Amazon Vendor Central Direct Import: How the 1P Program Works and Who It Fits

You make your product overseas, you sell it to Amazon as a 1P vendor, and someone has told you to look at Direct Import. Search for it and most of what comes back is about Amazon Global Logistics, a program for third-party sellers using FBA. That program is a different arrangement with a different importer, and it doesn't apply to you.

If you sell to Amazon through Vendor Central, the Direct Import you want is the vendor program: you ship full containers from your factory or supplier straight to Amazon's fulfillment centers, and Amazon acts as the Importer of Record. This guide covers how that works, which products fit it, what you are still responsible for, and how to tell it apart from the two programs it gets confused with.

Two Amazon programs called "direct import"

The name collision is the first thing to clear up, because it decides which half of the search results is useful to you.

• Direct Import in Vendor Central (1P). Amazon buys your goods on a purchase order, the goods ship from origin directly into Amazon's network, and Amazon is the Importer of Record, covering import clearance and transit costs.
• Amazon Global Logistics (3P). Amazon describes this program as exclusively for third-party sellers using Fulfillment by Amazon. It requires active FBA enrollment, and the seller supplies the Importer of Record documentation during onboarding.

The difference comes down to who owns the goods when they land. In Seller Central you own the inventory, so you import it. In Vendor Central, Amazon is the buyer, so under Direct Import Amazon does the importing. Many general Vendor Central onboarding guides cover EDI, forecasting, and trade terms and never mention Direct Import at all, which is part of why the FBA program fills the results.

What Direct Import is, for a 1P vendor

Direct Import lets you ship containers directly from the factory or supplier to Amazon's fulfillment centers, skipping any warehouse of your own in the destination country. With a regular domestic PO, the goods are already in-country and you ship them to the fulfillment center the PO names, following the routing and ASN steps in how to ship a purchase order to Amazon as a vendor. Under Direct Import, Amazon picks the goods up at the port of origin and takes it from there.

Here is how responsibility splits:

1. Export clearance stays with you. Getting the goods cleared to leave the origin country is the vendor's job.
2. Import clearance and transit costs sit with Amazon. As Importer of Record, Amazon covers clearing the goods into the destination country and the cost of moving them.
3. Inventory and risk transfer to Amazon at transport. Ownership and the associated risk pass to Amazon from the moment of transport and storage, so the inventory on the water is Amazon's.
4. Invoice terms start at port pickup. Your payment terms begin once Amazon collects the goods from the port, which can be weeks before they reach a fulfillment center, so the clock on getting paid starts much earlier than it would on a domestic PO.
5. Pricing is hedged in one currency. Direct Import transactions are hedged in a single currency at a fixed exchange rate, so the price on the PO doesn't move with exchange rates while the container is at sea.

A Direct Import order is still a purchase order, with Amazon as the buyer ordering against its own forecast. The purchase order (PO) glossary entry covers the general mechanics, including the EDI 850 and 855 flow, and what Direct Import changes is where Amazon takes the goods and who handles the import.

Which products and orders fit Direct Import

Direct Import moves goods in full containers on long lead times, so it suits some of a catalog and not the rest. Two published criteria decide which ASINs belong on it:

• Sourced overseas. KhooCommerce's guide, written for European vendors, describes the program as best suited to products sourced outside the EU. If you sell into another marketplace, read that as products made abroad and imported into the country Amazon is buying for.
• A minimum order quantity per ASIN. MOQs are set per ASIN and align with roughly one month of sell-through demand.

The other thing to weigh is lead time. A Direct Import order can take 21 to 60 days depending on shipping schedules, so an ASIN you need to restock quickly won't get that from this program. Build the window into your vendor lead time planning for every ASIN you move onto it.

Direct Import vs. Direct Fulfillment

The other confusion comes from inside Vendor Central. Direct Fulfillment is Amazon's vendor dropship program, where you ship finished customer orders from your own warehouse to the end customer. It has nothing to do with overseas sourcing or with who imports the goods.

So if someone on your team mentions both, they're talking about separate decisions: Direct Import governs how inventory gets into Amazon's network from overseas, and Direct Fulfillment governs whether you ship the customer's order yourself.

Direct Import vs. Amazon Global Logistics

Amazon Global Logistics is the program most search results describe. Amazon's own page for it says it is exclusively for third-party sellers using FBA, that it requires active FBA enrollment, and that the seller provides Importer of Record documentation at onboarding. None of that applies to a 1P relationship, where Amazon owns the goods once it collects them.

If you came from Seller Central

If you ran an FBA business before moving to Vendor Central, you probably handled imports yourself or through Amazon Global Logistics, and you were the Importer of Record either way. In Vendor Central that responsibility moves to Amazon for Direct Import orders, and the export side stays with you. The 1P, 2P, and 3P glossary entry explains the selling models underneath this split, and the Seller Central to Vendor Central guide maps the reports that moved.

Before you take a Direct Import order

Run through these before you agree to move an ASIN onto the program:

1. Confirm you, your supplier, or your forwarder can handle export clearance at origin, since Amazon's role starts at the port.
2. Size each ASIN's MOQ against a month of real sell-through, using Amazon's Vendor Central forecast and your own shipped history.
3. Add the 21 to 60 day transit window to your production plan so the container leaves in time.
4. Model the cash flow with terms starting at port pickup, and check the fixed exchange rate on the PO against your supplier's currency.
5. Ask your vendor manager whether your account and the specific ASINs qualify before you change production plans around it.

What Vendor Central will not give you

The program asks you to size each ASIN's order to a month of sell-through, and nothing in a Direct Import order does that sizing for you. You need Amazon's forecast next to what actually shipped, per ASIN, every week, and in Vendor Central that means downloading the reports and joining them yourself each time.

InsightLeap keeps the forecast history per product and compares it against what actually shipped, with open PO units landing on a schedule, so the one-month figure for each ASIN is already there when the Direct Import conversation comes up. To check your history before a Direct Import order lands, see how to track purchase order history in Vendor Central.

Related terms

• Purchase Order (PO): the general definition; Direct Import orders are still POs.
• Direct Fulfillment: Amazon's vendor dropship program, a different program from Direct Import.
• 1P, 2P, and 3P: the selling models behind the two "direct import" programs.
• Vendor Lead Time: where the Direct Import transit window belongs in your planning.