The latest news from Amazon: Prime Day postponed to October.
According to reports from CNBC, Geekwire, and BusinessInsider, Amazon Prime Day 2020 has been rescheduled to October in the wake of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Although no official date has been announced, it’s looking like the week of October 5th is the tentative new timeline.
Before COVID-19 took hold, it was assumed that Amazon Prime Day would occur on July 12th. Then, it got postponed to August. Then September. And now it’s been pushed back again to give time for the marketplace giant to get all its shipping and fulfillment ducks in a row, including the hiring of more than 175,000 new workers.
This announcement shouldn’t be a shock to anyone who advertises on Amazon. Merchandising, fulfillment, and shipping have been major concerns of brands large and small for the past several months. Although the situation has improved in recent weeks as many countries have seen a decrease in COVID-19 cases and shipping lag times have finally caught up with demand, a second wave in the U.S. will most likely lead to more challenges for those advertising on Amazon.
And aside from those concerns, there’s also the challenge of managing your inventory with Amazon Prime Day being so close to Cyber 5. How will Q4 seasonality start to play into the event? Will brands have enough inventory to cover two major influxes in orders with such short turnaround time between them?
If historical trends around Prime Day hold true this year, Amazon is looking in the neighborhood of $7-10 billion in revenue and over 150 million products sold during the 2020 event. To say that will put a strain on fulfillment and inventory management is a major understatement.
Savvy brands are already planning how they can optimize their performance with the new date so close to the holiday season. Effective planning and foresight will be the difference for the brands that see success and sales growth vs. those that stagnate and falter. Is your brand prepared?
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