Amazon 2020 SMB Impact Report Highlights Success for Small and Medium-Sized Businesses Despite COVID-19; American Sellers Average $160,000 in Annual Sales

Amazon gave more than $1 billion in AWS credits to help startups accelerate their growth, and there are now more than 700,000 Alexa developers worldwide (File Photo: Robert Scoble/Flickr, CC BY 2.0)

More than 2 million independent businesses work with Amazon in the U.S.

American small and medium-sized businesses sold 3.4 billion products in Amazon stores

U.S. delivery and logistics partners employ more than 95,000 drivers, while worldwide authors earned more than $319 million from the Kindle Direct Publishing Select Global Fund

Amazon gave more than $1 billion in AWS credits to help startups accelerate their growth, and there are now more than 700,000 Alexa developers worldwide

SEATTLE–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) today published the 2020 Small and Medium Business (SMB) Impact Report, highlighting how the company benefits SMBs, including more than 2 million independent sellers, authors, content creators, delivery providers, developers and IT solution providers in the U.S. Despite the impact COVID-19 has had on many small businesses, American SMBs working with Amazon have been able to thrive and grow. View the full 2020 Amazon SMB Impact Report, here.

This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200721005239/en/

The 2020 Amazon SMB Impact Report highlights how millions of small and medium-sized businesses are growing with Amazon. (Photo: Business Wire)

“At Amazon, supporting small and medium-sized businesses is a fundamental part of our work and an extension of our customer-centric culture. Our success depends on their success,” said Jeff Wilke, CEO, Amazon Worldwide Consumer. “COVID-19 has changed the way we live and work and has created daunting challenges for small businesses around the world. Yet smaller companies have continued to grow with Amazon, despite the crisis. Third-party sellers have seen record sales in our stores and continue to outpace our first-party sales.”

Amazon provides small business owners, startups, and entrepreneurs with tools and opportunities to succeed – whether selling their products online, running delivery and logistics companies, using the cloud to launch and scale their businesses, creating voice apps, or publishing their own books. The 2020 Amazon SMB Impact Report findings include:

American SMBs selling in Amazon’s stores are growing. In the 12 months ending on May 31, 2020:

• American SMB sellers sold more than 3.4 billion products, up from 2.7 billion year-over-year, and averaged 6,500 products sold per minute.
• On average, American SMB sellers each had over $160,000 in sales, up year-over-year from approximately $100,000.
• The number of American SMB sellers that surpassed $1 million in sales grew by more than 20%, and more than 3,700 surpassed $1 million in sales for the first time.
• American SMB sales from business customers on Amazon Business were over $7 billion.
• SMBs selling on the Amazon.com U.S. store support an estimated 1.1 million jobs, up from 830,000 in 2019.

Amazon delivery and logistics businesses are creating jobs

• There are now more than 1,000 Amazon Delivery Service Partner businesses in the U.S., employing more than 82,000 drivers.
• U.S. line haul service providers that move Amazon packages between fulfillment centers and to and from air hubs employ more than 13,000 drivers, up from 3,700 in 2018.

Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) enables authors to self-publish and distribute their books to millions of readers around the world

• In the twelve months ending May 31, 2020, worldwide authors earned more than $319 million from the KDP Select Global Fund, totaling more than $1.28 billion since the launch of Kindle Unlimited.
• Thousands of independent authors have earned more than $50,000, with more than one thousand surpassing $100,000 in royalties.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is helping hundreds of thousands of SMB customers, startups and partners around the world launch and scale their businesses

• Since June 2019, Amazon has provided more than $1 billion in AWS credits to help startups accelerate their growth and development, up from $500 million in 2018.
• AWS Activate has provided hundreds of thousands of startups with a host of benefits, including AWS credits, technical support and training.

Alexa enables SMB builders, developers and entrepreneurs around the world to innovate and create voice-first customer experiences

• There are now more than 700,000 developers building for Alexa, and more than 100,000 Alexa skills have been built with the Alexa Skills kit.
• Today, worldwide customers have hundreds of millions of Alexa devices, including more than 100,000 smart home products that can be controlled with Alexa from more than 9,500 unique brands.

Amazon also recently revealed the top 10 states with the most SMBs selling in Amazon’s stores per capita, and the top 10 states with the fastest growing SMBs selling in Amazon’s stores.

To help small businesses navigate this difficult time, Amazon provides an overview of practical resources, tools, and opportunities to partner with the company here.

About Amazon

Amazon is guided by four principles: customer obsession rather than competitor focus, passion for invention, commitment to operational excellence, and long-term thinking. Customer reviews, 1-Click shopping, personalized recommendations, Prime, Fulfillment by Amazon, AWS, Kindle Direct Publishing, Kindle, Fire tablets, Fire TV, Amazon Echo, and Alexa are some of the products and services pioneered by Amazon. For more information, visit www.amazon.com/about and follow @AmazonNews.