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Walmart Abandons Amazon's Kindle Lineup

Posted by Soulskill on from the clash-of-the-titans dept.

New submitter kiriath writes "Walmart has followed Target in ceasing to sell the Amazon Kindle product line. This is not terribly surprising, since Amazon and Walmart are major competitors. From the article: 'The world's largest retailer, which has been trying to catch up to Amazon in online sales, said the decision was consistent with its overall merchandising strategy. ... Now, with two large chains no longer selling Kindle, speculation has grown that the dominant online retailer could open its stores where shoppers could try out and buy Kindles. Amazon "is a little bit of a Trojan horse" when the Kindle is sold in other stores, said Sucharita Mulpuru, retail analyst at Forrester Research. "They should have made this decision to not carry the Kindle a long time ago."'"

4 of 104 comments (clear)

  1. No Surprise by oakgrove · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Huge multi-national discount chain doesn't want to sell a product the sole purpose of which is to get people to spend money somewhere else. News at 11.

    --
    The soylentnews experiment has been a dismal failure.
  2. Re:Who's affected? by tlhIngan · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Who would even buy a Kindle from WalMart or Target in the first place?

    People who shop at Target and Walmart? People who broke theirs and need a replacement immediately? People who wants theirs immediately? (It's the same price, after all)

    Thing is, there are a LARGE number of people who don't shop online. They'll purchase stuff from curated stores (Amazon, Apple, etc), but they won't go open a browser and type www.amazon.com, click through and check out. They will however find a book, see "buy it", tap it and boom, book is on their device.

    Thing is, a lot of other countries don't often have strong online shopping cultures (mostly due to lack of a decent Amazon, and competitors that charge shipping and taxes), so being able to buy it in a retail store for the same price is often quite appealing.

  3. Amazon is preparing to crush Wal-Mart by Animats · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Amazon is taking over more and more of retail. They've already taken over books and DVDs. They took over and re-started Webvan. They're building local distribution centers for same day delivery. They bought Kiva Robotics so those warehouses won't need many people.

    The glory years of store-based retail are over. No new enclosed mall has been built in the US in a decade. Most retail areas have vacant stores that will never be used again. In a few years, retail will consist of recreational shopping and convenience stores. Everything else will be on line.

    Then all we have to worry about is downtime. Read E. M. Forster's "The Machine Stops".

  4. Maybe.. not yet by rgbrenner · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Revenue:
    Walmart: 460b
    Target: 71b
    Amazon: 54b

    http://www.wikinvest.com/stock/Wal-Mart_(WMT)/Data/Revenue
    http://www.wikinvest.com/stock/Target_(TGT)/Data/Revenue
    http://www.wikinvest.com/stock/Amazon.com_(AMZN)/Data/Revenue

    Net profit:
    Walmart: 16.4b
    Target: 2.9b
    Amazon: 0.38b

    http://www.wikinvest.com/stock/Wal-Mart_(WMT)/Data/Net_Income/2012
    http://www.wikinvest.com/stock/Target_(TGT)/Data/Net_Income
    http://www.wikinvest.com/stock/Amazon.com_(AMZN)/Data/Net_Income

    So Walmart is 10x larger by revenue.. and 43x more profitable.
    Target is 1.5x larger by revenue.. and 7x more profitable.

    Amazon has a long way to go.