Amazon has today opened it's full online store in Australia. Amazon.com.au has existed for some time, selling basically books and Kindle related products, though it did in recent years offer instant video, Kindle Unlimited and basically a few miscellaneous services. Kindle hardware and other physical products other than books simply linked to a few local retailers or to the main US store. Some things of course did not ship to Australia at all.
Amazon was to open last week, but the launch was delayed, apparently due to some problems with the site design. The new full store now features a range of products both Amazon's own products from it's single Melbourne warehouse and marketplace products. It seems many of Amazon's overseas suppliers have come to Australia with it, or will be doing so. As yet, the offering is limited compared to the US or UK. Our large local retailers will be pleased to see there are no televisions featured on the site. Prime will not be offered until next year, though a limited version is available for 6 months at a discounted price which features only Prime Video and Prime Twitch. They do state that Prime Shipping is coming, that they are working hard on it but can't share details at the moment. They invite people to join an email list for updates. Echo devices are not yet available, and apparently won't be until some time in the New Year. The Fire TV stick is available, but not the full Fire TV.
At the moment shipping lags well behind the rest of the world. Australia is a huge country and very sparsely populated except for a relatively few cities with great distances between them. At the moment Amazon has a single Warehouse in Melbourne. According to a report in The Australian newspaper:
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Amazon plans to offer free *delivery on orders above $49. *Delivery would take three to seven days in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Canberra, Perth and major *regional areas of Victoria, NSW and South Australia. Otherwise delivery is between seven and 10 days, or longer in some remote areas.
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I expect Amazon to improve this very quickly. I can see 2 day delivery coming to capital cities and perhaps some large regional areas. I can see one day or even shorter delivery times coming to Melbourne, but without a local Warehouse even one day deliveries to other capital cities may be a challenge in the near future. I do think this will come as Amazon gains market share and gathers local sales data.
All in all, not a bad start. But, of course:
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In a briefing to The Australian yesterday, Amazon said some of its services would come online slowly — not everything would be available at launch. Gaining market share in Australia would take time.
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Welcome to Australia Amazon. I wish you well.