Amazon may raise Prime prices.

[tubemonkey]

Pandora is raising it's fees from $4 to $5 per month and dropping the $36 annual subscription. This is due to rising royalties. Still waiting to see what Amazon brings to the table for streaming music.

[Sregener]

Well, I caved and renewed my Prime subscription. Came time to buy birthday presents, and in order to get them on time, I would have paid nearly $40 in shipping. So in one order, I paid for half the year, and I get all the other Prime benefits as well.

[fjtorres]

KMART is doing their own two day shipping program at $39 a year.
(With execeptions for big or heavy products.)
http://www.kmart.com/shc/s/SywMaxLan...2&ruid=2003063

That sort-of values the non-shipping perks of Prime at $60 a year.
(Which oddly enough, is the retail value of the free Amazon First ebooks.)

If you want to decontruct Prime pricing, that's one benchmark to add to Netflix pricing...

Edit: SEARS is also pushing MAX. No shock.

[gal_amy]

My prime is expiring next month.

Anything prime is still free shipping if it goes over $35?

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by gal_amy

My prime is expiring next month.

Anything prime is still free shipping if it goes over $35?

If I understand your question right, yes. There are things on Amazon that are not on the free shipping program and those won't count to the 35. But in general if it's in prime it also qualifies towards the 35. If there is a particular item you want to know about and I'm in the right country, I can look it up for you. Or some people log out and look or look from a different computer when not signed in.

I used the free shipping with 25 for years. 35 is a bit more difficult to hit and with it in place I am finding things are cheaper to buy elsewhere. I haven't bought anything other than kindle books since 35 started (and I have a subscription for walnut oil--that doesn't have to hit 35). I did cancel two other subs because the price for them went up past where it made sense.

[tubemonkey]

I got Prime last Nov for the video and Black Friday sales. It'll get me through this year's Black Friday sales, then I'll cancel it. Then the following year, I may repeat that process - 1 year of Prime to last 2 years of Black Friday sales.

Of course I may change my mind if Amazon offers radio streaming with no ads and unlimited skips; and/or an Android video app.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

and/or an Android video app.

It's pretty trivial to get Amazon video on most any Android device. Works fine, and doesn't even seem kludgey.

[Purple Lady]

Originally Posted by ApK

It's pretty trivial to get Amazon video on most any Android device. Works fine, and doesn't even seem kludgey.

I use this as well and it works great.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by ApK

It's pretty trivial to get Amazon video on most any Android device. Works fine, and doesn't even seem kludgey.

Already have Amazon video on my Nexus 7.2, but an app is easier to deal with.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

Already have Amazon video on my Nexus 7.2, but an app is easier to deal with.

It's possible they could come up with a truly awful app....

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by ApK

It's pretty trivial to get Amazon video on most any Android device. Works fine, and doesn't even seem kludgey.

It works, but doesn't work all that well quality wise in my experience especially compared to the Fire or iOS app.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

It works, but doesn't work all that well quality wise in my experience especially compared to the Fire or iOS app.

I'll take your word for it. I can't tell them apart, but to my eyes, on our 8" and smaller screens, medium-bandwidth SD looks the same as high-bandwidth HD, as long as the motion is smooth and the audio is in sync.

[TheMatrix]

Not just going up to $99, but its $99+tax. At least for us here in California.

[DiapDealer]

They didn't charge tax on the $79 version in California?

[rkw]

Originally Posted by gal_amy

My prime is expiring next month.

Anything prime is still free shipping if it goes over $35?

Not sure what you are asking here. If you have PRIME here in the US anything that is not an add-on ships free 2-day with Prime no matter what the order total. There is no minimum total for free shipping to Prime members.

Now there is the free shipping for non-prime members. They have to hit a minimum order total for the free shipping to apply.

I don't like this price increase either, especially when combined with the sales tax detail but I still save so much time shopping with Amazon it's well worth it, to me. It also has not helped that Amazon is no longer even trying to be competitive on pricing items sold by Amazon. It seems they have been bumping prices slowly to cover shipping costs.

If anything we Prime members should be cranky over the fact non-members continue to receive free shipping. Perhaps raising that minimum order for free shipping will help a bit but the markup on that added $10 can't be more than a couple bucks so I don't see how it actually helps anything. Only upping prices on Prime eligible items will cover shipping increases.

I wanted to clear that up as there is a bit of mis-information being passed around, as usual one the web by the chicken-littles. I don't know why Prime shipping confuses people so much, it's not "rocket surgery" after all but Amazon has found a way to confuse people it seems.

I actually think Amazon is at a crossroads with their retail sales, at least here in the US. Unless they do something like buy UPS or some other parcel delivery service...and don't think the can't or won't. I suspected DHL had enough infrastructure but maybe not. Despite the overhead of doing so I do think Amazon has to be pondering their own parcel delivery company. It's a service the could offer to ALL Amazon sellers no matter their location. Now there would be a huge advantage over the competition which nobody could match. It sure could shake things up as if it was their own company UPS would take a HUGE hit on the balance sheets almost overnight. Heck it might even make UPS try and provide friendly and reasonable service...