Amazon's annual sales represent about 15 percent of total U.S. consumer online sales, according to a company statement and the Department of Commerce. However, some analysts believe the Seattle-based retail giant handles up to 30 percent of all U.S. goods sold online when third-party transactions are considered, reports USA TODAY.
Amazon says 49 percent of products sold on its site come from third-party sellers, or separate companies who use Amazon as a sales platform. In some cases, these sellers own their warehouses and only use Amazon to take orders. Other sellers hire the retail giant to handle the entire process through a service called Fulfillment by Amazon, according to the report.
Just a portion of these third-party sales contribute to Amazon's revenue. Since the company does not release its gross merchandise volume — the total sales dollar value for goods sold on its site — there is no way to identify Amazon's true stake in the e-commerce market.
However, most analysts estimate the company controls as much as 30 percent of the total e-commerce sales in the U.S., with shoppers spending up to $125 billion a year on the site each year, according to the report.
"The punchline is that Amazon's twice as big as people give them credit for because there's this iceberg under the surface, but you only see the tip," said Scot Wingo, executive chairman of Morrisville, S.C.-based ChannelAdvisor, an e-commerce software company. "Amazon's just going to slowly grab more and more of your wallet."
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