What Your Amazon Profit Calculation Is Probably Missing

Ask ten sellers for their profit last month and you will hear ten numbers calculated ten different ways. Some subtract only Amazon fees. Some subtract fees and ads. Few subtract everything. The gap between a partial calculation and a complete one is often the difference between a business that feels fine and one that is quietly breaking even.

This is a checklist of the costs most often missing, and a simple structure for a monthly profit and loss statement.

Why Seller Central alone is not enough

Seller Central reports sales, fees and payments well. It does not know what you paid your factory, what the freight forwarder charged, or what your software costs. Payment reports also follow settlement timing, so a period's payout is not the same as that period's profit. To see real profit you have to combine Amazon's data with your own costs.

The checklist

Amazon-side costs

• Referral fees on every sale. Rates vary by category; see Amazon's pricing page.
• FBA fulfillment fees per unit.
• Monthly and aged inventory storage fees.
• Inventory-related fees that apply in specific situations, such as low inventory levels or inbound placement choices. Check the current rules in Seller Central, because these programs change.
• Advertising spend across Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands and Sponsored Display.
• Refunds and returns, including the fees Amazon retains on refunded orders.
• Removal and disposal fees when you pull inventory.
• Subscription fee for the Professional selling plan.

Product-side costs

• Factory cost per unit.
• Freight from factory to warehouse or to Amazon, per unit.
• Duties and tariffs. These can change with trade policy, so recheck them when you place a new order.
• Prep, labeling and packaging if not included in the factory price.
• Inspection and samples.
• Third-party warehouse storage if you hold stock outside Amazon.

Together these form your landed cost. Using only the factory price is the single most common reason profit is overstated.

Business-side costs

• Software subscriptions.
• Bookkeeping and tax preparation.
• Photography, design and listing content, spread across the months they serve.
• Payment and currency conversion fees if you pay suppliers abroad.

A simple monthly P&L

Use this structure once a month. The numbers below are illustrative.

• Gross sales: $22,400
• Refunds: -$610
• Net revenue: $21,790
• Amazon fees (referral, FBA, storage, other): -$7,190
• Advertising: -$2,450
• Landed COGS (units sold x landed cost): -$7,020
• Contribution: $5,130 (23.5%)
• Software, bookkeeping and other fixed costs: -$640
• Net profit: $4,490 (20.6%)

Now remove the landed cost adjustments and use factory price only, say $5,610 instead of $7,020. Net profit appears to be $5,900, or 27.1%. That 6.5-point gap is invented here, but gaps like it are common, and they lead to budget and reorder decisions based on money the business never earned.

Payout is not profit

Your Amazon disbursement depends on settlement timing, reserves and refunds in transit. A month with a large payout can be a weak profit month and vice versa. Track both, separately. The inventory and cash flow guide covers why profit and cash diverge.

Daily profit versus monthly profit

A monthly P&L is essential for accounting. For running the business, a daily estimate is more useful: it lets you see a problem in the week it starts, not after the month closes. Daily figures are estimates because some fees and refunds settle later, but they are good enough to trigger questions.

Keep your landed cost current

Every new production run can change landed cost. Store landed cost per product per batch, and switch to the new cost when the new batch starts selling. Averaging across batches is acceptable if you document it.

A five-minute sanity check

If you only have five minutes, check three things:

1. Does your profit figure subtract ad spend from all campaign types?
2. Does it use landed cost, not factory cost?
3. Does it include refunds?

If any answer is no, your profit is overstated.

How Sollo Central handles it

Sollo Central's Sales and Profit area combines Amazon fees, ads, refunds and your cost of goods into daily and monthly net profit, along with estimated payout, real ACoS and a 12-month P&L. Its purchasing area tracks landed cost and supplier balances per order. The aim is a number you trust enough to decide with. For how these numbers feed decisions, see the weekly review guide.