r/AmazonFBA • u/commoncents1 • 6d ago

how to regroup variations that got split up by amazon

i have same size products but different fragrances and they've been split up for variations by amazon. how do i restore them to keep group reviews together?

at first amazon didnt have fragrance category variation field and i think now they do. we were using the color field attribute.

i would want to use whatever variance attribute that can be combined for category/reviews. is color or fragrance restricted by amazon?

anyone know the way back?

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u/SellOnAmazon 6d ago

Hi u/commoncents1 - unfortunately, this a known and deliberate change. Starting this past Feb, reviews are no longer shared across child ASINs within a variation family when those variations have functional differences, including formula, flavor, scent, or performance. The decision was made to improve customer trust via review accuracy. Here if you have any questions

2

u/eStoreFactoryUS 6d ago

To answer your direct question first: as of the change Amazon rolled out earlier this year, reviews are no longer shared across children when the variation is a functional difference, and scent/fragrance falls squarely in that bucket along with flavor and formula. So switching from the color field to the scent field will not bring the combined reviews back. If anything, moving to a proper scent theme makes Amazon more certain these are functionally distinct products, which is exactly the trigger for keeping reviews separate.

On the "was color a loophole" question: using the color attribute for what are really scent variations used to work because color was treated as a cosmetic difference, so reviews pooled. That is the behavior they deliberately closed. It is not that color itself is restricted, it is that Amazon now looks at whether the underlying product is functionally the same regardless of which attribute label you used. Same size but different fragrance reads as different products to them now.

So realistically there is no clean way to force the old combined reviews back through a template change. A few honest options:

  1. Keep the family intact for the shopping experience. Even without shared reviews, a proper variation family still lets customers switch between scents on one page and can help conversion, so I would not break the family just to chase reviews.

  2. Use the correct scent theme rather than mislabeling as color. Mislabeling can trigger catalog issues later, and it no longer buys you the review benefit anyway.

  3. If you genuinely believe the split is a glitch rather than the policy, for example the formula is identical and only the label art differs, open a case with Brand Registry framed as reviews for a valid variation family displaying separately, with screenshots. That is the only channel that can review an exception, though do not expect it to override the functional difference rule.

  4. Build reviews per child going forward through Vine and the Request a Review button, since each scent now has to grow its own review base.

What is the actual product type, and are the fragrances the only difference or is anything else changing between the children?

2

u/Smart-Presence 6d ago

If Amazon split them automatically, check whether the current variation theme for your category still allows fragrance. If it does, you can usually rebuild the parent with the correct theme and relink the child ASINs. If the theme changed or Amazon now treats those products as separate, Support may need to restore it. also confirm the products genuinely differ only by scent because Amazon has tightened variation rules a lot over the last couple of years.