By                                                     Richard Robinson

Amazon wants to crack Sweden. This could turn out to be its biggest challenge yet

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2021-05-25 12:00:10

By Richard Robinson | May 25, 2021 -- 10:05 GMT (03:05 PDT) | Topic: Innovation

The arrival of Amazon's online retail arm in Sweden last October caused no shortage of agitation, speculation – and mirth. Six months on, the most striking thing about its Swedish operation is the silence currently surrounding it.

For some, the company's muted impact on e-sellers, consumers and labor practices is indicative of the strength of the country's established online market and unionized workforce. For others, this quiet is very much the ominous calm before the storm – before Amazon's corporate imperative collides with fundamental pillars of Swedish identity and culture.

When Amazon.se launched, it trumpeted a range of 150 million products across 30 categories from books to toys. Unfortunately for the retail giant, in the media, the loudest furore around Amazon's Swedish launch centred on its inept and rather rude product translations from English to Swedish. Customers could find bespoke items like a baking tray for 'goose water' and specialist collectables like "bottom with bunch of flowers" (a Smurf figurine holding a bouquet). Less comic, but equally baffling, was the use of the Argentine flag in place of the yellow-blue one of Sweden.

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