Can't find the vase, earrings or toy you want on Amazon? Get it printed.
The US Amazon site is now selling customisable 3D printed items, offering more than 200 objects from bobble-head dolls to home decor and jewelry, letting customers choose material, designs, colours and more.
So far, the personalisation service appears to be limited to one main partner, Mixee Labs, but Amazon is listing a host of 3D printed products on the page, so it'll likely expand to others. Indeed, it also lists Sculpteo - which readers may recall to be the company that will 3D print a vase of your head.
To order, click the "Personalise Now" button and you will see a "widget" pop-up letting you select different options. You can preview your order in 360-degrees before your purchase is printed on-demand.
The products on offer aren't only plastic: Mixee Labs also offers customised metal items, such as cufflinks and jewelry.
"The personalisation widget empowers customers to make something unique in seconds without knowing how to 3D model," said Nancy Liang, co-founder for Mixee Labs. "A product personalisation platform on Amazon has the potential to become the app store for the physical world."
The on-demand 3D printing marketplace could come into its own with the technology on the Amazon Fire phone, which shows items from the store in a pop-up, 3D hologram over the handset - but it's not clear as yet if there's any integration planned between the personalisation widget and the smartphone.
It's not the only area Amazon is eyeing on-demand printing: the company has reportedly offered publishers the ability to print books on demand if they go out of stock, rather than leave customers waiting for a title to be reprinted.
So far, the service is only available in the US; But this is nothing new as the US e-commerce company normally trials services or products in its home market before rolling them out internationally.
This article originally appeared at pcpro.co.uk
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