Amazon's retail sales surpassed Walmart's for the first time last year

Amazon has surpassed Walmart to become the world's largest retailer outside of China, according to business and industry data released by Seattle-based companies, a milestone in the shift from brick-and-mortar stores to online shopping that has changed the way people buy all kinds of goods.

According to estimates by Wall Street financial research firm FactSet, driven by a surge in shopping demand during the epidemic, Amazon's spending exceeded $610 billion in the past year , while Walmart said in data released on Tuesday that its sales last year were $566 billion.

While Walmart perfected the booming big-box retail industry, undercutting competitors by cutting costs and driving down prices, the Internet has become central to the evolution of the retail industry. Amazon has attracted and retained customers with door-to-door delivery and a wide selection of shopping items, making its founder, Jeff Bezos, one of the world’s richest people.

But at the same time, Amazon's success has brought stricter government scrutiny. At present, Amazon has begun to receive many complaints, which is exactly the same as Walmart during its greatest expansion period more than ten years ago. Both are facing a number of issues such as worker treatment and impact on local and national economies. But it also reflects from another level that Amazon has surpassed Walmart.

Although Walmart is still the largest private employer in the United States, with 1.6 million workers, Amazon currently employs nearly 1.3 million workers and continues to expand the size of Amazon warehouses and the number of workers. JPMorgan Chase estimates that Amazon will completely surpass Walmart next year and become a true business leader in all aspects.

Affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, traditional economic and trade activities such as offline stores have been hampered. E-commerce has been favored by consumers around the world for its unique advantages of low cost, high efficiency, and breaking through time and space constraints, and has shown a rapid growth momentum. Under the influence of the epidemic, most consumers buy products online, and the most important reason why Amazon's sales exceeded Walmart last year was that it seized the dividends of online sales!

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