Amazon.com is no longer the only place to buy an Amazon Echo.
Starting today, Amazon’s smart Bluetooth speaker is now available at Staples.com, the new exclusive third-party retailer of the Echo.
The device sells at $179.99 online — the same price you’ll find on Amazon, which began selling the Echo to anyone on June 23. Previously, potential Echo buyers had to wait for an invitation to buy the speaker. It cost $99 for Amazon Prime members (raised to $149 later) and $199 for everyone else.
You won’t find the Echo at Staples’ physical retail locations, as this is an online-only offer. Staples also sells other Amazon hardware like the the Fire TV, the Fire TV stick, the Fire TV game controller, and several Kindle tablets on its website.
Staples has worked hard to build up its online presence in the face of increasing competition and in February announced it was acquiring Office Depot for $6.3 billion in cash and stock. Currently, e-commerce represents nearly 50 percent of the company’s overall revenue.
The Framingham, Massachusetts-based company also opened a 15,000 square-foot engineering and development center in downtown Seattle last year. The office, which has room for about 80 employees, is being led by Faisal Masud, who previously held roles at drugstore.com, Amazon, eBay and Groupon.
Staples and Amazon have partnered in the past, with Amazon.com putting its locker system — which allows customers to order products online and pick them up at physical locations — in Staples stores back in 2012. However, Staples removed the lockers in September 2013.
As for the Echo, Amazon earlier this year introduced the cylindrical speaker that connects to the Internet and responds to voice commands, adds things to shopping lists, plays your favorite music, and tells you the news and weather, among other features. Amazon, which in June released a set of APIs that lets developers create voice-driven capabilities for the Echo, competes with Apple’s Siri, Google Now and Microsoft Cortana in the voice-activated virtual assistant market.
Reviews are generally positive for the Echo thus far, with two-thirds of reviewers on Amazon.com giving the intelligent talking speaker a 5-star rating.
