The e-tailer is planning a summer sale event that will start on June 22 and run for seven to 10 days, per CNBC. The event is separate from Prime Day, which is reportedly being postponed from July to September due to the coronavirus pandemic. Amazon has reached out to merchants to ask them to participate in an invite-only “Fashion Summer Sale Event,” and is using “Biggest Sale in the Sky” as a working title for the event. It’s unclear if these are different names for the same event, or if the event will focus on fashion, but merchants are being asked to offer discounts of 30% or more to participate in the sales.
Business Insider Intelligence
This new summer sale will help Amazon limit the potential costs of postponing Prime Day to September. By putting off Prime Day, Amazon is creating a sales event void over the summer that competing retailers may try to take advantage of, especially since many merchants have tried to steal sales during Prime Day in July in past years. Introducing a new sale in late June enables Amazon to maintain a sales presence over the summer so it can still rack up sales and fend off competitors, while buying itself more time to prepare for Prime Day.
The event could help merchants rack up sales after struggling during the pandemic — and while Amazon likely doesn’t need more sales volume, the event should still prove valuable for it.
Third-party merchants on Amazon that sell nonessential goods likely saw their sales slide in recent months, but the summer sale could boost their recovery. Amazon temporarily stopped accepting shipments of nonessential orders to its warehouses to prioritize essential goods during the pandemic, hurting merchants’ ability to keep products in stock.
Taking part in the summer sale could help merchants make up for missed sales, albeit at a steep discount, which brands may desperately need considering 42% of the 1,000 US brands surveyed by Feedvisor get more than half of their e-commerce sales from Amazon.
Meanwhile, Amazon’s sales have boomed during the pandemic, but the new event could help it expand its reach in apparel and show that its delivery speeds have recovered. Amazon posted its highest annual e-commerce sales growth in over three years in Q1 2020, so it’s not in desperate need of the increased sales the new summer event may bring, though more sales would help it continue to lead the e-commerce industry as its sales take off during the pandemic.
But if the event highlights fashion products, it could promote Amazon’s recent push to offer high-end apparel and help it secure more sales as the category rakes in more sales online going forward. And if the event attracts consumers, Amazon will have the chance to show that it has regained the ability to deliver orders in one or two days, if that’s the case, after struggling to do so during the pandemic, assuaging any concerns consumers may have developed about its delivery capabilities.
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Source: https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-plans-new-sales-event-later-this-month-2020-6
