Amazon Moves Into Big Appliances In Partnership With Retailer
In what could be a forerunner for the likes of JB Hi Fi and The Good Guys US retailer has moved to sell their house brand appliance range online.
Overnight Sears have announced that they will begin selling its Kenmore line of major appliances on Amazon, marking the first time Kenmore major appliances are sold by another retailer.
The move could see JB Hi Fi move to sell their Soniq TV brand or The Good Guys who have several house brand appliances sell direct through Amazon the main Amazon portal.
The move to cut a deal with Amazon came after the US online retailer announced that they are moving into selling “bulky” appliances. Under the deal Sears will warehouse and supply the stock.
Sears said that their full line of Kenmore Elite, Kenmore Pro and Kenmore Smart appliances will be available on Amazon, as will Sears Home Services and Innovel Solutions delivery, installation and extended product protection.
Sears will begin shipping a select assortment of Kenmore appliances next week in the Los Angeles market as an operational test,
Tom Park, president of Kenmore, Craftsman and DieHard brands at Sears Holdings, told TWICE in the USA. It will roll out to the rest of the country “as soon as possible.”
In Australia Amazon is believed to be only concentrating on Melbourne and Sydney initially.
Park said Sears made the deal to expand its brand distribution and omnichannel retail strategy. “This is an opportunity to broaden reach of the brand and expose it to new consumers,” he said, describing the deal as “complementary to our retailer operations.”
The deal also provides Amazon with a high-profile entrée into major appliances, a category which has so far eluded the e-tailer save for third-party sales.
As perhaps a prelude to this announcement, Sears announced last month that its Kenmore Smart appliances would feature Amazon Alexa compatibility. The Kenmore Smart connected room ACs are the first products to feature voice control, and consumers can raise and lower temperatures using the Kenmore Smart skill.
All Kenmore Smart products will feature Alexa.
