Amazon Sets Date for Prime Day
Amazon.com's second annual Prime Day sale will launch at midnight PST on July 12. The Seattle-based online retailer created the shopping holiday for its Prime customers last year as something of a half-birthday for Christmas. On 2015, Prime Day customers ordered 34.4 million items worldwide, breaking the retailer's Black Friday records.
Total Retail's Take: Only open to Amazon Prime members, Amazon has positioned Prime Day and its bevy of deals as another incentive for consumers to sign up for the $99/year service. The strategy makes sense, as Prime is a major profit driver for the company. Prime members spend, on average, about $1,100 per year vs. about $600 per year for nonmembers, according to Consumer Intelligence Research Partners. Amazon has created its own shopping holiday in a typically slow part of the retail calendar — right before back to school starts to heat up — and in the process acquires high-value customers. A win-win for Amazon; not so great for its competitors (i.e., basically everyone else selling online).
- Companies:
- Amazon.com
- Places:
- Seattle
Joe Keenan is the executive editor of Total Retail. Joe has more than 10 years experience covering the retail industry, and enjoys profiling innovative companies and people in the space.
