Dive Brief:
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Amazon is letting its Prime members in Chicago and Indianapolis in on its $7.99 one-hour and free two-hour Prime Now delivery services.
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The move comes just two days after the company signed up a new record number of Prime members during its inaugural Prime Day all-day sales event.
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Prime Now is also available in Atlanta, Baltimore, Dallas, Manhattan, and Miami, and will be expanding to more zip codes in those areas and to more cities in coming months, Amazon says. Free same-day delivery is available to Prime members in 14 U.S. metro areas.
Dive Insight:
There are now seven American cities (plus London, U.K.) where Amazon’s Prime members can get free two-hour delivery; the super-impatient can plunk down $7.99 to trim that down an hour. That means that all the new Prime members in those cities who are trying out the service for the first time thanks to Amazon’s Prime Day will have yet another reason to hang on to their memberships after their trial period expires.
This expansion is just a reminder that Amazon isn’t one to rest on any one achievement and is adamantly keeping brick-and-mortar retail on its toes. Despite grumbling and ribbing from customers and the press about Prime Day last week, Amazon declared victory. And with good reason: The company says it broke sales records and signed up “hundreds of thousands” new Prime members.