Ahead of its festive season sale, Amazon, a prominent e-commerce giant, has unveiled a new Prime annual membership plan tailored for Android users, priced at just INR 399.
Named Prime Shopping Edition, this new offering is likely a strategic move by Amazon to compete with Flipkart’s recently launched VIP pass.
Read More: Flipkart launches VIP membership to counter Amazon’s Prime program
Amazon’s latest offering provides a straightforward shopping-only plan, featuring complimentary shipping, one-day deliveries, and associated perks. Nevertheless, users will not have access to additional services like Prime Video, Music, Reading, Gaming, and more, which are bundled with the comprehensive Prime membership.
For the time being, it appears that this offering is exclusively accessible to users who access the e-commerce platform through the app or mobile browsers on Android devices. The decision to restrict the offering to Android users is likely influenced by the fact that over 85% of smartphone users in India use Android devices.
“Once customers see and experience this shopping benefit, they would love to become a full member and enjoy all the other things. We don’t want them to think that it’s all or nothing. We want them to experience the shopping benefits and we believe that they will upgrade to full membership later,” Amazon India vice president Saurabh Srivastava told Moneycontrol.
The primary allure of the Prime Shopping Edition seems to be its 24-hour early access pass for subscribers. Essentially, while Amazon’s flagship sale, the ‘Great Indian Festival,’ is set to kick off on October 8, this pass grants users the privilege of accessing it a day in advance.
Amazon’s competitor, Flipkart, recently introduced a comparable offering known as the VIP pass, priced at INR 499 per year, only a few days ago.
At the moment, it remains uncertain whether this offering will extend its early access benefits to other sales hosted by the US-based e-commerce platform.
The decision comes as Amazon moved up its annual festive sale to October 8, aligning with Flipkart’s sale dates, in a bid to capture a larger share of the festive sales market.
The decision to introduce a more affordable version of the Prime membership may also be driven by the goal of expanding the Prime user base in India. Currently, Amazon has 18-20 million Prime users in India, compared to the reported monthly active user (MAU) count of 200 million.
This membership option offers a highly enticing opportunity for the e-commerce giant since Prime users typically generate an average order value (AOV) ranging from INR 1,800 to INR 2,000, in contrast to INR 1,000 to INR 1,200 for non-Prime customers, as reported by Moneycontrol.
In the meantime, Amazon has intensified its endeavors to leverage the surge in demand during the festive sales season. With distribution centers strategically located in 15 states and providing a total storage capacity of 43 million cubic feet, Amazon has also optimized a network consisting of nearly 2,000 delivery stations operated by Amazon itself and its partners throughout the country.
Amazon India has recently collaborated with India Post and Indian Railways to enhance its delivery operations. Additionally, the company has stated that it has generated over 100,000 seasonal job opportunities in anticipation of the upcoming sale event.
According to Redseer, the gross merchandise value (GMV) of India’s e-commerce sector is expected to experience a significant increase of 18-20%, reaching INR 90,000 Crores during the upcoming festive sale season.
