Amazon launches in Sweden with Amazon.se

As global expansion goes, Amazon has, over the years, moved slowest. But when it does commit to a market, it tends to stick around and increase its investment and service offerings. Like India and Australia, two of its more recent local websites.

And so now we see Amazon.se.

Readers of this blog know well that I think country codes are a very smart move — particularly for ecommerce. Search engines favor country codes and, more important, consumers favor country codes.

According to this TechCrunch article:

Amazon said that the local storefront will launch with 150 million+ products in 30 categories — examples of the popular Swedish brands that it will feature include Electrolux, Lagerhaus, OBH Nordica, Ellos, BRIO, Bonnierförlagen and Ifö — and it will provide free delivery on eligible orders above SEK229 ($26) that are fulfilled by Amazon.

Merchants come from Sweden itself but — as with other Amazon marketplaces — from outside of it, too. One estimate puts the number of actual Swedish retailers on the .se site at only around 100. That’s also resulted in some problematic translations of the product descriptions.

Swedish consumers have long had access to Amazon, but Amazon has long resisted supporting the Swedish language. I’m glad to see that practice coming to an end.

And this will certainly help Amazon’s ranking in the next Report Card.

(Or not. The launch has not gone as well as planned. Also, another reason to avoid using flags on our website.)

John Yunker
John Yunker

John is co-founder of Byte Level Research and author of Think Outside the Country as well as 19 editions of The Web Globalization Report Card.

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