Amazon.com met with success this holiday season getting customers to try a Prime membership, the program that offers free 2-day shipping, access to thousands of movies and TV shows and other perks.
The company said that more than 10 million people tried Prime for the first time this holiday season, with “tried” being the operative word. Amazon offers a 30-day free trial to customers, and includes Prime trials with its devices including the Fire tablets. It’s unclear how many Amazon customers will stick with the membership, now that the holiday shopping crush is over.
Amazon has always closely guarded its total number of Prime customers, only saying that it has “tens of millions.”
Earlier this year, a stock analyst estimated that Amazon had 50 million Prime members worldwide. The company boosted the cost of a Prime membership in March, increasing it from $79 to $99.
At 50 million members, Prime alone would bring in roughly $5 billion in subscription fees.
“We are working hard to make Prime even better and expanding the recently launched Prime Now to additional cities in 2015,” said Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos in a statement.
Amazon Prime Now is a new 1-hour delivery service, first available in New York City, which allows customers to get daily essentials like toothpaste and paper towels super quick. It is only available to Prime members.
