buying for the department.

https://dsgarms.com/rifle-accessories-mag522-blk

[Wise_A]

Amazon is increasingly not worth it because of how they manage stock. Physical inventories of items are all lumped together, individual seller inventories are digital. In other words, they have a big pile of Magpul MOE K2s, and Seller A has 20 of them, Seller B has 35, etc. Those individual sellers ship to Amazon, and Amazon ships to the customer.

The problem is that if you have a bunch of counterfeit items, you can just ship them to Amazon and put them in the inventory pile. Amazon doesn't check/care. Their only interest is to move as much product as possible, and they know that most customers won't spot counterfeit goods. So when you sell your counterfeit K2s and undercut legit sellers by 25%, it's very likely that your customer will actually receive a legitimate item. Meanwhile, some other guy will pay full price, receive a counterfeit item, and if it's shit or he spots it, he'll make the legitimate seller eat the return and leave them negative feedback while you keep rollin'.

In the rare instance that Amazon actually does shut down a counterfeiter's store page, they just open up a new one. Gun parts and optics are just generally easy to counterfeit, and since most buyers haven't seen the item they're buying in a store, they have no idea what legitimate packaging looks like. Also, most people can't tell the difference between a counterfeit piece of shit and a $700 riflescope, because they're idiots.

[Medusa]

I confess I easily found a Troy dioptic rear buis on amazon and it’s sitting on my carbine rn. I noticed they had lots of optics and such, too. I’ve gotten other small firearm stuff from them, like those orange things that go on top of your pistol mag followers so you can cycle the slide with an empty mag.

[Joe S]

I've also heard that the amazon marketplace can be a pain to deal with.

In certain ways, yes. I use it for my business. IMO, the Amazon customers are the biggest whiners about any sort of shipping, even if they want a large awkwardly shaped object shipped to a remote fishing village in Norway.

The biggest problem I see if that if a customer requests a refund, for any reason, bam, you lose the money. The price of the item, shipping, any fee/percentage Amazon takes out. Then, if you want the product back, you pay for return shipping from a remote fishing village in Norway. Be ca use the customer changed their mind, and you don't even have the opportunity to offer alternatives.

Amazon is increasingly not worth it because of how they manage stock. Physical inventories of items are all lumped together, individual seller inventories are digital. In other words, they have a big pile of Magpul MOE K2s, and Seller A has 20 of them, Seller B has 35, etc. Those individual sellers ship to Amazon, and Amazon ships to the customer.

Not always. You can choose to have Amazon handle your inventory this way, but not everyone does. It will prioritize quantity of sales for a standard widget, because it will get Prime shipping, and be favored in searches. But if you have non-standard widgets, like a lot of smaller independent businesses, you can fulfill from your location. Amazon doesn't have any other vendors, or less of them that have that widget, so you can take a bigger cut (for more work, of course), and also spread your name a little.

[revolvergeek]

Not that I have noticed. I have been prowling ebay for all sorts of grips, sights, etc with good success. I just got a good price for two 10 round 9mm Beretta Cougar 8000 Mini mags on there.