History of Amazon's Prime Day

Payal Raheja

The launch of Amazon Prime Day in 2015 came as a surprise to Amazon customers and the retail industry – no marketing promotions were made about Prime Day and the date was not documented as an Amazon holiday in previous years. When Prime Day was launched in 2015, it was almost entirely unnoticed by the public. The purpose of Prime Day is to encourage consumers to shop online and promote Amazon in general. It began as a day for Amazon to boost its sales with special deals and discounts lasting for 24 hours. The main idea behind Prime Day was to get the attention of less active Amazon prime members.

Let us check how Amazon Prime Day event has evolved over the years

2015

The first ever Prime Day was on 15th July 2015,  to celebrate 20 years of Amazon and 10 years of prime. Lasting 24 hours, several Prime Day features were activated in nine countries, which included the US, UK, Spain, Japan, Italy, Germany, France, Canada, and Austria.

Customers purchased thousands of Amazon products. Amazon sellers experienced a remarkable amount of sales as unit sales grew nearly 300% worldwide.

2016

After the success of 2015 Prime Day, there wasn’t much extension in the number of participating countries, in addition to the nine countries that participated in 2015, Belgium was also included. 

2017

In 2017 Prime Day duration was increased from 24 hours to 30 hours. 2017 also witnessed a steady increase in the number of new prime members. In this year, Mexico and China joined this Prime Day and the number of countries grew. Compared to 2016 the number of orders on Amazon also doubled.

2018 

In 2018 Prime Day sales were open for 36 hours. Small and medium sized businesses on Amazon exceed their sales $1.5 billion. Amazon included grocery stores with prime deals for the first time in 2018. Customers purchased more than 5 million  items in some of the categories.

2019

For the first time ever, Prime Day kicks off a 48 hours sales event. Even the list of participating countries doubled to 18. If we go with the estimated sale on this Prime Day it was $7.16  billion. Over 175,000,000 items were purchased by the customers and Amazon devices such as electronic gadgets were on the top selling deals.

2020

Amazon continues to expand their reach by emphasizing their commitment to help small business amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. On 2018 Prime Day, 77%  new sellers participated and had 68% new product launches. This year also saw electronics as the leading category.

2021

In 2021, 20 countries participated. Prime Day dates for Canada and India were postponed due to COVID concerns. In this year Amazon provided extra incentives and cash back rewards to their prime members. Surprisingly, some of the biggest discounts were on Amazon’s own devices.

So what are you waiting for, grab your slot and start serving the best to your customers on this Prime Day.

Happy Selling!

Enjoyed the blog? Checkout another interesting blog on How can sellers be prepared for Amazon’s Prime Day - Dos and Don’ts from Ishita Chauhan.

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