Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, Amazon’s Prime Day sale in India saw a huge demand for smartphones, large appliances, and apparel, with Chinese names such as OnePlus and Redmi among the top-selling brands despite the anti-China sentiment.

Amazon India says it added twice the number of Prime members added in last year's event during the sale it held last week.

The ecommerce company also said it had the highest participation from small businesses, with over 91,000 SMBs participating, and over 209 of them becoming ‘crorepatis’.

India was the first country for Amazon globally to kick off its 2-day annual Prime Day event on August 6, while the other markets will hold the event in the next quarter.

Prime Day is meant for Prime members of Amazon, allowing them to avail discounts, grab new launches, and access new content on Prime Video and other Amazon platforms.

Globally, Amazon has 150 million Prime members, though, in India, the base was around 10 million as of July, as per Forrester Research.

Amazon said it was prepared to deliver to customers in containment zones with a certain protocol, such as making the delivery at the periphery of the containment area, while also making tech changes to prioritise essential items wherever necessary.

But apart from essential pantry items, the larger-ticket, non-essential items such as smartphones, personal computing and large appliance saw the most units sold.

Chinese smartphone brands such as OnePlus and Redmi continued to be among the best-selling phones on the platform, apart from Samsung and Apple, despite the rising anti-China sentiment in India.

“Mobile phones category has a large selection of foreign brands. But a lot of mobile accessories are increasingly local,” Agarwal said.

“There is an increasing trend of local manufacturers launching products on Amazon,” he added.

For Amazon, the event also comes under the new ecommerce rules under the Consumer Protection Act, which mandates ecommerce companies to appoint a grievance redressal officer and to also display the Country of Origin for all products, among several other changes.

“We are compliant with all rules including Country of Origin,” Agarwal said. “It is the sellers’ responsibility to accurately reflect the Country of Origin,” he added.

Amazon India has over 6.5 lakh sellers on its platform.

First Published:Aug 10, 2020 3:11 PM IST