Drop shipping - anyone ever try this?

Small margins, little control over customer experience. You need to be strong in SEO and marketing to stand out from your competitors. Two ways to do it:
1) Find a manufacturer willing to dropship who does not sell directly to the consumer. Tough to find a legit operation you can trust, but at least you don't have to worry about your supplier being your competitor. You just have to remember that if they will dropship for you, they are likely doing it for countless others who may have more resources than you.
2) Find a wholesaler of a niche product. You will be competing with the seller and the other who dropship from them. These are much easier to find, but this is rarely ever profitable if you are just trying to dip your toes in the dropshipping world.

Dropshipping has become this myth of semi-passive income. A lot of people think it can be done easily, and they won't have to lay out the cash for inventory. In reality, any time/money you are saving on foregoing inventory will need to be funneled into marketing. If you have any manufacturing connections who can link you up with a supplier who isn't easy to find, that would be your best bet.

Full disclosure - I tried to start dropshipping sites several times and it just never worked for me.

Went to the Atlanta Market a few years back and asked the vendors - one by one - if they drop-shipped in behalf of online only stores. That was my grand idea - to create an online presence and simply pass the orders on to the vendors and have them deliver to the customer - all under the cover of my online store name using customized labels which made it appear I had shipped it.

Hardly any of the vendors would consider it, and the message was clear: get lost. This was just before Amazon began to take their toll on Brick & Mortar stores. I went back to ATL 2 years later and it was like I was in a different world. The vendor winds were blowing from the opposite direction. Nearly everybody was onboard with the idea.

I built the online store and stocked it with "virtual" inventory (just photos, descriptions and prices). I was very excited, but alas, it just couldn't get the traction it needed and I decided to pull the plug.

My advice to you would be simply to stock inventory with an Amazon fulfillment center, but that defeats the no-inventory, drop-ship idea. It's a tough racket. If you hook up with a manufacturer that's willing to stock your inventory on consignment, that might fly, but unless your product is unique, it's a tough row to hoe. Again, Amazon is the 800 LB gorilla you have to contend with.

If you're willing to actually purchase the inventory and tie up $$ and have wholesalers list it for you, then you have nothing to lose.