Amazon Expands Its Home Services Offering to 15 U.S. Markets

Amazon expanded its Amazon Home Services offering, bringing the number of markets it serves to 15, it said in a Wednesday news release. Joining Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco and Seattle are Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Miami, Philadelphia, Phoenix, San Diego, San Jose and Washington, D.C. Customers can shop for custom and pre-packaged services through the Amazon marketplace. With custom services, consumers create free requests by describing the service they need using text and photos and submitting the request to get estimates from local professionals. Home entertainment installations fall into the custom category, while TV wall mounting falls into the pre-packed service category, Amazon said. Customers are 11 times more likely to leave reviews on verified service purchases than on products, Amazon said, saying the number of new applications from service pros quadrupled in the past three months.