Amazon teases Prime Day events in NYC, LA
Marketing blitz similar to Alibaba’s Singles’ Day
SAN FRANCISCO – If you live in New York or Los Angeles, don’t be surprised if a 25-foot Amazon box shows up in your city sometime in the next two weeks. It’s part of a marketing campaign for Amazon’s Prime Day sale that starts July 16.
The giant boxes, which will also appear in London, Tokyo and Milan, will open to reveal a pop-up event that will be live-streamed on the Amazon website. New York City’s event could be a concert and Los Angeles’ a video-gaming event. Fashion and literary themes are also a possibility.
“New this year, members can ... experience surprise entertainment events unboxed from giant Smile boxes in major cities,” said Jeff Wilke, Amazon’s head of retail.
The marketing blitz comes in advance of Amazon’s fourth annual Prime Day sales event. In 2017, Prime Day brought in revenue of about $1 billion, according to estimates by Cowen & Co. and JPMorgan Chase & Co., triple the company’s average daily e-commerce revenue.
Amazon will tout the value of its $119-a-year Prime membership to its more than 100 million subscribers, with access to Amazon Music, Amazon Prime Video and its video-game streaming platform Twitch.
The concept of opening the boxes in public is a nod to the popularity of “unboxing videos.” Hugely popular online, these feature a simple video shot of someone taking a product out of a box and sometimes enumerating what’s inside.
The company plans to invite select Prime members to view the physical opening of the boxes. The millions of Amazon customers who aren’t able to watch in person will instead get to view whatever the events turn out to be in real time by going to amazon .com/unboxingprimeday, where each event will be streamed live.
The promotional shows bear more than a passing resemblance to the giant streamed extravaganza China’s Alibaba online company holds each year, a star-studded event that helps launch its annual Singles’ Day sale on Nov. 11.
The four-hour Alibaba live spectacular included more than 700 performers last year, including actress Nicole Kidman and musician Pharrell.
Amazon’s Prime Day first launched in 2015 as a sort of Christmas-in-July sale where customers were meant to buy things they themselves wanted, rather than buying gifts for friends and family.
Panned the first year as having too few deals and too many overstock items sellers seemed to be trying to unload, it has grown in usefulness and interest. It now lasts 11⁄ days.
2