The summer retail wars are heating up. Walmart has announced a massive online sale in an effort to compete with Amazon Prime Day. Starting Wednesday, the giant retailer will offer thousands of new online-only “rollback deals” and lower its free shipping minimum order to $35 from $50.
“We’ve heard some retailers are charging $100 to get access to a sale. But the idea of asking customers to pay extra in order to save money just doesn’t add up for us,” Fernando Madeira, president and CEO of Walmart.com, said in a statement on a company blog.
Madeira was referencing Amazon Prime, a service that gives exclusive deals and free shipping to subscribers who pay the $99 membership fee. Amazon recently announced that this Wednesday will be the first Prime Day, a one-day sale celebrating the online retailer’s 20th anniversary and spanning all of its departments. Amazon’s website states there will be more deals than Black Friday, but these deals will only be available to Prime members.
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But Madeira said Walmart’s sale will be open to everybody and last longer than a day. He also said the website will be unveiling special “atomic-deals” in the days to come.
A spokesman for Walmart said the retailer will lower prices for 90 days on thousands of “rollback” items, while the atomic deals would be for an unspecified limited time. The free shipping offer will last for at least 30 days, he said.