NOT A PRIME DAY FOR AMAZON USERS
Early glitches paralyze Amazon web site on big sale holiday
Amazon’s website ran into some glitches on its much-hyped Prime Day on Monday.
NEW YORK — Amazon’s website ran into some early snags Monday on its much-hyped Prime Day, an embarrassment for the tech company on the shopping holiday it created.
Shoppers clicking on many Prime Day links after the 1 p.m. MT launch in the U.S. got only images of dogs — some quite abashed-looking — with the words, “Uh-oh. Something went wrong on our end.” People took to social media to complain that they couldn’t order items.
By about 2:30 p.m. MT, many Prime Day links were working, and Amazon said later Monday that it was working to resolve the glitches.
In an email to The Associated Press, it said “many are shopping successfully” and that in the first hour of Prime Day in the U.S., customers ordered more items than in the same time frame last year.
Still, the hiccups could mute sales and send shoppers elsewhere during one of Amazon’s busiest sales periods that’s also a key time for it to sign up new Prime members. Shoppers have lots of options, as many other chains have offered sales and promotions to try to capitalize on the Prime Day spending.
Analyst Sucharita MulpuruKodali at Forrester Research called the glitch a “huge deal.”
“This is supposed to be one of their biggest days of the year,” she wrote in an email. “I am shocked this caught them off guard. But I guess the lesson is to not have a big unveil during the middle of the day when everyone comes to
your site all at once.”
Amazon, which recently announced that Prime membership would be getting more expensive, was hoping to lure in shoppers by focusing on new products and having Whole Foods be part of the process.
Jason Goldberg, senior vice president of commerce at Sapient Razorfish, noted that the problems could turn off shoppers for a while, particularly those who planned to sign up for Prime membership.
Goldberg noted that it’s easy for Amazon to extend deals on its own devices and brands, but trickier for it to extend deals for its third-party sellers because they signed up for different promotional slots.
While Amazon doesn’t disclose sales figures for Prime Day, Deborah Weinswig, CEO of Coresight Research, had estimated that it will generate $3.4 billion in sales worldwide, up from an estimated $2.4 billion last year. Prime Day also lasts six hours longer than last year.
Meanwhile, other retailers like Macy’s, Nordstrom, Best Buy, Walmart and Target have rolled out their own promotions, said Charlie O’Shea, lead retail analyst at Moody’s.