Amazon recently announced that Prime members will now have access to the same Visa rewards when shopping at Whole Foods. All prime members who own the Amazon Visa card are eligible for these rewards. They will receive a five percent bonus (cash back) when they shop at Whole foods.
Whole Foods, the popular grocery store was recently acquired by Amazon for $13.7 billion dollars. Although Amazon acquired the store, Amazon has let the store operate on its own without interference. The purposed behind the purchase seemed to be to learn more about the market Whole Foods operated in. However, Whole Foods does come under Amazon now.
Therefore, there are some changes such selling Amazon’s own Echo smart speaker even at Whole Foods stores. Amazon also announced that it will start delivering groceries from Whole Foods stores through its Prime delivery service. Thus, Amazon slowly integrating Whole Foods into its system, it makes sense to extend their reward services to Whole Foods shoppers as well.
“We are excited to launch the Amazon Rewards Visa Card in our stores, offering benefits to our customers on all of their purchases at Whole Foods Market,” John Mackey, Whole Foods Market co-founder and CEO, said in a press release Tuesday.
The Amazon prime card itself was introduced last year by the US-based e-commerce giant. The Visa rewards card entitles prime members to different rewards when used for purchases I.E. 5 percent cash back. Prime members pay $99 a year for their subscription and gain a 5 percent bonus on all Amazon purchases. Visa rewards are not limited to just inside Amazon’s own (huge) bubble. You can also get a bonus elsewhere such as restaurants, gas stations, and drugstores. Of course, the bonus here is not as much as compared to shopping within the confines of Amazon.
If you haven’t subscribed to Amazon prime but still want to avail the Visa rewards then there’s good news. Non-prime members are also eligible for Visa rewards. However, they only get a 3 percent bonus, unlike the 5 percent bonus Prime members receive. Therefore, making sure its users get enough bonus to stick to Amazon but also enough to give them the incentive to purchase the subscription.
Amazon has also been trying to get more people to start purchasing their grocery at Whole Foods. Amazon’s actions regarding the supermarket retailer are indicative of that. Immediately after acquiring Whole Foods, Amazon cut most of the products’ prices in order to entice people to shop at Whole Foods. Since then, Amazon has also extended its two hour Prime Now delivery to Whole Foods as well. This means that you can have your grocery delivered to your doorstep in under 2 hours. Perhaps the last thing Amazon could have done was to introduce the 5 percent cash back at Whole Foods as well.
The Visa rewards bonus will surely get a lot of people’s attention, which is just what Amazon wanted. The grocery market is not as easy to break into as other markets. Amazon, although a large company, will also face a lot of difficulties in establishing a firm stance in the supermarket industry. However, the purchase of Whole foods along with the different perks being offered is definitely a step in the right direction for Amazon. The recent announcements regarding the rewards will help Amazon become a serious competitor in the market.
With Amazon open to trying different things and acquiring information on other markets, it’s safe to assume that Amazon won’t stop at Whole foods. Amazon will look to expand even beyond this. If it does, then it’s only a matter of time when these rewards start covering a variety of different things which will make it near impossible for people to not purchase Amazon’s prime subscription.