Amazon.com plans to launch an online storefront for low-priced apparel and home goods, the company’s biggest move to date to counter the rise of discount upstarts like Temu and Shein.

The Seattle-based company’s plans, described in slides posted to websites for third-party Chinese sellers, show Amazon shipping goods directly to customers from China. Amazon, which has sought to hold its ground with promises of speedy shipping, previously encouraged Chinese merchants to use logistics services that concentrate merchandise at US-based warehouses.

The new mall will appear in its own section of Amazon’s website, the slides say. For now, it’s open only to invited sellers.

“We are always exploring new ways to work with our selling partners to delight our customers with more selection, lower prices and greater convenience,” Amazon spokeswoman Maria Boschetti said in response to questions about the programme, which was reported earlier by the Information.

Among the documents is a screenshot of an apparent invitation from Amazon for a 5 July launch event in Yiwu, a famous manufacturing and export hub in China’s eastern Zhejiang province.

Amazon and other US retail incumbents are grappling with the rapid rise of Temu, a unit of PDD Holdings, and online fashion retailer Shein, which have lured customers with steep discounts and, in Temu’s case, a barrage of advertising on television and social media.

Amazon this year began cutting the fees it charges merchants to sell low-priced clothing, a move seen as an attempt to compete with Shein’s bargain basement prices. — Matt Day and Jacob Gu, (c) 2024 Bloomberg LP