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Welcome back to the PPC Den podcast! Today we’re catching up with Francis Leger, co-owner of GS Plant Foods, to talk about the harsh realities of selling on Amazon in 2026.
Let’s be honest, the days of easily launching a profitable product from your bedroom with fifty bucks are long gone. Francis gets totally real about why Amazon has become such a frustrating and expensive barrier to entry, complete with random listing suspensions and endless bureaucratic headaches. Because of this margin squeeze, his two-person team is actively pivoting to build out their own independent D2C website.
Instead of just playing around with trendy AI tools, Francis shares a brilliant, practical approach: look at your daily workflow and hand the tedious stuff over to a computer. He even shares a great story about how they built a custom script to automatically check their Amazon Buy Box across all 50 states to catch sneaky account issues instantly.
Grab a coffee and join us for a really honest, refreshing conversation about surviving and thriving in e-commerce today.
We’ll see you in The PPC Den!
Episode Highlights
- 0:00 – Intro
- 02:40 – Why building a Shopify D2C website is now an absolute must
- 04:02 – Why you can no longer start on Amazon with just $50
- 06:30 – The nightmare of arbitrary Amazon delistings
- 15:21 – How we built a custom AI script to check our Buy Box in all 50 states
- 19:47 – Stop asking “What can AI do?” and look at your org chart instead
- 25:25 – The danger of building yourself a job instead of a business
- 30:44 – How to get a business to run itself
- 33:23 – The one thing you can never outsource to AI
- 36:47 – Why the fundamentals of business haven’t changed in 100 years
- 42:10 – Outro
Links & Resources
- 🦡 GET AD BADGER ➡️
- Find Michael Erickson Facchin — Ad Badger’s CEO and soul, PPC whisperer, and your go-to guide through the wild world of Amazon advertising
- Check out Francis Leger and GS Plant Foods at gsplantfoods.com — where healthy plants (and smart business decisions) are always in season.
- Successful Ecommerce Entrepreneur On Business, Scaling 10x, and Finding the Right Partners
- How to Find Products That Sell Organically
- How To Use Psychology To Master Amazon PPC (Classic)
- Who to hire for your Amazon Growth Team (Classic)
- What’s the Best Way to Manage an Amazon Brand? Exploring Agency Strategies
- 📚 Unlock our FREE comprehensive Amazon Marketing Playbook
- Subscribe to our newsletter
- Transform your workflow with our comprehensive Amazon Advertising checklist
- Review all our show notes
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If you missed them, check out our previous episodes of The PPC Den Podcast:
Find even more episodes here.
Podcast Credits
- Host and Executive Producer: Michael Erickson Facchin
- Guest Co-Host: Francis Leger
- Senior Producer: Nancy Lili Gonzalez
- Podcast Coordinator and Graphic Designer: Sofiia Podash
- Video and Audio Editor: Pedro Moreno
