Ali Lokhandwala, 27, on His Amazon Story: ₹2 Lakh in Crop Tops, Zero Sales, and the Shift to High-Ticket Private Label

In 2017, Ali Lokhandwala was 18, a college student in Rajkot, and convinced he had found his way into business. He put about ₹2 lakh into his first Amazon product, a range of crop tops. It did not record a single sale.

Today Lokhandwala, now 27 and a Gujarat-based Amazon private label seller and e-commerce mentor, runs a catalogue of more than 80 live products from a business headquartered in Morbi. The distance between those two points is less a success story than a record of mistakes, most of which he now teaches other sellers to avoid.

The first product

The crop tops looked, on paper, like a sensible bet: widely searched, inexpensive to buy and easy to list. The problem was that hundreds of other sellers had reached the same conclusion. With nothing to distinguish his listing and no budget to compete on advertising, it disappeared among near-identical alternatives.

“I didn’t fail because Amazon was hard,” Lokhandwala said. “I failed because I picked a product nobody had a reason to buy from me. That is still the most common mistake I see.”

The expensive lessons

The next few years brought a series of costly lessons. Products that did sell were quickly copied and pushed into price wars, and margins on low-priced goods were too thin to absorb mistakes. When he began importing from China in 2021-22, new problems arrived: a shipment was held at port for months over clearance paperwork he had not understood, and releasing it meant paying heavy penalties. Suppliers delivered goods that did not match the samples.

Each problem, he says, forced him to build a system: checklists for import documentation, multiple samples before any order, and research into why buyers were unhappy with existing products before choosing what to sell.

The shift to higher-priced products

The real change came in 2021-22, when he stopped competing in low-priced categories altogether. Instead, he began selecting products typically priced above ₹2,000 that could be meaningfully improved: a better material, a missing feature, a more useful bundle. He sold them under his own registered brands, and in 2022 he began teaching the same approach to other sellers.

The higher price gave room to absorb Amazon’s per-unit fees and advertising costs. A distinct product and a registered brand made copying harder. It also raised the stakes: each product now meant hundreds of imported units and lakhs of rupees in stock.

What the business looks like now

As of September 2026, his business runs more than 80 live products and generated revenue of about ₹3.5 crore a month in FY 2025-26, according to the company. He has trained more than 15,000 sellers, whose businesses have generated more than ₹200 crore in combined revenue. He shares selling lessons on his YouTube channel and Instagram, and the company publishes what his students say on its review site.

Five lessons for first-time Amazon sellers

1. Choose a product people have a reason to buy from you. If your listing is identical to fifty others, price is your only weapon.
2. Understand import rules before you order. Documentation and certification problems are cheaper to solve before goods ship.
3. Never skip samples. Compare several suppliers and test products yourself.
4. Work out landed cost first. Know your real per-unit cost, including freight, duty and fees, before setting a price.
5. Only invest what you can afford to lock up. Stock can take months to sell, and sometimes it does not sell at all.

“The ₹2 lakh I lost was the cheapest education I have had,” he said. “The expensive mistakes came later, when I had more money and still hadn’t learned the lesson.”

Frequently asked questions

How did Ali Lokhandwala start his Amazon business?

He started selling on Amazon in 2017, at 18, while in college in Rajkot. His first product, crop tops backed by about ₹2 lakh, recorded zero sales.

What changed in Ali Lokhandwala’s business?

He moved from low-priced commodity products to higher-priced, differentiated private label products sold under his own registered brands.

How many products does Ali Lokhandwala sell on Amazon now?

As of September 2026, his business runs more than 80 live products on Amazon.

How old is Ali Lokhandwala?

Ali Lokhandwala is 27. He started selling on Amazon in 2017, at the age of 18.

When did Ali Lokhandwala start teaching?

In 2022, around the time he moved his own business to imported, high-ticket private label products.

Ali Lokhandwala's YouTube channel → https://www.youtube.com/@AliLokhandwalaofficial

What his students say → https://alilokhandwalareviews.com/