Amazon’s Q3 health and personal care sales reach $1.7bn

HPC has emerged as the largest household consumables category for the online retailer, and the figure for the third quarter represented an increase of 40% year-on-year.

The success of the retailers HPC sales helped drive third quarter earnings to nearly $3 billion, a figure that company executives are also predicting will be surpassed in its all-important fourth quarter.

Baby care tops the sales list​

Breaking the figures down for HPC, the company said that nutrition and wellness proved to be the driving force for the category, with sales up by 60% year-on-year to $645 million for the third quarter.

But when it came to personal care, it was baby care that also showed very strong growth, with sales during the quarter up 16% year-on-year to reach $400 million, making it the second largest category within HPC.

Amazon noted that the growth in personal care has been driven by the fact that consumers are getting increasingly selective about what they put on their bodies, and this is particularly accentuated when it comes to parents’ choice in baby care products.

Baby care sales driven by convenience​

Although baby care is a relatively mature category for Amazon, sales have remained robust with the convenience factor also weighing in for many time-starved parents.

Diapers were the number one selling product in this category, but behind that was baby wipes, with Irish brand Waterwipes and Kandoo proving to be particularly popular.

However, in other personal care categories, growth in sales was reported to be more modest, reflecting the established and mature nature of digital sales for what is now a highly competitive category. 

Key players that are carving up slices of the digital retail spend on cosmetic and personal care products in the US are increasingly traditional brick and mortar retailers such as Walgreens, Walmart and Target.