netmeg - 8:44 pm on May 1, 2012 (gmt 0)

but in my case my EMD's which sell affiliate products are usually noticeably better than the actual products company site

But in almost every case I've seen, Google (and the general public) will consider the manufacturer to be the authority site. Even if they do no direct selling themselves. Despite some of the SERPs we see, I don't think Google considers itself to be primarily a shopping engine. That's going to be a tough nut to crack.