CBD On Amazon. Why Amazon doesn’t sell CBD yet?
Posted by Lewis Olden on
*Scroll down to the bottom of the article to find your discount code for ALL Cannacares CBD Products
It is common in this day and age that when you are looking to purchase a specific item, Amazon is the first port of call. Amazon spends a tremendous amount on Google ads to ensure no matter what product you search for; Amazon is never too far from the top of the search results. Amazon also has extremely strong Search Engine Optimisation (“SEO”) so it is almost always highly ranked on Google and other search engines.
However, due to the proceeds of crime act Amazon has elected not to have CBD products available on its website. Many people ask ‘should I buy CBD on Amazon?’ If you search for CBD on Amazon’s website, you will get lots of results that look similar to CBD oil, but the product is named ‘Hemp Oil’ or ‘Hemp Extract’. This is down to the fact that Amazon does not permit the sale of CBD on the Amazon website. This doesn’t just apply to CBD oils; all CBD products are banned. Meaning even CBD balms, CBD creams and CBD patches are even banned.
Can you purchase CBD oil on Amazon?
The short answer is, you cannot sell CBD oil or any other kind of CBD via Amazon. CBD oil is not permitted to be sold on Amazon in any jurisdiction. It does not matter whether you are in Europe, the United States or even Canada where cannabis has been legalised.
Amazon has restricted CBD and it is included on Amazon’s restricted list. The exert relating to CBD within Amazon’s restricted product list is below:
“Listings for products containing cannabidiol (CBD) are prohibited, including but not limited to: i) Full Spectrum Hemp Oil, ii) Rich hemp oil”.
The confusion surrounding CBD being listed on Amazon is due to the fact that Amazon has banned all CBD products, but they have not banned hemp products in general. This has led to many companies cleverly renaming certain products within their range in an attempt to be listed on Amazon. There are sellers on Amazon who name their products “Hemp Oil” or “Hemp Extract’ in an attempt to have their product listings removed by Amazon. While describing the product in the exact way you would describe CBD oil but without ever including CBD.
What is the difference between CBD and Hemp Oil?
Hemp oil and CBD oil are both derived from the cannabis plant. The key difference is that CBD oil is extracted from the entire plant including the leaves, flowers and stalk while hemp oil is only extracted from the seeds. Hemp seeds have numerous benefits and have been used by humans in cooking and wellness products for many years. Hemp seeds do not contain any CBD whatsoever and there are hardly any cannabinoids contained within hemp seed oil. Bad actors in the CBD space have taken advantage of the hemp crossover to bamboozle prospective customers.
Respectable and Trusted CBD Companies Do Not Sell on Amazon
It cannot be definitively stated that the Hemp oils listed on Amazon do not contain any CBD. However, it is companies who list CBD on Amazon under the guise of Hemp oil that forced the Food Standards Agency (“FSA”) to implement the incoming Novel Food legislation on March 31 2021.
Reputable CBD brands do not list their products on Amazon, so it is advisable to never purchase CBD oil or Hemp oil via Amazon.
How can you ensure you are buying high quality CBD oil?
The best way to understand the CBD contained within a product you are purchasing, and the profiles of the other cannabinoids is to review the third-party laboratory tests. It is important to ensure that the laboratory test was carried out by a third party. The lab tests will allow you to make an informed decision and be confident that what is quoted on the product’s label correlates with the actual contents of the product. There are never any third-party lab tests on the Amazon website which is probably the most important reason why you should not buy CBD oils or any other CBD products from Amazon.
If CBD is legal, why is CBD prohibited from being listed on Amazon?
CBD products are legal in the UK so long as they contain less than 0.2% CBD. The reason that Amazon do not list CBD products and other cannabis derived products is that Amazon takes the view that CBD and cannabis derived products fall under the category of prohibited drugs.
This is primarily because it is simply too risky for Amazon not to deem CBD as a prohibited substance. Amazon cannot risk having sellers on their website selling illegal products containing THC on their website. If they were to allow CBD to be sold on the Amazon website, Amazon would have to verify each individual product that is listed on their website to mitigate the risk of listing the products.
The CBD and cannabis industries are gradually evolving from illegal industries to widely accepted legal industries across the globe. Every jurisdiction around the world has varying legislation with regard to CBD and cannabis. There are different proceeds of crime acts in different countries which make it highly ambiguous and leaves Amazon vulnerable to being held to account for illegal products on its website. As Amazon is such a massively successful business and is a global conglomerate the revenue derived from selling CBD products would be immaterial to their business, so it is simply not worth the risk.
Many payment processors and payment service providers also refuse to work with CBD companies. For instance, PayPal do not allow CBD companies to integrate PayPal with their website to allow customers to pay using PayPal. This is of great frustration to some customers and without knowing why a company does not offer the option of checking out using PayPal, they may come to the conclusion that the site may not be secure and may choose not to complete their purchase.
Square is another company that does not offer their services to CBD companies meaning it takes a lot of work to set up an appropriate payment system for a CBD company.
Conclusion
If you are looking to purchase CBD online, it is definitely advisable to avoid using Amazon. The CBD products listed on Amazon will not be being distributed by reputable brands and the containments of the product may not be what is advertised on the bottle.
Most CBD and hemp related products on Amazon consist of listings that are not presented with laboratory tests and may not even be CBD at all.
Amazon will most probably not permit the sale of CBD on their platform for a long period of time. It will take CBD and cannabis to be widely legalised across the world before Amazon believe that the level of risk of listing CBD and cannabis-based products on their site is worth it. At this time the differing cannabis laws around the world mean that it is simply too complicated and risky for Amazon to be involved with CBD.
