Amazon FBA and third-party logistics (3PL) fulfillment are the two most common options for sellers who want to outsource order fulfillment — and in 2026, the gap between them is narrowing in ways that matter.
Amazon ended U.S. FBA prep and labeling services on January 1, 2026, and fulfilled its annual promise of higher fulfillment fees. Sellers who were using FBA as a complete end-to-end solution are now evaluating alternatives. The math has shifted, and the decision deserves fresh analysis.
Amazon’s FBA Prep Service — where Amazon would inspect, label, and prepare your products for fulfillment for a per-unit fee — ended for U.S. sellers at the start of 2026. Sellers now need to ensure their shipments arrive at Amazon fulfillment centers already prepped, labeled, polybaged, and bundled per Amazon’s specifications, or risk refusal and additional fees.
This creates a new operational requirement: you need a prep partner. A domestic 3PL that handles FBA prep can receive your goods, complete all prep requirements, and ship inbound to Amazon’s assigned fulfillment centers — often at lower cost than Amazon was charging for the same service.
Amazon’s 2026 fee increases apply to fulfillment fees, storage fees, inbound placement fees, and the low-inventory-level surcharge that penalizes sellers who do not maintain adequate stock relative to their sales velocity. The cumulative impact for a mid-volume seller can represent a 15–25% increase in total FBA cost over 2024.
A 3PL does not charge inbound placement fees. Storage fees are typically lower for slow-moving or seasonal SKUs. And because you control the inventory, you are not subject to Amazon’s inventory performance index penalties or low-inventory surcharges on items you choose to hold.
The sellers adapting most effectively to FBA’s 2026 changes are those running hybrid fulfillment models: FBA for fast-moving, Prime-eligible SKUs where Amazon’s fulfillment network advantage is real; a 3PL for DTC orders, subscription channels, B2B accounts, and slow-moving inventory that would incur Amazon’s storage penalty.
Inventory split between two fulfillment nodes gives you flexibility and negotiating leverage. You are not dependent on one platform’s policy changes, and your cost structure reflects actual demand patterns rather than Amazon’s fee schedule assumptions.
A 3PL partner handles fulfillment outside Amazon’s network — DTC orders, wholesale shipments, subscription box fulfillment, and FBA-inbound prep. If you sell across multiple channels (Amazon, your own Shopify store, wholesale accounts), a 3PL becomes the hub that integrates all of them, letting you maintain single inventory while routing orders to the right channel fulfillment method.
For sellers who have been relying on FBA for prep, the loss of that service is an operational disruption. But it is also an opening to build a fulfillment model that gives you more control, lower overall cost, and resilience against Amazon’s next round of policy changes.
J.M. Field handles FBA-ready prep, labeling, polybagging, and bundling from our Fort Lauderdale, Florida facility, and we support hybrid fulfillment across DTC, wholesale, and subscription channels. If you want help building a 2026-ready plan, get in touch.
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