How much would you be willing to pay for Amazon Prime?

With flagging profits, Amazon is looking at raising the price on a Prime membership. But would you be willing to pay this kind of increase?

Amazon announced it may up the cost of a Prime membership from $79 to $119, according to The Seattle Times. My suspicion is they’ll relent and go with $99, making people happy that the cost isn’t going north of $100.

Meanwhile, it looks like Amazon is transitioning to a modified Costco business model. Both companies are based in the Pacific Northwest; they both have an extreme customer focus; and they’re both trying to create instantaneous loyalty among a customer base to the point where people don’t even comparison shop at competitors anymore.

Costco won’t even let you in to look around if you’re not a member. While Amazon won’t go that far, they will continue separating their customer base into first class and second class status with more perks for members.

But mark this well: Even though Amazon may be selling merchandise without making much profit, their prices are often *not* the best. It’s up to you to do that shopping if money does matter.

If you want an easy way to see if a quoted price is a deal or not, try installing a browser plug-in like Invisible Hand that automatically pops up an alert while you’re shopping if a better price is available on another website.

Finally, Amazon is rolling out a payment platform for retailers using the Kindle, according to The Wall Street Journal.

For further reading:

• Amazon and eBay testing same day delivery
• Is Amazon Prime really worth it?
• Little known Amazon program offers auto-scheduled delivery, extra savings