The Toy Book caught up with Anne Carrihill, category leader of toys and games at amazon.com, about how the company boosted its worldwide orders during Thanksgiving weekend and anticipated releases for the year.
Cyber Monday once again became the single-biggest shopping day in Amazon company history based on the number of orders worldwide. What new strategies did you implement to help boost sales?
Our mission and focus continue to be delivering a world-class shopping experience, providing customers vast selection, value, and convenience — not just during the holidays, but also all year long. This Cyber Monday, we offered customers incredible deals, deeper discounts, and more Deals of the Day than ever, with customers worldwide purchasing more toys this Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined than ever before. Best-sellers among the tens of millions of toys purchased during this time period included the LEGO Star Wars Darth Vader’s Castle, L.O.L. Surprise!, Melissa & Doug products, and games, such as Jenga, Monopoly Game: Disney Frozen 2 Edition, Guess Who, and Candy Land Kingdom of Sweet Adventures.
Our in-house toy experts work year-round to ensure we’re offering customers the largest selection of toys and games from manufacturers and brands of all sizes — from established brands to small businesses and entrepreneurs. Last holiday season, customers could shop more than 26,000 new and exclusive toys on Amazon. We offered customers more exclusive products than ever before, including FurReal Plum, from Hasbro; Fisher-Price Wonder Makers, from Mattel; Journey Girls dolls, from Just Play; the Ravensburger Minecraft Builders & Biomes game; and many more.
How will you continue to evolve your toy department this year?
This year, we will continue to surprise and delight customers by making shopping for toys on amazon.com fun and convenient by offering a broad selection that inspires; has low prices; and includes fast, free shipping options. We expect toys from Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker and Frozen 2, along with PJ Masks and PAW Patrol, to continue to be popular this coming year. Other highly anticipated releases include The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run; Trolls World Tour; Minions: The Rise of Gru; Disney•Pixar’s Onward and Soul; and Marvel’s Black Widow, Venom 2, and The Eternals.
We continue to support startups and innovators through the Amazon Launchpad program, which makes it easy for startups to launch, market, and distribute their products. As consumers continue to turn to their mobile devices to conduct online shopping, we will continue to make it easier to discover, buy, and gift toys and games on mobile devices.
This State of the Industry Q&A response originally appeared in the February 2020 issue of the Toy Book. Click here to read more!
