The Grasshopper Co. experiences a steady rise in sales at the beginning of the year, peaking in April through June.

Trent Guyler, vice president, digital and marketing, The Grasshopper Co.

But in recent years, the company has realized a pick-up in parts sales following the usual end of its peak season in July, says Trent Guyer, vice president, digital and marketing.

One reason, he says, is the mid-July Amazon Prime Day promotional event. Although designed primarily as a big promotional day for retailers and retail consumers, Prime Day also helps to generate spikes in traffic and sales on the Amazon storefronts and product listings of B2B sellers. Amazon scheduled its 10th annual Prime Day this year for July 16 and 17.

Grasshopper is a manufacturer of high-end grass-cutting equipment used to maintain such properties as corporate campuses and the White House lawn. It sells grass-cutting equipment priced at up to $20,000 or more per mowing unit. It also has a network of about 1,000 North American dealers and has customers in about 42 countries. On GrasshopperMower.com, it displays equipment and parts images and details, a request-a-quote feature and a dealer locator. It sells parts through the Amazon.com marketplace and Amazon Business.

Trent notes that Grasshopper customers don’t typically plan their purchasing around promotional events, because if they need a part, they want it immediately.

Manufacturers benefit from Amazon Prime Day

A Grasshopper mower.

Still, he notes that the extra Prime Day traffic has helped Grasshopper experience some of its strongest July sales days for equipment parts.

“The July Prime Day in 2022 actually helped us to have a best day of that month,” Trent says, adding, “Our sales on Day One of Prime Day 2023 uplift us to have one of our three best days in July of that year.”

Trent says Grasshopper runs ads throughout the year to promote its parts sales on Amazon, but nothing specific to Prime Day events. He adds that the reliable rise in traffic is enough to generate increased customer activity through a “halo effect of just being on the platform on Prime Day.”

Dynabrade takes a similar approach regarding Prime Day promotional activity. It relies on an expected boost in traffic rather than specific promotions. Dynabrade is a pneumatic power tools manufacturer.

B2B sellers capitalize on Amazon Business and B2C sales

Ronald Veiders, global brand manager, says the manufacturer tried running a limited Prime Day promotion a couple years ago for one of its popular SKUs and realized only a minor direct benefit. In addition to referring customers on Dynabrade.com to its distribution partners, the manufacturer sells some of its products through a Dynabrade Amazon storefront. Like Grasshopper, Dynabrade has received advice on Amazon marketplace strategy from Enceiba, a digital marketing agency.

Ronald Veiders, global brand manager, Dynabrade

The Prime Day promotion “wasn’t worth it to us,” he says. “We just like being on Amazon, because we know there’s more eyes. And I guarantee we’ll get at least a couple more sales out of it.”

Veiders agrees that Dynabrade benefits at least somewhat from a Prime Day halo effect. But he figures that the boost in activity sparked by Dynabrade’s Amazon presence is tied in large part to the trend of today’s B2B buyers to search online for Dynabrade products and to seek out deals like Amazon’s Prime two-day delivery service.

“Think about the procurement buyers out there nowadays,” he says. “Their first step is Googling, and Amazon is going to come up first or close to it if they’re looking for one of our products. And they’re going to go there to shop, price and compare. And because we’re FBA (Fulfillment by Amazon), it’s Prime and ready to go … for two-day delivery anywhere in the country.”

Paul Demery is a Digital Commerce 360 contributing editor covering B2B digital commerce technology and strategy. [email protected].

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