Amazon highlights small biz sellers with Storefronts page

Amazon on Monday launched Amazon Storefronts, a landing page made specifically for the over 1 million US small and medium-sized businesses selling on the site.

Storefronts joins three similar landing pages Amazon created to highlight smaller businesses: Launchpad and Exclusives, for up-and-coming brands, and Handmade, for hand-crafted jewelry, art and gifts.

The new initiative is another way for Amazon to show it's helping small businesses, even as its facing growing complaints that it's forcing more mom-and-pop retailers to close and mistreating its workers. These small sellers have become more important to Amazon, since its third-party sales -- those that aren't made directly by Amazon -- now account for more than half of Amazon's online sales.

The American-centric collection of over 1 million products could also help mitigate persistent -- and widely refuted -- criticisms from President Donald Trump that Amazon wasn't paying enough in taxes and underpaying the US Postal Service.

Storefronts categories include books, travel, grocery, jewelry and pet supplies. The new landing page will also profile different sellers through featured videos and stories, as well as a new national TV campaign.