Amazon’s June Prime Day week turns into a hit for early summer shopping

You’d expect interest in Prime Day to have waned after 12 years, but this year, shoppers went in looking harder for deals to snag hefty discounts on everything from TV sets to back-to-school items and everyday essentials.

Amazon’s first June Prime Day, which ran from June 23 to June 26, delivered deeper discounts across the board. The overall energy around the event was positive, with strong consumer response throughout the four days. Last year, Prime Day shoppers might have been filling their carts, but were not quite ready to hit buy.

This year’s event generated $26.4 billion in consolidated e-commerce sales in the US, data from Adobe, which tracks visits to retail websites, showed. The overall haul marks a 9.3% rise in spending YoY.

The nature of the event, overall, is such that shoppers show a heavier spend volume on the first two days, Vivek Pandya, lead analyst at Adobe Digital Insights, told Retail Brew.

“What we’re finding is the consumer is leaning in on these sales moments to really experience more value,” Pandya said. “They’ve dealt with a lot of price fluctuations through the years, and they really locked in on these moments to get additional items that they might need down the road, stocking up on goods, but also getting that balance of essentials, and also nice-to-have items.”

“You have a consumer who’s very reactive to these moments,” Pandya added.

Basket story: The top-selling items early in Prime Day were premier protein shakes, Liquid IV packets, and strong trash bags, based on data tracked by Numerator. Nearly seven in 10 items (69%) purchased cost under $20, and just 3% of orders crossed the $100 mark, bringing the average spend per item to $23.23, down from $24.59 last year. About half of shoppers said they bought something they’d been holding off on and waiting for the right deal, Numerator’s survey found.

“It sort of created a bit of a frenzy,” Phil Masiello, founder and CEO of Crunchgrowth—which handles Amazon stores for roughly 100 brands across food, apparel, and electronics—told Retail Brew. “Some of the discounts were strong enough that people saw the value.”

Prime discounts on Amazon ran deeper than previous years, ranging from 20% to 40%, significantly more than the usual baseline range of 15%–25% among clients, Katya Constantine, CEO of agency Digishopgirl Media, told Retail Brew.

The bigger brands were tracking flat compared to last year, Constantine said, while smaller brands were having their “best” Prime Day yet, she said. “There’s definitely kind of a split, but Day 1 was definitely very strong,” Constantine said. Amazon’s Day 2 performance came in slightly below Day 1, though it still outpaced expectations, she added.

For Masiello’s clients, electronics performed well because of strong discounts of 25%–30%, driving demand. Home textiles were another bright spot, with shoppers stocking up on sheets, blankets, and pillowcases to get a head start on back-to-school and college move-in season.

“I’m surprised at how well that category is doing for us right now,” Masiello said.

Consumer behavior showed a preference for early shopping, according to Adobe, with the first two days potentially clocking $7 billion–$8 billion in spending across retailers, compared to $5 billion–$6 billion on the last two days, Pandya said.

July story: The average order size for Prime Day dropped to $47.66 down from $53.34 last year, Numerator reported. Still, nearly half of shoppers placed two or more orders, putting the average household spend at around $143.45 down from $156.37 a year ago.

The conversation with clients has already shifted to what July looks like, Constantine said. And even though Amazon isn’t running another Prime Day next month, there’s a real opportunity to keep the momentum going. “We’re looking at Brand Tailored promotions and coupon plugs, and then also some dedicated offers on Subscribe and Save,” she said.