Amazon announces Great Indian Festival sale between September 21 and 24

Dates coincide with Flipkart's Big Billion Days sale

Amazon India announced on Wednesday that it will host its annual flagship Great Indian Festival Sale between September 21 and 24, as it attempts to overthrow rival Flipkart as the reigning champion of the country's e-commerce market.

Unlike previous versions of its sale, Amazon is taking its rival head on by announcing its sale on largely the same days as Flipkart. While Amazon’s sale opens for everyone on September 21, members of its Prime loyalty programme will get an early access at noon on September 20.

“As our customers prepare for the festive season, we are geared up to serve them with blockbuster deals from India’s biggest brands... we have worked together with our entire ecosystem of sellers, partners and brands to help customers celebrate a bigger and better festive shopping experience," said Manish Tiwary, vice president of Category Management at Amazon India.

Rival Flipkart is hosting its BigBillionDays sale from September 20 to 25 and is expecting a two to threefold jump in sales during the five-day sale when compared to last year. The Indian firm said it will look to serve customers with big discounts, apart from offering them easy buying options such as EMI on credit and debit cards, exchange offers and buy-now-pay-later.

Amazon is working with banks to offer cash-backs over and above the discounts and will even incentivise customers to pay through its own digital wallet Amazon Pay. For Prime customers, the company will offer exclusive deals and also assured one and two-day free delivery.

Earlier this week, Amazon announced that it had created 22,000 temporary jobs in order to cater to the increased demand during its festive sales. The company has also expanded its warehousing capabilities across the country in the run up to the festive season, targeting sales of high-value products such as large appliances and furniture.