Amazon claim to have added more than 10 million new buyers to their Prime programme in December, according to press reports.
It seems that most of the new users were Stateside where subscribers get unlimited two-day shipping for an annual fee of $99. Also, it must be noted, that we don’t know how many are also just taking part in a free promo over Christmas and don’t yet actually pay for the service.
Amazon likes Prime members because they are said to spend twice as much as regular users. Sadly we don’t know how many Prime members there are in total (although tens of millions is a fair estimate) and we also don’t have a breakdown of those numbers with reference to the UK and Europe.
Prime members in the UK get fewer perks than those in the US and pay £79 including access to Amazon Video and other services as part of the package.
3 Responses
Prime used to be great when they used Royal Mail and DPD but since deliveries started to be made by Amazon Logistics it can no longer be relied on for next day delivery and instead we often get the ‘we tried to deliver’ email when the driver has not even bothered to. Still we probably will never need to pay again for Prime as they keep giving us a free month for every time they fail to deliver.
I cancelled my Prime membership because (1) an every increasing percentage of goods didn’t qualify (2) I could not be sure of getting my parcels within the time stated (3) very few films of interest to download (4) Expensive.
I managed to get Prime for £49 last year; one week before it increased to £79.
For me, they provide great service, and never missed a delivery. Also, streaming service has plenty to offer (some great Amazon-only TV series, especially). Don’t also forget the free lending library they offer (although you need a Kindle device to take advantage of that).
£79 is a little harder to swallow however, and I will probably let the subscription lapse, until the next time I actually want another next day delivery later this year.
S.