Brazilian Retailer Magazine Luiza To Compete With Amazon

Brazilian retailer Magazine Luiza has announced that it will be selling books online, which could be picked up in one of its almost 1,000 stores.

The company is aiming to compete directly with Amazon, which launched its online Brazilian operations in 2012. After two of the country’s biggest booksellers — Saraiva Livreiros SA and Livraria Cultura — filed for bankruptcy protection last year, Magazine Luiza saw room in the market.

“The goal is to turn Magalu into a reference in this segment,” said Eduardo Galanternick, Magazine Luiza’s executive director of eCommerce, according to Reuters. He added that 300 of the retailer’s 954 stores are in cities without any bookshops.

Magazine Luiza shares were up 1.9 percent at R$170.31 ($43.45 USD) on Tuesday (April 23) after the announcement.

Earlier this year, it was revealed that Amazon was getting ready to launch the fulfillment and delivery network it has been working on in Brazil, which was delayed because of logistics and a complex tax system. However, it now plans to directly sell merchandise in 11 categories from more than 800 suppliers, including L’Oréal and Black & Decker.

“We are launching [our direct sales platform] with 320,000 different products in stock, including 200,000 books,” said Amazon’s Brazil Country Manager Alex Szapiro in January. “Our obsession is always to increase this catalog, and to have everything Brazilian consumers seek and want to buy on the internet.”

While the eCommerce giant has been in Brazil since 2012 (selling eReaders and books, and streaming movies), in October of 2017, the company opened up its website to third-party merchants selling electronics. As a result, the company partnered with startup CargoX on a pilot program to use bulletproof trucks for the delivery of expensive goods in the country.

Amazon also leased a 505,904-square-foot warehouse in a town outside of Sao Paulo, and employs — both directly or indirectly — more than 1,400 people in the country.