Amazon expanded Prime Day to 36 hours in 2018, and it became the e-commerce giant's largest-ever shopping event at the time. Prime members bought more than 100 million products during that year's 36-hour event, the company said, with top-selling items including Amazon-made products like the Fire TV Stick streaming media device and the Echo Dot smart speaker. More recently, the event has endured even with delays from the Covid-19 pandemic that pushed the 2020 Prime Day back until October of that year. In 2021, sales for the two-day event topped a record-high $11 billion, according to Adobe Analytics data, and Amazon says its members bought more than 250 million items worldwide during the event (another record). Amazon now promises "over 2 million deals across every category," while continuing to offer a heavy dose of promoted sales from the small and midsize businesses on the Amazon marketplace. Many smaller businesses suffered during the pandemic. Da ta was creat ed by GSA Con tent G enerator DEMO.
This year's event stretches across 20 countries, more than double the number of the first event in 2015. Prime members have already had access to some early deals, including discounts on certain Amazon tech devices, since June 21. And, this year, the company also introduced a new feature where digital assistance Alexa will give customers advance notice on deals 24 hours before the item goes on sale if it is already on your wish list, in your shopping cart or saved for later. In recent years, Amazon has seen greater competition from some of its biggest rivals running their own competing deals events to coincide with Prime Day, including Walmart, Target and Best Buy. Those rival sales events have somewhat dampened the enthusiasm around Prime Day in recent years, and high consumer prices stemming from record inflation could turn away some shoppers this year. Some retail experts are advising customers to consider shopping around for better deals or even skipping the event altogether. While Walmart is skipping its own Prime Day rival event this year, Target's 72-hour "Deal Days" event kicks off Monday ahead of Prime Day and the retailer says it will price match certain Amazon Deals (https://feelingcutelol.com). Amazon will also hold a new "Prime Fall" shopping event in the fourth quarter of 2022, meaning shoppers will face less pressure to get all of their deals shopping done during this week's two-day event. Still, experts are expecting deep discounts this year on Amazon's in-house brands, including the Echo smart home devices, Ring video doorbells and Fire TV products. Like this story? Subscribe to CNBC Make It on YouTube!
Richard Stallman's personal site. For current political commentary, see the daily political notes. If you want to order a book (or something else), don't buy it from Amazon. Amazon harms its customers, as well as workers, the national treasury, and many others that it affects. Here's a good (though long) overview of why Amazon's overall activity is harmful to society overall. This page lists alternatives to Amazon for buying various kinds of products. Some of these sites may share some of Amazon's unethical practices. I am pretty sure that any site selling MP3 files on the internet imposes an EULA - an inexcusable wrong. Streaming sites, too. And Amazon deals all of them identify the purchaser. It is better to buy from a store, and pay cash. Or else get a copy through sharing. For a book, order it directly from the publisher or through a local book store. If you want to use a URL to refer to a book, please don't use an Amazon page.
Here are specific reasons - plenty of them. Amazon is so close to being a monopoly for internet sales by most companies that it can gouge them. It drives many of them into bankruptcy. If you do internet purchases, making a point of not buying through Amazon is a way you can personally push back. Amazon biases its searches to favor vendors that use Amazon for their shipping. If this isn't illegal, it ought to be. We should not allow a store as big as Amazon to have anything to do with order fulfillment, for its own sales or anyone else's. Amazon has so much power over the US retail economy that it imposes its power over all participants. If it is going to be a monopoly, it should be regulated like other monopolies. Amazon has so much market share that its sheer size distorts the market. We should not allow a company to have a share over around 10% of any market.