Amazon’s second annual Prime Day will take place Tuesday and rival U.S. retailers have announced deals of their own in a bid to steal sales from the online giant.
The Seattle-based e-tailer said new and existing Prime Members in the U.S., U.K., Spain, Japan, Italy, Germany, France, Canada, Belgium and Austria can expect more than 100,000 exclusive deals across nearly all departments and categories.
American members can start shopping at midnight Pacific time, with new deals expected as often as every five minutes throughout the day. Last year’s event was Amazon’s biggest day for sales internationally up to that point, as shoppers ordered a whopping 398 items per second worldwide.
“Prime Day is a unique opportunity to discover new items and great deals, on top of our already low prices. Following last year’s record sales, we have dramatically increased the inventory behind many deals,” Greg Greeley, vice president of Amazon Prime stated, noting that U.S. members will have access to nearly double the TV units compared to Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined.
With that being said, the deals are exclusive to members of its paid subscription service, Prime, which costs $99 per year but includes free two-day shipping on millions of items plus digital content.
Walmart, which challenged Amazon last year with its own summertime specials, is once again taking on the e-tailer, offering free shipping with no minimum purchase on all online orders for five days, starting Monday. An ad on its website pointed out that products included in rollback promotions would retail “at or lower than Amazon’s prices.”
Customers can also avail of a free 30-day trial to ShippingPass, Walmart’s Prime-like shipping option that’s normally $49 per year.
Elsewhere, Gap Inc.’s brands are all running promotions this week, too: Gap is offering up to 60 percent off goods online and in stores; all Old Navy merchandise is discounted by 15 percent Monday and Tuesday; and Banana Republic’s online store has up to 40 percent off select styles.
Additional “Black Friday in July” promotions can be found at Forever 21 (deals up to 70 percent off), as well as Target, Sears, The Limited and Express.