Look out online shoppers… Amazon is bringing you a ‘Black Friday’ style sale in July.
July 15 has been set aside for ‘Prime Day,’ with Amazon promising unbeatable deals for members of the Prime shopping program.This event is intended to celebrate Amazon’s 20th anniversary, as well as entice more consumers into joining the paid Prime program. For a $99 annual fee, users receive free two-day shipping, the ability to rent one Kindle book a month, and access to the Amazon music and video streaming services.
Greg Greeley, vice president of Amazon Prime, stated that “Prime Day is a one-day only event filled with more deals than Black Friday.” Given the increase in subscription price for the Prime service this year, consumers will be looking to this event as a way to justify the inflation. In recent years, Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales have dramatically decreased. In 2014, Black Friday saw a drop of 11 per cent in sales in the United States.
Despite this, Amazon has had commercial success during shopping oriented events, and perhaps Prime Day will be successful enough to overshadow Black Friday or Cyber Monday.
Amazon Prime has quickly established itself as an integral part of the Amazon family. According to an article published on TechCrunch, Prime helped the company recover from an unexpected loss and turn a profit of $214 million in 4Q2014.The increase in subscription fees is largely responsible for this accomplishment, and if Prime Day goes as planned, consumers won’t think twice about the $99 fee.