Great Indian Festival 2025: Amazon doubles down on seller empowerment, AI to drive its biggest festive season sale

This year, Amazon is doubling down on its effort to make the Great Indian Festival (AGIF) 2025 not just a consumer bonanza, but a milestone for sellers across India. For Amit Nanda, director of Selling Partner Services at Amazon India, the focus is clear: make selling easier and more profitable.

“We’ve made significant changes based on seller feedback,” Nanda told Fortune India. “It boils down to two key asks from sellers – ease of selling and cost of selling.” 

In April, Amazon rolled out its biggest fee reduction yet—zero referral fees on over 1.2 crore products priced below ₹300 across 135+ categories. And from September 1, the company has gone further, reducing referral fees in fast-moving categories such as fashion, beauty, home appliances, and healthcare, while also cutting weight handling fees by up to ₹100 for items under 25kg.

Take treadmills priced around ₹36,999, where sellers now save ₹740 per unit. Men’s t-shirts priced at ₹999 benefit from ₹40 per unit fee cuts, while air fryers see ₹100 per unit in savings. “This increment in margin allows sellers to list more products and compete better,” says Nanda.

On the logistics front, Amazon is bolstering its fulfilment network, onboarding 150,000 seasonal workers, and launching 12 new fulfilment centres along with 6 new sort centres. This expansion helps handle the festive season’s inventory surge and reduces delivery times, supporting the promise of fast delivery and easy returns that the Great Indian Festival is known for.

Amazon has also upgraded its tech stack to simplify seller operations. The new Samriddhi Dashboard provides yearly performance analytics, strategic planning tools, and inventory recommendations. Sellers can now use the GenAI-powered listing tool to cut the effort of creating product descriptions by 70%, while the Opportunity Explorer tool helps pinpoint market demands and product opportunities.

An important innovation this year is the intelligent Basket Building promotion tool “Sell More Save More,” enabling sellers to offer deals like “Buy 2, get 10% off” with just two clicks. These promotions reduce shipping costs and increase average order values.

In 2024, the festival drew 40 crore customer visits, over 3 crore products were delivered same or next day, and there was a 70% increase in sellers crossing ₹1 crore+ in sales compared to 2023. More than 85% of customers hailed from non-metro cities, and over 70% of sellers came from Tier 2 and 3 locations.

Looking ahead, Nanda says the momentum is expected to grow even further in 2025. “We’re already seeing over a 25% increase in new product launches compared to last year,” he shared.

This year, Amazon is empowering 17 lakh sellers, spanning small businesses, D2C startups, women entrepreneurs, artisans, and local shops across categories like home, kitchen, festive décor, and apparel.

“What we’re also seeing now is a natural shift toward Make in India products and sustainable choices,” says Nanda. He shares the story of an incense seller from Vrindavan whose business grew sixfold over three years, employing local women in the process.

As the festival approaches, Amazon positions itself not just as a marketplace, but as a "full-stack partner" enabling sellers to focus on what they do best—making products—while Amazon handles the rest.