Amazon plays coy on Christmas Kindle sales figures

January 6, 2010 — 11:42am ET | By Sharon Fisher

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Amazon is going to a lot of trouble to tell the industry that its Kindle eBook reader is popular. However, Amazon is withholding one minor detail: How many of the damn things they've actually sold.

"Kindle has become the most gifted item in Amazon's history!" enthused Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.com, in a Dec. 26 press release.

Not the most purchased, but the most gifted. As in, "What shall we get John for Christmas?" "Oh, I don't know, he's already got an MP3 player, let's get him one of those book reader things."

How many, though? Amazon doesn't say. "We are very pleased with how Kindle's been received and the great demand, but as a matter of company policy, we do not disclose unit sales," a company representative said.

This assertion wasn't new; Amazon had also announced on Nov. 30 and Oct. 7 that it was the most-gifted product on Amazon. In fact, those earlier releases also said it was the number-one, bestselling product--a claim that's missing from the Dec. 26 release.

Amazon also said that on Christmas Day, for the first time ever, customers purchased more Kindle books than physical books. Well, that only makes sense; if someone receives a new electronic device, whether it's a Kindle or an MP3 player, the first thing they will do do is buy stuff for it.

The company also offered free two-day shipping from mid-December and free one-day shipping for Dec. 23 to help boost Kindle sales. Amazon has also been steadily lowering the price, from $359 when it started shipping on Feb. 23 (when it was also the number-one seller in electronics--but again, no numbers), to $299 in July (which Amazon did not announce), to $259 on Oct. 7. These are strange moves for a product that is supposed to be so popular.

As we've previously mentioned, Forrester has said the price needs to drop below $100 for Amazon to gain significant market share and the device uses a proprietary rather than an open file format--both are factors that could affect sales.

For more information:
- see the press release