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In this Amazon Seller's Week in Review, Julie Spear, our Operations Manager, shares her take on recent news highlights and what these could mean for brands selling on the Amazon marketplace.
Amazon adds 4 more Fulfillment Centers
After building out 26 fulfillment centers in 2016, Amazon kicked off 2017 by announcing the building of 4 additional centers. Earlier today, Amazon announced plans to build a 1 million-square-foot facility in Aurora, CO, the first center in Colorado! This center will offer 1,000 full-time positions.
Amazon will also build a 1.2 million-square-foot facility in North East, Md., which will employ 700. and a 1 million-square-foot facility in Coppell, Texas. Earlier in January, Amazon announced plans to build a 1 million-square-foot facility in Jacksonville, FL that will eventually employ 1,000 full-time workers.
Amazon adds Digital Dash Buttons
Source: Amazon.com
In 2015, Amazon introduced Dash buttons to bring even more one-click, instant gratification to its customers. The physical buttons, similar to key fobs, enabled customers to reorder frequently used items by pressing a button.
Last week, Amazon upped its game once again by taking the physical Dash Buttons and turning them digital. The new version of the buttons appear on Amazon’s home page of Prime members and allow customers to reorder the item with one click. These buttons appear automatically for all Prime-eligible items that a customer has purchased previously. They’ll appear for items the customer has ordered often or for items that others typically order frequently...it just keeps getting easier to purchase on Amazon!
Amazon’s impact on the US toy market continues to grow
While still awaiting final numbers for 2016 holiday toy sales, YTD figures shared by the Toy Industry Association in September indicate total toy sales in the U.S. grew 6% year over year over 2015, bringing the 2016 U.S. toys market value estimate to roughly $27 billion. Amazon’s total toys sales for 2016 are estimated at $4 billion, meaning Amazon captured 15% of the total toy market. Even more impressive is Amazon’s YoY growth of 24% in this category alone!
What toys sell best? Building Blocks (which include LEGOs) and Board Games topped the charts. While final numbers for brick-and-mortar are still rolling in, the initial data indicates the trend of purchasing on Amazon continues to grow stronger and toy developers identify Amazon as the place to grow the toy industry.
Source: OneClickRetail.com
10% of Top Brands on Amazon Are Private Label or Exclusive Deals
Recent analysis of the top 10,000 brands on Amazon finds 10% of these brands are sold by a single seller. Marketplace Pulse hypothesizes that this indicates the marketplace is increasingly going the direction of limiting competition for a single brand. Manufacturers are increasingly cutting out the middle-man and selling their products on Amazon directly as opposed to distributing to retailers.
If you missed our previous Amazon Seller's Week in Review, you can read it here.
That’s all there is to it this week's news for Amazon Sellers. Stay tuned for next week's news update. In the meantime, you can ask your Amazon related questions in our Facebook group, The Amazon Channel Mastery for Brands or contact us here.
