Here's How the First 24 Hours of Prime Day Shook Out

We're past the halfway point of Amazon's first-ever 48-hour Prime Day and Amazon is already boasting how discounts have saved Prime members “hundreds of millions of dollars in the U.S.” Meanwhile, the company says customers around the world have purchased millions of Alexa-enabled devices, along with Instant Pots, water filters and Crest 3D White Professional Effects Whitening Strips. And this train ain't slowing down. In the next 24 hours, Amazon said some of the best deals are still to come “with new deals being revealed as often as every five minutes.” As for the rest of the retail landscape, Adobe Analytics found large retailers—those with more than $1 billion in annual revenue—saw a 64% increase in sales on their own sites compared to an average Monday on the first day of sales. (That’s also up from their 54% bump in 2018.) This, Adobe says, suggests “Amazon is no longer the sole winner of the summer shopping holiday.” Small retailers, or those with less than $5 million in annual revenue, benefited too, seeing a 30% bump in online sales on their own platforms. And now Adobe says Prime Day has cemented itself as the third occasion outside the holiday season to surpass $2 billion in online sales, following Labor Day 2018 and Memorial Day 2019. Increased visits to online retailers account for 66% of revenue lift, Adobe said. Adobe said “brands that delivered excellent email experiences” saw a 50% lift—and retailers with BOPIS [Buy-Online-Pickup-In-Store] saw average orders increase 12%, or from $115 to $131. If it seems like every purveyor of everything has its own spin this year, you’re on to something: Savings site RetailMeNot counted over 300 retailers offering deals as of 9 a.m. CT on July 16, including “aggressive deals, flash sales, free shipping offers and other types of promotions aligning to the two days around Prime Day.” RetailMeNot said “aggressive free shipping offers” are particularly popular among these retailers, which either lower minimum spend or tout no membership fees. In addition, RetailMeNot said 35% of these competing sales are playing on the word “prime” in their offer messaging, including: Joann’s Primo Days, West Elm’s “Reasons to Love West Elm, (Primarily) Today” and Ulta’s “Up to 50% Off Primer Days” with deals on—what else?—face primers. But not everything is smooth sailing from a customer perspective. According to Melissa Burdick, president of ecommerce platform Pacvue and a former Amazon category and advertising manager, not all retailers are making it easy to compare prices. That includes Target, which she noted forces shoppers to add items to their carts to see prices. She said one item from Target is $17.99 versus $20.69 on Amazon, but Target’s price is actually $23.98 with $5.99 shipping, “which isn’t transparent until you add to cart and look to check out.” “On top of this, Target is offering a $10 gift card with same-day order services,” she added. “The gift card [plus the] inability to directly price match with a straightforward price on the detail page makes it difficult to actually price compare and determine which retailer is the winner to the customer.”