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Prime Day success extends beyond Amazon

July 19, 2018Written by George Anderson

Source: Amazon

Rising tides do lift all boats, or it appears at least some of them when the metaphor is extended to retail. While Amazon.com announced that it had set a new 36-hour sales record blowing past revenues generated on past Prime Days as well as Cyber Monday and Black Friday, many rival retailers were also feeling pretty good about Tuesday, July 17, as well.

First to Amazon: the e-tail giant got off to a rocky start on Monday as it appeared unprepared for the traffic hitting the site. Visitors from desktops and via its mobile app were greeted with error messages when they attempted to shop. Despite the initial glitches, Prime members around the globe purchased more than 100 million products during this year’s event. Amazon also announced that more people signed up for its Prime program on July 16 than any day in its history.

The company’s best sellers worldwide included its Fire TV Stick with Alexa Voice Remote and Echo Dot, marking a big day for Amazon’s private labels. Prime Day deals were also extended to Whole Foods Market where organic strawberries were the biggest seller. Third-party sellers on Amazon’s marketplace also had a big day-and-a-half with revenues over $1 billion.

As to its competitors, Adobe Analytics reported that online retailers with more than $1 billion in revenue generated 54 percent more in sales on July 17 than they do on an average Tuesday. Adobe, which measures transactions for 80 of the largest online retailers in the U.S., did not indicate whether its numbers included Amazon, according to CNBC.

Target, which ran a sale on Tuesday, said the event was the biggest online shopping day for the chain so far this year. Nearly 90 percent of the orders placed on target.com are being fulfilled at the chain’s stores across the country.

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