Six that sellers actually use: supplier payment terms, marketplace lending offers, revenue-based financing, purchase order and inventory finance, credit card float, and pre-selling. Score each on cost, speed, personal guarantee, and what happens to the obligation if the product fails, which is the column most people skip.
The short version
- Supplier terms are the cheapest capital available. They cost negotiation rather than interest, and they scale with your order history.
- Anything secured against inventory follows the inventory. If the product dies, the obligation does not.
- Speed and cost trade against each other. Fast money is expensive money, everywhere, always.
- A personal guarantee changes what you are risking. It moves failure from the company to your household.
- Fund a decision, not a hope. Borrowing to keep a failing product alive is the most expensive mistake in this list.
Score the options before you take any of them
Weight the criteria first, then score each source out of five. The weights below are the ones I would use for a seller with one or two products.
| Criterion | Weight | Why it carries that weight |
|---|---|---|
| True cost of capital | 25% | Fees plus interest plus what you give up, expressed annually |
| Behavior on failure | 25% | What you still owe when the product does not work |
| Personal exposure | 20% | Guarantee, collateral, or nothing |
| Speed to funds | 15% | Whether it can meet a production deadline |
| Flexibility | 15% | Can you stop, prepay, or scale it down |
Now the options, scored on the same grid.
| Source | Cost | Behavior on failure | Personal exposure | Speed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Supplier payment terms | Lowest, often free | You still owe the supplier, but the relationship is negotiable | Usually none | Slow to earn, instant once earned |
| Marketplace lending offers | Moderate | Repaid from sales, which stall exactly when sales do | Varies | Fast when offered |
| Revenue-based financing | Higher | Payments flex with revenue, which softens a bad month | Sometimes a guarantee | Fast |
| Purchase order and inventory finance | Moderate to high | Secured against goods that may not sell | Often a guarantee | Moderate |
| Credit card float | High if it revolves | Full obligation regardless of outcome | Personal, almost always | Instant |
| Pre-selling or crowdfunding | Cost is delivery obligation | You owe product, not money | None financially | Slow, and it is a campaign |
The decision rule. Take the cheapest source whose failure behavior you can survive. Not the cheapest source. Not the fastest. A slightly more expensive facility that flexes when sales stall is worth more than a cheap one that does not.
Start with supplier terms, because most sellers never ask
The first order is usually cash up front, or a deposit with the balance before shipment. After two or three clean orders, that is negotiable. Ask for a longer balance window, then partial terms after delivery, then a rolling arrangement as volumes grow.
This is capital that costs you a conversation. It does not appear on a credit file, it carries no guarantee, and it improves as your relationship improves. Our sourcing runs through an in-house studio in Guangzhou and terms are a normal part of the negotiation there, not an exotic request. Sellers who deal with factories directly often assume the payment structure is fixed. It is one of the most movable parts of the deal.
The mistake that makes every funding source dangerous
Early on I poured money into a failing product for three months, hoping the advertising would turn it around. It did not. That was my own money, and it was still the most expensive lesson I have had in this business.
Add borrowed money to the same behavior and the mistake compounds, because debt service creates pressure to keep buying inventory for a product that is not working, which is the exact opposite of what the situation requires.
So before you take any facility, write the criteria that would make you stop. Rating trend, return rate, conversion rate and acquisition cost trajectory, each with a number and a defined window. Then decide in advance what scale, fix and kill mean for this product. Funding a product with kill criteria in place is a business decision. Funding one without them is a bet, and lenders do not care which it was.
What most agencies will not tell you
Nobody advising you on growth is neutral about your capital. An agency paid a percentage of ad spend has an interest in your budget increasing, regardless of where that budget came from. An agency paid a flat fee has no reason to care how you fund inventory, which is exactly the point.
We charge a flat monthly fee from $800 with no commission and no revenue share, and revenue share only appears above $50,000 a month in profit. There is also an equity option, discounted services for a stake, decided case by case. That last one is a funding conversation and it deserves to be treated as a corporate decision rather than a procurement one.
The question to ask any service provider before you borrow: what would make you tell me to stop spending. If they have no answer, do not fund anything they recommend.
Related answers
- Rank top ways to finance an Amazon launch
- Crowdfunding vs revenue-based financing for Amazon
- Bootstrap vs funded Amazon launch
- Cash flow timeline from production to Amazon payouts
- Amazon seller roadmaps and capital: the complete guide
We will write the kill criteria alongside the plan before you commit capital, at Flapen.
