Amazon Stumbles Into Blunder on Prime Day
The e-commerce giant creates real trouble on its fake shopping holiday.
The customer isn’t always right, apparently.
Photographer: Bess Adler/Bloomberg
Amazon.com Inc.’s fake shopping holiday started off on the wrong foot, unless you love dogs. Adorable canines doubling as error messages greeted at least some people who tried to surf Amazon’s vast shopping mall in the early hours of Prime Day on Monday.
The technical glitches, and Amazon’s lackluster response to them, were an embarrassment for a company that was making itself the center of attention. Amazon’s Prime Day failures won’t mar the company’s financial results, but they do leave a mark. A company that’s trying to be the starting point for the world’s shopping displayed how fragile it could be, just like any fusty old retailer. And worse, the company’s reaction to its setback exposed Amazon as tone-deaf to its customers’ problems.