Momentum Commerce Says Amazon Prime Day Sales Down 14% in First 4 Hours

The first four hours of Amazon’s Prime Day event reportedly saw sales figures that were 14% lower than those at the beginning of last year’s event, Bloomberg reported Tuesday (July 8), citing data from Momentum Commerce.

Momentum Commerce manages Amazon sales on behalf of brands and generates about $7 billion in sales annually on the platform, according to the report.

Reached by PYMNTS, Amazon declined to comment on the report.

The Bloomberg report noted that this year’s event will last four days, while the 2024 event lasted two days, so shoppers could be spreading their purchases over a longer period of time or holding off on their purchases in hopes of larger discounts being offered later in the event.

“Amazon’s first 4-day Prime Day is completely different,” Momentum Commerce said in a Wednesday (July 2) post on LinkedIn.

At the same time, the Bloomberg report said, the initial hours of Prime Day are seen as an indicator of the event’s performance and are closely watched for signals about consumer sentiment and the strength of the economy.

During Prime Day, Amazon offers exclusive deals to the members of its Prime subscription program. The event was introduced in 2015, and the Prime program had 196 million members in the U.S. as of March, according to the report.

PYMNTS reported Tuesday that Walmart launched Walmart+ Week the same day Amazon launched Prime Day and that observers are watching to see if consumers will behave differently during this year’s sales events than they did during last year’s.

While last year’s deal season took place under a cloud of economic uncertainty, this year’s season is also faced with global tariffs and declining consumer confidence.

It was reported Tuesday that the trade war has caused some consumers and some brands to stay away from this year’s edition of Amazon’s annual summer sale.

Amazon said in a Tuesday press release that in addition to the new four-day format, this year’s Prime Day summer shopping event also introduces themed daily deal drops called “Today’s Big Deals.”

In another Tuesday press release, the company said the deals offered during the extended shopping event will be offered across more than 35 categories of products and services.