Amazon is celebrating a successful holiday season with growing Prime members, record setting free shipping through Prime and incredible sales throughout the holiday season.
Shoppers make the most during the annual festive season. Leading retailers bring the best deals to attract more buyers.
Amazon, the world's largest online retailer, has released its post-Christmas statistics report of sales and shipping during the peak shopping period of the year. The e-commerce giant broke its own record for the number of Prime items shipped worldwide. Amazon had to put a hold on new member signups for Prime so as to cater to the current members effectively in the peak sale period.
According to the company's press release, Amazon Prime customers took advantage of the unlimited Free Two-Day shipping on millions of items. The retailer claims this holiday season was the "best ever," with more than 1 million customers joining Prime in the third week of December. Also, more than 36.8 million items were ordered on Cyber Monday alone. According to calculations, 426 items were sold per second, setting a new record.
"Amazon Prime membership continues to grow, and we now have tens of millions of members worldwide. They benefit from all-you-can-eat free two-day shipping on millions of eligible items and our members have a voracious appetite," Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.com, said in a press statement. "We are extremely grateful to our customers around the world and wish everyone the very best for the coming year."
Amazon offers Prime membership for $79 annual fees, which offers free two-day shipping.
The online retailer also saw a significant boost in its offerings in 2013. Kindle owners enjoyed over 475,000 books, up from 250,000. Prime members had the option to borrow these books for free with no due dates. Each of 150 Kindle Direct Publishing authors had sold over 100,000 copies of their books in 2013. Amazon also increased the number of apps to more than 100,000 in 2013.