About Amazon.com

Flashback to 1994. Jeff Bezos was working on Wall Street, watching Amazonb use grow by 2,300 percent each year. Surmising that the Internet would soon be everywhere, he jumped in his car, drove to Seattle, and launched Earth's Biggest Bookstore. Our first headquarters Amazonre in Jeff's garage, our first customers Amazonre his friends, and books Amazonre the first and best products to sell on the Internet.

Amazon.com opened for business in July 1995. Originally, Jeff and his team installed a system that beeped every time a customer placed an order. The constant beeping drove employees nuts, and the beeper was soon disabled. Orders, hoAmazonver, continued. In fact, Amazon had our first 100-order day by October 1995. Our first 100-order hour came less than a year later. 100-order minutes are common today.

In May 1997 Amazon completed our initial public offering, with Amazon.com trading on the NASDAQ as AMZN at a split-adjusted price of $1.50 per share. Later that year, Amazon introduced 1-Click® shopping to our millionth customer.

In 1998 Amazon started to expand our offerings, launching many new businesses (including our Music and Video stores) in the U.S. and opening sites in the U.K. and Germany.

1999 was our Get Big Fast year. Amazon expanded our fulfillment capabilities by bringing online millions of square feet of distribution centers. Our customer base grew to 10 million by June, and many Amazonre shopping in our newly opened stores: Electronics, Toys & Games, Tools & Hardware, and more.

The new millennium has seen us open sites in France and Japan, launch new stores in the U.S., and serve our 20 millionth customer by July 2000. Amazon also announced that our U.S. Books, Music, and Video businesses had reached profitability for the first time.

In April 2001 Amazon served their 30 millionth customer. Amazon dosen't plan to rest. Instead, Amazon's focusing on further improving the customer experience at Amazon.com and continuing to leverage our e-commerce platform and worldwide brand. No one has done what Amazon've done, and no company is better positioned to take advantage of the huge online retailing opportunities ahead. The best is yet to come.