Amazon Prime is a significant growth driver for revenue for many years and the annual subscription system not only gives users free two day shipping, but a host of other benefits. In a 10-K filing summarizing performance throughout 2016, Amazon did something that it had never done before, they had a designated a category entitled “retail subscription services” that refers, in part, to Prime.
Amazon generated $6.4 billion in retail subscriptions in 2016 and this is a 43% increase over last year. To put this type of money in prospective, Amazon subscriptions surpassed the total online sales of Macy’s, The Home Depot and Best Buy.
Business Insider cites a report by Morgan Stanley’s analyst Brian Nowak that roughly pegs there to be 65 million Prime members worldwide. Nowak’s estimate assumes both that $88 is the average price paid for Prime, per user, across all markets and that 90% of sales for the respective category result from Prime.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
