Amazon reckon that UK-based businesses selling on Amazon Marketplace will see their best-ever sales this Christmas.
The record-breaking sales are expected as a result of third-party Marketplace sellers offering more products than ever before, participating in Amazon Christmas deal events for the first time, selling across more of Amazon’s international websites, and using Fulfilment by Amazon (FBA), so their products are included as part of Amazon’s popular Prime and Free Super Saver Delivery programmes.
Last quarter, 46% of units purchased by customers on Amazon’s websites around the world were sold by third-party sellers and Amazon say that Marketplace sellers play a vital role in helping Amazon offer Earth’s biggest selection. In Britain alone the number of sellers who generate over £1 million in annual sales increased 28% in the past year.
“We are thrilled to see our Marketplace sellers experiencing such rapid growth, creating jobs and playing an integral part in delighting customers,” said Simon Johnson, Director of UK Seller Services at Amazon. “We anticipate the biggest Christmas ever for our third-party businesses as a result of using services such as Fulfilment by Amazon and Global Selling.”
Here are a selection of comments from Amazon readers, it’s staggering to hear their stories and see their year on year growth:
Zamir Cajee, Founder, iQualTech
iQualTech year-to-date sales on Amazon.co.uk are currently running at 75% up year on year, and our Amazon European sales are up over 800% year on year. We sold 20,000 units on Amazon UK in Q4 2014 and ran out of stock due to sales significantly above expectations.
Growth this Christmas was anticipated at 75% year-on-year with an additional 25% buffer on key lines to avoid running out of stock as we did the previous year. However, following our participation in the inaugural Prime Day in July 2015, we realised we needed to dramatically revise our forecast to 150% year-on-year with an additional 50% buffer for key lines. Thanks to additional funding from Amazon Lending, we were able to fund this increase.
Steve Oliver, ZOverstocks
In the last three years, the business has sold 30 million DVDs, games and CDs on Amazon – that’s one product every three seconds! It is no exaggeration to say that we would not be here without Marketplace. As our primary online selling partner, it has facilitated explosive growth in a way I could never have imagined. There is little doubt that our 1,000 employees in the UK and 100+ team members in the United States are largely down to the growth on Amazon since we launched.
Dipesh Majithia, TVsandMore
Dipesh Majithia, TVsandMore
We anticipate huge growth this Christmas – triple the sales in comparison to the same period last year, which was our strongest trading period on Amazon to date. We have invested time on market research to ensure our Christmas buy is absolutely right. This year, through Fulfilment by Amazon, we can participate in Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals for the first time. With exposure to millions of Amazon’s Prime customers, we are predicting sales of more than 4,000 TVs.
“We are launching a brand new product – T4Tec, which is our first own manufactured line, and I predict it will be our best-selling Christmas product. As an Amazon exclusive, we have high hopes of huge sales volumes as it is a top quality product, great value for money and the perfect gift for tech addicts.
Ray Qudos, RDX
Being on Amazon Marketplace for Christmas is an outstanding opportunity for our business. You have the dual benefits of an incredible global retail partner and the best delivery options for customers.
“This helps us to plan and execute what is a crucial retail period for us globally. The festive season represents a 40% increase in sales and takes us over the £1 million a month barrier. We have been planning Black Friday, the Christmas rush and the January sales period for months now. We take full advantage of FBA and their international Fulfilment Centres, which historically perform better than all our other logistics carriers in this period.
