A Brief History of Amazon.Com
Amazon.com
Real-Time Case 2
12/1/2009 Brief History of Amazon.com
Jeff Bezos, an entrepreneur, created Amazon.com in 1994; the business was originally run out of his garage in Washington. With the additional investments from Nick Hanauer and Tom Alburg, Bezos was able to create the more user-friendly website that we are used to. As Amazon.com’s customer base began to grow Bezos realized that he was going to have to add variety to the products Amazon.com offered. Bezos hit on a successful idea when he added the feature that allowed customers to write their own book reviews. In 1997, Amazon.com went public and it continued to increase its product lines to include CDs, movies, and toys to its inventories. Amazon.com was profitable, but in 2001, Amazon.com reported a fiscal loss and over a couple of years they laid off over 1000 workers. But, this set back did not discourage Bezos instead he came up with the idea of joining forces with other retailers to sell their products online through Amazon.com. So, through hard work and determination Bezos has been able to turn the simple online bookstore from its early beginnings into the global phenomenon that is Amazon.com.
Competition and Industry
An industry is the group of companies that produces competing products or services that a company operates in. Amazon.com has a wide variety of products and services so it is difficult to pin down exactly what industry Amazon.com competes. According to Yahoo Finance, Amazon.com’s industry market is Catalog & Mail Order Houses. But, we believe that Amazon.com is so much more.
A key part of industry is competition. Amazon.com has such diversity that they don’t appear to have traditional competition. Amazon.com’s competition comes from the different segments of its business. EBay is Amazon.com’s prime competition for its online auction services. Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million are Amazon.com’s primary competition for its book sales. But, no one company
Real-Time Case 2
12/1/2009 Brief History of Amazon.com
Jeff Bezos, an entrepreneur, created Amazon.com in 1994; the business was originally run out of his garage in Washington. With the additional investments from Nick Hanauer and Tom Alburg, Bezos was able to create the more user-friendly website that we are used to. As Amazon.com’s customer base began to grow Bezos realized that he was going to have to add variety to the products Amazon.com offered. Bezos hit on a successful idea when he added the feature that allowed customers to write their own book reviews. In 1997, Amazon.com went public and it continued to increase its product lines to include CDs, movies, and toys to its inventories. Amazon.com was profitable, but in 2001, Amazon.com reported a fiscal loss and over a couple of years they laid off over 1000 workers. But, this set back did not discourage Bezos instead he came up with the idea of joining forces with other retailers to sell their products online through Amazon.com. So, through hard work and determination Bezos has been able to turn the simple online bookstore from its early beginnings into the global phenomenon that is Amazon.com.
Competition and Industry
An industry is the group of companies that produces competing products or services that a company operates in. Amazon.com has a wide variety of products and services so it is difficult to pin down exactly what industry Amazon.com competes. According to Yahoo Finance, Amazon.com’s industry market is Catalog & Mail Order Houses. But, we believe that Amazon.com is so much more.
A key part of industry is competition. Amazon.com has such diversity that they don’t appear to have traditional competition. Amazon.com’s competition comes from the different segments of its business. EBay is Amazon.com’s prime competition for its online auction services. Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million are Amazon.com’s primary competition for its book sales. But, no one company