Wal-Mart Stores Inc.’s ShippingPass e-commerce subscription programme will begin offering delivery in two days rather than three, escalating competition with Amazon.com Inc.’s Prime.
The retailer is also cutting the price of the programme by $1, to $49 a year, according to a recent statement. Amazon’s Prime costs $99 annually, although it offers other perks, such as free movies and TV shows.
ShippingPass, still in a pilot phase, lets Walmart.com customers get free delivery of more than one million products on the site. The idea is to encourage frequent shopping and lock in customers – something that Amazon’s Prime has achieved with its tens of millions of members. Despite being the world’s largest bricks-and-mortar retailer, Wal-Mart is still struggling to catch up with Amazon.
Wal-Mart’s strategy in e-commerce is to rely on its stores and distribution centres to support its online efforts. Over the holiday season, the company encouraged shoppers to place orders on its website and pick the products up in stores.
With ShippingPass, Wal-Mart’s existing infrastructure is helping it lower delivery costs, the Bentonville, Arkansas-based company said recently.
“We can offer faster and more affordable shipping because we have a unique fulfilment network that includes new large-scale fulfilment centres, stores, distribution centres and our transportation network,” Wal-Mart said in the statement.
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