Amazon announcing a crazy sale next week to celebrate its 20th anniversary. The Amazon sale is pushing Prime memberships to amp up battles with Netflix and Hulu and consumers win and get their back-to-school and maybe some holiday shopping done early. The whole Christmas in July thing is real.
Front page news:
Get ready to lose some serious work productivity. Next Wednesday, July 15, Amazon will hold a better-than-Black-Friday extravaganza to celebrate its 20th anniversary. Why wait for the day-after Thanksgiving for what you can have now? Imagine how lazy Black Friday could be for you!
The company announced Prime Day, which will feature “more deals than Black Friday.” The summer sale will be held next Wednesday, July 15, actually the eve of Amazon’s 20th birthday. There’s even a Facebook page with 73,000 members already attending
New sales will pop up every 10 minutes (hence the loss in worker productivity), and in order to participate, Amazon members need to sign up for Prime, which after the 30 day trial, costs $99/year for 2 day shipping, unlimited photo storage and access to movies, music and Kindle content.
The deal-making starts at midnight and promises to have more bargains than what the company will offer around the holidays, though the company has yet to advertise what some of the deals could be.
Read between the headlines:
Make no mistake, this is not a retail push but a digital media push. One to get users to become Prime users, which is a great deal anyway for heavy Amazon retail customers and content downloaders. As competition gets fierce against, Netflix, Hulu and other content outlets, Amazon is leveraging its strong retail consumer base to get customers on board for their Prime plan, which by Consumer Reports, has been called the better bet for standard definition downloads and those who want greater selection of titles (and free shipping for purchases).
What’s next:
Expect more news on the deals that will drop in coming days. Amazon promises deals on items “perfect for summer adventures, their-to-do list, family road trips, back to school supplies and every day essentials.” Will there be dirt cheap deals on flat screen TVs or is this geared more for back-to-school? That’s make a difference to big box retailers like Walmart who are watching closely.
