Amazon’s Launchpad is a department that aims to make it easier for startups to sell their goods, and now Amazon has added a subsection to showcase products that were originally crowdfunded on the Kickstarter platform.
This is good news for those companies that successfully raise funds on Kickstarter, but that may then have trouble reaching new customers after the initial hype has died down.
Amazon (AMZN) has already been stocking certain products that originated on Kickstarter for some time, though it didn’t give them this degree of prominence until now.
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From Amazon’s side, picking up crowdfunding successes means the company knows there’s traction for the products it is stocking—if people care enough to help it get made, others may be keen to buy it afterwards too.
“Working with Kickstarter is a great way for us to hear directly from customers what products they care about, since they truly hold the power to bring these products to life,” Amazon vice president Jim Adkins said in a statement.
Examples of the Kickstarter-originated products that have made it into the Kickstarter Collection include JamStik, an app-connected device that teaches people how to play guitar, the Prynt photo-printing iPhone case, and the MudWatt “living fuel cell” kit, which aims to get kids into science and technology.
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The Oculus Rift virtual reality headset is also in there—the company may be owned by Facebook (FB) now but it started as a Kickstarter project—as is the Kano computer kit, which was also already on Launchpad anyway.
Kano, incidentally, is shaping up to be a standout success from the crowdfunding scene—major retailers including Toys “R” Us and Barnes & Noble (BKS) have just agreed to stock it in their online stores.
Amazon also said Wednesday that Launchpad now includes products from over 1,000 startups, a year into its operation.