Prime, the Amazon subscription-based loyalty programme, drove a third of all orders on its platform, its highest sales so far in India, during its five-day festive season sale which concluded on Wednesday.
The US-based e-tailer shipped a little over 15 million items to customers across the country and got tens of thousands of users to pay Rs 499 for its Prime membership. Overall, more customers bought Amazon’s Prime subscription than the best-selling smartphone on the platform.
Amazon in the US counts nearly half of all households as Prime Customers, who spend nearly double ($1,200) than regular users to buy goods on its platform.
“In the little over three years we’ve been in India, we’ve probably created the fastest ramp up for e-commerce in this eco-system. This Diwali (sale) was three times bigger than last Diwali. We’ve been growing at 150 per cent year-over-year even though the landscape was flat and Diwali saw an even bigger acceleration,” said Amit Agarwal, country manager.
Over the past week, Amazon and local leader Flipkart have been competing to garner higher share of the customer wallet, offering discounts, better product quality and faster delivery. Flipkart and smaller rival Snapdeal close their five-day sale on Thursday. The sale is expected to garner $1.5 billion (Rs 10,000 crore) across all e-commerce platforms.
