Report: Amazon to Shutter Webstore, Its Ecommerce Platform for Small Businesses
Users of Amazon Webstore have received letters from the company stating the service will be ending in July of next year.
By Geoff Weiss •
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Amazon is reportedly in the process of shuttering Amazon Webstore, a service enabling small business owners to create standalone ecommerce websites.
Though the company has yet to confirm its closure, several users of the service noted on an Amazon forum that the company had contacted them last Monday to state that the platform would close next summer.
"We will support the Webstore service until July 1, 2016 to give you 15 months to prepare for the change," the notification letter reportedly reads. "Your ability to sell on Amazon.com and your Selling on Amazon account will not be impacted by this change."
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A message on the top of its Amazon Webstore landing page also states that the service is "no longer available to new sellers."
Amazon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The move comes as the hosting landscape has become increasingly flooded, Re/code reports, with competitors Shopify and Bigcommerce raising boatloads of venture capital to develop more enticing eCommerce tools. eBay said last summer that it would discontinue its Magento Go software, which provides a similar service.
Amazon launched Webstore in 2010.
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