Adam Weiler

My community has $15b of yearly sales on Amazon with 800+ members. These are small businesses. They employ real Americans and support local communities. They do not have large margins to absorb shocks. Every year Amazon squeezes them more and supports overseas Chinese sellers instead of local American businesses. Now Amazon is hitting sellers with even more of a squeeze all back to back: 1.Amazon has moved many sellers to DD+7 Meaning funds are held until 7 days after delivery, not simply paid out on the old cadence. 2.Amazon just added a 3.5% fuel/logistics surcharge on fulfillment fees. 3.To top it off now Amazon Ads charges will be pulled directly from disbursements rather than floating on a credit card. That combination matters. Amazon already forces sellers into an environment where ads dominate visibility. So now the same platform that pressures brands to spend more on ads is also tightening payout timing and pulling more cash out before sellers ever see it. For a very large business, this is just a minor annoyance. But for a small business making payroll just got 50x harder. Less cash on hand means: less inventory more stockouts more debt more strain on small teams and ultimately a worse customer experience This is not “supporting small business.” It is starving the brands that create so much of the value customers come to Amazon for. @WSJ @business @nytimesbusiness @BusinessInsider @ReutersBiz @CNBC @APBusiness If you’re covering Amazon, local communities hit by a hard economy and large companies trying to squeeze hardworking Americans hit me up.

Fourth year of MDS Inspire and honestly… I’m feeling a bit nostalgic. Every year we raise the bar, but this lineup genuinely has me excited and it’s rare for me to feel that way. When a new hot topic explodes right before an event like what has happened with OpenClaw, suddenly the conversations inside MDS get sharper. That’s where MDS tends to shine, because the people in the room aren’t theorizing, they’re implementing. This isn’t a bunch of people on YouTube trying to get you to buy some nonsense with an affiliate code. It’s founders rolling up their sleeves and pulling all nighters. So of course we will have some serious sessions on AI implementation in the ecom biz and then continue to cover advances in new channels like TikTok, it’s founders actively testing what’s working in their business and prepping presentations on it just to give back to the group! We’re hosting at the Wynn this year, which I’m also excited about. Anyone who has planned events in Vegas knows that this venue is king of the holy grail of the strip. The team has visited multiple times and the experience is going to match the caliber of attendees. I also know a lot of events sound the same right now. Polished pages, similar AI-written copy, big promises. On the surface, ours might even read similarly. But the difference is in the room. Sessions founders actually stay for. Networking so strong people skip breaks just to keep talking. And a highly vetted audience where we turn down far more applicants than we accept. We don’t give tickets away for free. We never sell attendee lists. We keep sponsor standards extremely high. All of that is intentional to protect the founder experience and keep the signal high and the noise low. In a world where many events optimize for scale, we optimize for quality and economic value created per attendee. Yes, there are bigger events in the US. But very few with this high of a concentration of $5M, $10M, and $20M+ founders in one place talking real tactics across Amazon, DTC, TikTok, and now AI-led growth. Super excited for the waves this one is going to create. If you’re a serious ecom founder, I think you’ll feel the difference the moment you walk in.

Pattern.com is going public next week, could be a major milestone for benchmarking the industry, what do you think they will trade at?