I second the tattoo!
All jokes aside. I have many of the same affliate sites (almost cloned but with slight changes and targeting various keywords using SEO). And like lerchmo said fuck the drop ship and only concentrate on on affliate sites.
And I'll give you the reason why to both. First, it's all about getting to the customer first. You don't have to be Amazon or Ebay in size. You just have to get to the customer first. This is where SEO comes in. By having a site optimized for the SE's, you could land within the top 10 for that keyword. Now, if you do things right. With multiple sites with slight variations like I mentioned. Within, the top 10 of that keyword. Your sites could be in position 2 and 4 for example. Are your sites competing against each other? Yes, but who gives a shit. Your taking up spots that if they weren't there, your competitors would be getting your business. And like I said before, you don't have to be the best or biggest. Just get to the customer first.
Second, why affilate instead of drop ship? You might make higher margins with drop ship. But think of all the fucking head aches and time wasted. If your drop shipping you have to deal with processing the payment. If there's a problem the customer comes back to you. You have to deal with a butt load of e-mails from customers asking where's there shit after 2 days. And the list goes on. Yes, you could outsource it all. But then, there goes all your margins. If you were to be an affilate, then the primary affilating company deals with all that shit. You get your commission. You could then spend your time wisely and make more affilate sites. Thus making more money.
In the end, this is a numbers game. If you haven't figured it out yet, by reading this forum. It's all about getting customers to your site. The greater the number the better, especially if it's free from good SEO sites. If you're paying via PPC then yeah you want more quality then quantity.
Good Luck.
