Irish Amazon users are well-used to going through other countries' Amazon sites, whether it is the UK or an EU country.
With news that Amazon.ie will be a dedicated site for users next year, the days of tracking packages across Europe will be a thing of the past.
So what exactly will this mean for Irish customers, and what can we expect when it launches next year?
Here is what you need to know about Amazon.ie:
When will it be up and running?
No definitive date has been given for when things will come online, except that it will be some time in 2025.
They said the store follows the launch of Amazon’s first fulfilment centre in Dublin in 2022, which created 500 new jobs and has provided faster delivery for customers across the country seven days a week, including One-Day Delivery.
What impact will the site have on customers?
With a dedicated store on Irish soil, it will mean faster deliveries for customers and more one-day deliveries.
Seeing as products will not have to come from abroad, there will be no customs charges, meaning that products will be cheaper overall.
For Amazon Prime users, along with the addition of Prime Video, they will also be able to watch UEFA Champions League football starting from next season.
What impact will it have on Irish business?
Amazon said there are currently over 1,000 small and medium-sized Irish enterprises (SMEs) that already sell on Amazon, with these SMEs generating over €150 million in export sales in 2022 alone.
From 2020 to 2022, Amazon has invested over €20 billion helpinh European SMEs reach new customers across the single market and international export markets, achieving more than €8 billion in export sales in 2022.
Amazon currently employs around 6,500 people in Cork, Dublin, and Drogheda in a diverse range of roles including data engineers, operations management, and finance –supporting an additional 9,000 jobs in the wider Irish economy.
They also said that Amazon.ie will also be supported by the new five-year agreement that An Post and Amazon announced last year, which will lead to more convenient and faster deliveries and returns.
While Amazon.ie will offer an opportunity for smaller Irish businesses to sell their products, it remains to be seen what impact a dedicated site in Ireland will have.
Will the 'Amazon effect' become even bigger?
The Amazon effect relates to the disruptive impact that the company has had on retail sales because of its dominant position in online sales.
Retail sales have continued to decline in Ireland with the latest figures showing that the volume of sales decreased by 0.6 per cent in the month and was down by 1.0 per cent in the 12 months from May 2023.
Monthly volume decreases were recorded in clothing, footwear & textiles (-6.4 per cent), motor trade (-4 per cent), other retail sales (-3.8 per cent), hardware, paints and glass (-2.4 per cent), furniture & lighting (-2.1 per cent), and Electrical Goods (-1.7 per cent).
That same drop is seen throughout the EU. After a sharp increase in 2021 due to pandemic restrictions being lifted, sales have continued to decrease.
Across the US, department stores fell from 14.1 per cent of retail sales in 1993 to only 2.6 per cent last year.
Similarly, in the UK, department-store revenue is forecast to have contracted at an annual rate of 2.7 per cent, to £35.6 billion (€42.2 billion), according to market-research group IbisWorld.
