Been waiting all year long for that 55 gallon vat of lube to go on sale again? Nail clippers for a giant dog? Beard growther? Save the date and clear the garage, the anticipation is over — Amazon Prime Day is back for another round July 12 with what they promise to be the Black Friday event of the summer.

On July 15 last year, Amazon premiered its much-hyped Prime Day, a one-day sale exclusively for members of its Prime subscription ($99 annual fee) status. The site promises 24 hours of nonstop deals, which will include 100,000 discounts worldwide. Deals will be announced as often as every 5 minutes — in hopes to keeps its 54 million strong Prime base shopping all day long.

The day's revival comes as a surprise to some as last year's participants took to Twitter and compared these "exclusive deals" to that of an Amazon Garage Sale.

Less than half of the social media mentions were made in a positive fashion toward the day.

Amazon sings a different tune, however, claiming they had 18 percent more placed during the massive sale event than on Black Friday. In fact, sales in the United States rocketed up 93 percent for Amazon that day, according to online retail tracker ChannelAdvisor. European sales grew by 53 percent.

According to the Amazon VP Greg Greeley, Prime Day '15 saw more than twice the number of TVs sold as on Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined. Even though they had nothing nice to say, participants were quietly stocking up on socks, microfiber towels and Adam Sandler movies.

And Amazon didn't just make believers out of themselves — it had some imitators. Prime Day last year spurred "Christmas in July"-type sales from Target, Macy's and Best Buy as well as Wal-Mart.

Wal-Mart has decided to return again this year, but this time stepping up as a direct competitor. Walmart president and CEO Fernando Madeira announced in a blog post this week that they will offer a free 30-day trial for ShippingPass, Wal-Mart's answer to Prime.

ShippingPass costs $49 a year and offers Walmart customers free, unlimited two-day shipping. Walmart customers who already have ShippingPass will get an extra month free.

Despite the negative chatter, there must be a real method to this madness — even if no one wants to admit it. (Who wants to actually confess to needing an overabundant barrel of lubricant?) As they say, imitation is the highest form of flattery. Whether this ends up being a "prime day" to shop or not, leave that up to the pocketbook.