Prepping for Amazon Prime Day: What You Need to Know

Prepping for Amazon Prime Day: What You Need to Know​

(July 7, 2017) This coming Tuesday (July 11) marks Amazon.com’s third annual Prime Day, which is billed as a special sales-ridden shopping event loaded with price-slashing deals. In fact, Amazon claims the day offers “hundreds of thousands of deals, with new deals starting as often as every five minutes,” crisscrossing nearly every product category imaginable (including electronics, movies, and music).

These deals aren’t open to the general public; you must be a Prime Member. Membership has an annual fee of $99 (or $10.99 per month), but if you’re considering giving it a try, Amazon offers a free 30-day tire-kicking trial. And unless you’ve been living under a rock, then you probably know that Prime Membership has amazing benefits, such as free two-day shipping on many purchases, free access to movie and music streaming services, direct shopping through its voice-activated Echo, and more.

The big question for gear heads and home theater enthusiasts is: will Prime Day offer access to incredible savings on expensive televisions and electronics? The answer is “maybe” with a few shades of grey. The site is already offering a pre-Prime Day deal on its Music Unlimited service ($1 for four months) and says that owners of Echo devices will receive special voice ordering discounts beginning on Monday July 10 (6pm PST). However, last year The Wirecutter analyzed nearly 8,000 deals and found that only 64 represented true savings. Some of their best electronics finds were Vizio’s SB3821 Soundbar System (street: $170, sale: $130), LG’s C7 55” OLED TV (street: $2500, sale: $2300), Apple’s 5th Generation iPad (street: $330, sale: $300), Peachtree Audio’s Deepblue2 Bluetooth Speaker (street: $400, sale: $350), and Beats Wireless Earphones (street: $130, sale: $75).

So, how do you know if you’re getting a good deal?

There are several different ways to deal-check. One is to let a website such as The Wirecutter do the hunting for you. That particular site says it will be posting hot finds on its Deals page and its Twitter feed. But the Wirecutter isn’t guaranteed to find everything, which leaves some investigative work in your hands. One of the slickest tools on the Internet to gauge Amazon pricing is a website called CamelCamelCamel, which provides free Amazon price tracking. Here you’ll find instant access to price history charts, customizable price alerts for Amazon wishlist items, and Twitter alert notifications. This is the best way to decide if a Prime Day deal is truly a deal or just a puff of smoke.

Of course, we encourage AV NIRVANA members to share the love and post any of their own hot-finds in the “Awesome Deals and Budget AV Equipment” forum section.

If you’re interested in joining Prime for Prime Day shopping, you can click here to sign up for a free 30-day trial. And if you’re a student with a .edu email address, click here for a six-month free trial plus 50-perecent off!

 

[tripplej]

Thanks Todd for mentioning the Amazon prime day. I thought to add here that I am an amazon prime member and I did take advantage of the Prime day specials. I didn't purchase any AV related items but I needed a nice shredder that could do cross cut and they had one on sale. I ended up getting that and saved some money. I was looking earlier but thought to wait till prime day which was best since there were savings to be had.

 

[Todd Anderson]

A buddy of mine picked up a pretty sweet mini-projector. If you catch one of these sales, major bonus in savings!

 

[tripplej]

I agree, as a prime member, there are a lot of benefits on amazon. Plus, they do have daily deals going on as well. Just a matter of what is on sale that particular day and if it meets your needs.