Prime & Punishment: Evaluating Amazon’s Liability for Defective Products from A-to-Z in AZ
By Spencer Shockness. From air fryers and Apple watches to Ziploc bags and zero-gravity chairs, consumers can purchase everything on Amazon.com—as famously indicated by Amazon’s A-to-Z logo. The “online-everything store” accounts for roughly 37–49% of all online commerce in the United States. This suggests an immense number of consumers interact with Amazon.com for various purchasing needs on a daily basis. One unique aspect of Amazon’s operations is that it only manufactures a minority of the products sold on its website. Products manufactured by third parties make up 58% of sales on Amazon.com. So if consumers purchase products from Amazon.com that a third party manufactured, who is responsible if the product is defective? The obvious answer is the manufacturer because it placed the product in the marketplace. However, an individual consumer may…