Amazon Goes Shopping in Europe

There's something new in Amazon.com's (Nasdaq: AMZN  ) shopping bag.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the world's leading online retailer is buying Spain's BuyVIP, an online shopping hub with 6 million members across Europe. As a private sales club, BuyVIP offers its membership base access to fashions and lifestyle brands for as much as 70% off.

In other words, Amazon isn't just making a play to go upscale overseas. There's also a discounting element here. In other words, it's straddling the realms of both Blue Nile (Nasdaq: NILE  ) and Overstock.com (Nasdaq: OSTK  ) here -- a pair of stateside dot-com warriors that it probably would have acquired if their valuations weren't so high.

Amazon knows its place in the online space. It carries a broad line of products at attractive price points. It opens up its storefront to third-party vendors to broaden its offerings. It wants to reach a higher-end clientele, but it also doesn't want to dilute its brand as a mainstream retailer. When it wanted some more skin in designer handbags and accessories, it launched Endless.com four years ago. It snapped up Zappos last year.

Amazon isn't afraid to go outside of its organic offerings if there's a void that can be better served by a company that it can acquire. Earlier this year, it bought Woot.com. Two years ago, it was digital audiobooks specialist Audible.

This doesn't mean that Amazon will buy anything that moves, just for the sake of incremental sales. Bluefly (Nasdaq: BFLY  ) would be a decent push into fashionable apparel. Drugstore.com (Nasdaq: DSCM  ) and Vitacost.com (Nasdaq: VITC  ) would be natural fits in vitamins, sundries, and other pharmacy-related items.

The e-tailer's shopping list is long, but not all-inclusive. Right now, BuyVIP makes perfect sense. The popularity of daily deal websites where online groups gather for timely bargains is driving its strategy through both Woot and a more upscale play in BuyVIP. The Transatlantic allure of BuyVIP also helps, especially if it's serious about conquering Europe through Lovefilm before Netflix (Nasdaq: NFLX  ) expands outside of North America.

So keep on shopping, Amazon. If the price is right, now is not the time to be a shrinking violet.

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