Amazon vs Walmart: The Battle Of The Summer Sales Begins
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MIAMI (CBSMiami) -- Black Friday is more than four months away but there is already a battle underway for your holiday dollars.
Amazon is celebrating its 20th anniversary on Wednesday and offering exclusive sales to subscribers of its "prime" service.
It's called Prime Day but Walmart is looking to upstage Amazon with a sale of its own by launching a rival sale which will include more than 2,000 online exclusive "rollbacks."
Amazon calls its one day sale, "bigger than Black Friday" and it'll include thousands of deals, with new ones as often as every 10 minutes, according to Julie Law, an Amazon spokeswoman.
But to get the deals, you have to be a Prime member which costs $99 a year, but offers free two-day shipping and access to video streaming and music.
"You have the number one brick and mortar store in the world going after the number one online retailer in the world and they are not messing around," explained CBS News Financial Contributor Melony Hobson.
Walmart called out Amazon for making its lower prices available only to Prime members. "We just don't believe you should pay a fee to get a better price," said Walmart spokesman Ravi Jariwala. "The idea of asking customers to pay extra to save money just doesn't add up to us."
However, Amazon is offering a 30-day free Prime membership.
Walmart is countering by reducing its shipping from $50 to $35 for at least 30 days.
