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Black Friday and Christmas time get all of the love when it comes to online shopping, but Amazon has had the brilliant idea to create their own holiday in the summer to produce another surge in online sales.
Amazon Prime Day debuted last summer and was an immediate success. Only July 15th, the 20th anniversary of the company, Amazon Prime Day led to 34.4 million products sold, selling more items than they’ve sold on any Black Friday despite the holiday being exclusive to only Prime members.
This year, Amazon Prime Day will be held on July 12, with new deals popping up as quickly as every five minutes throughout the day on various types of products. Prime Day will officially begin at 3 a.m. ET on July 12.
Amazon Prime has become a very popular membership for online shoppers. The service gives customers free two-day shipping, unlimited video and music streaming and the ability to borrow books off of the Kindle marketplace.
Online sales are typically sluggish in the summer months, so from a business perspective this was a fantastic promotion from Amazon. Considering last year’s Prime Day had 18 percent more orders than the previous year’s Black Friday, there’s something to be said about the company-created holiday.
Some consumers complained about the random selection of promotions during last year’s Prime Day, claiming that it was a gimmick used to get rid of overstocked items. Even if that is the purpose of the promotion, it wouldn’t matter that much, because there were apparently still enough consumers genuinely interested in the deals that Amazon was offering.
For those who are Amazon Prime members, be sure to check the website on July 12 for any potential deals.