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   (NASDAQ: AMZN) is a US-based
multinational electronic commerce company. Headquartered in
Seattle, Washington, it is the largest online retailer in the United
States, with nearly three times the Internet sales revenue of the
runner up, Staples, Inc., as of January 2010.
Jeff Bezos founded Amazon.com, Inc. in 1994 and the site went
online in 1995. The company was originally named Cadabra,
Inc., but the name was changed when it was discovered that
people sometimes heard the name as "Cadaver". The name
Amazon.com was chosen because the Amazon River is one of
the largest rivers in the world and so the name suggests large
size, and also in part because it starts with "A" and therefore
would show up near the beginning of alphabetical lists.
Amazon.com started as an online bookstore, but soon
diversified, selling DVDs, CDs, MP3 downloads, computer
software, video games, electronics, apparel, furniture, food, and
toys. Amazon has established separate websites in Canada, the
United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Japan, and China. It
also provides international shipping to certain countries for some
of its products.
History

Amazon was founded in 1995,[3] spurred by what Bezos called

"regret minimization framework", his effort to fend off regret for
not staking a claim in the Internet gold rush.[4] Company lore
says Bezos wrote the business plan while he and his wife drove
from New York to Seattle,[5] although that account is disputed.
Bezos flew from New York to Texas, where he picked up a car
from a family member, and then drove from Texas to Seattle.

The company began as an online bookstore;[6] while the largest

brick-and-mortar bookstores and mail-order catalogs for books
might offer 200,000 titles, an online bookstore could offer more.
Bezos named the company "Amazon" after the world's largest
river. Since 2000, Amazon's logotype is an arrow leading from
A to Z, representing customer satisfaction (as it forms a smile); a
goal was to have every product in the alphabet.[7]

Èroducts and services

mazon product lines include books, music CDs, videotapes and

DVDs, software, consumer electronics, kitchen items, tools,
lawn and garden items, toys & games, baby products, apparel,
sporting goods, gourmet food, jewelry, watches, health and
personal-care items, beauty products, musical instruments,
clothing, industrial & scientific supplies, and groceries.

4

 
4

   is the largest book retailer in the United
States,[4][5] operating mainly through its 4

4



chain of bookstores headquartered in lower Fifth Avenue in Lower
Manhattan, New York City.[6] Barnes & Noble also operated the chain of
small B. Dalton Booksellers stores in malls until they announced the
liquidation of the chain. The company is known for large, upscale retail
outlets, many of which contain a café serving Starbucks Coffee, and for
competitive discounting of bestsellers. Most stores also sell magazines,
newspapers, DVDs, graphic novels, gifts, games, and music. Video
games and related items were sold in the company's GameStop retail
outlets until October 2004, when the division was spun off into an
independent company. Barnes & Noble is also known for selling the
Barnes & Noble Nook, as well as various incarnations of its mascot, a
teddy bear named "Barnsie".

The company operates 717 stores (as of October 30, 2010) in all 50 U.S.
states and the District of Columbia in addition to 637 college bookstores,
which serve nearly 4 million students and 250,000 faculty members
across the country.[7]

History

Barnes & Noble originated in 1873 when Charles Barnes opened a book-printing business in
Wheaton, Illinois. Their first true bookstore was set up by his son, William, in partnership with
G. Clifford Noble, in 1917 in New York City.[8] The original bookstore was at 31 West 15th St.,
and opened during World War I. In 1932, at the height of the Great Depression, the bookstore
was moved to its current flagship location on 18th Street and Fifth Avenue.[9]

In 2002, Leonard Riggio's brother Stephen Riggio was named CEO. Barnes & Noble has been
spending millions on legal fees to defend against a lawsuit by billionaire investor Ron Burkle.[14]
Burkle is engaged in a proxy fight against chairman Steve Riggio in an attempt to change the
management and direction of Barnes & Noble.[15] Burkle is concerned about falling profits and
disagrees with Barnes & Noble's e-book strategy.[16]

Barnes & Noble in Lynnwood, Washington, using the 1992-1998 (exact?) logo sign.

On Aug 3, 2010, the company announced that its board was considering a sale of the company,
possibly to an investor group led by its chairman, Leonard Riggio.




Èublishing

Barnes & Noble publishes some of the books it sells, inexpensively reprinting non-copyrighted
titles or acquiring the U.S. or English language rights from another publisher. In addition, Barnes
& Noble commissions reprint anthologies and omnibus editions using in-house editors.

(afés

The first store to feature a café serving Starbucks beverages was in Springfield, New Jersey in
1993. Since then, most stores have been amended or constructed specifically to feature a cafe
serving Starbucks beverages, Harney & Sons or Tazo Tea, FIJI Bottled Water, bakery goods
from The Cheesecake Factory, candy from Godiva Chocolatiers, sandwiches and other specialty
products. Although the cafés are owned and operated by Barnes & Noble, servers follow
Starbucks' standards in beverage preparation; the prominent Starbucks logo is sometimes
confusing for customers wanting to use Starbucks stored-value cards or the Starbucks Gold Card,
which are not accepted (the Barnes & Noble Membership is accepted to receive a discount on
any Cafe related good).

Barnes & Noble Nook

÷

 





 
 



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Barnes & Noble Nook is an electronic book reader developed by the company,[27] based on the
Android platform. The device was announced in the United States on 20 October 2009, and was
released 30 November 2009 for US$259.[28] On June 21, 2010 Barnes & Noble reduced the
Nook's price to US$199, as well as announcing the launch of a new Wi-Fi-only model, for
US$149.[29]

(ollege bookstores

Barnes & Noble College Booksellers, Inc., headquartered in Basking Ridge, NJ, is a subsidiary
of the company which operates bookstores at more than 600 institutions of higher education.
College Bookstores was previously owned by company chairman Leonard Riggio.




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Amazon.com is widely regarded as the first significantly successful
enterprise
to sell traditional consumer goods over the Internet and the epitome of
retail
electronic commerce.
Customers shop by visiting www.Amazon.com, a World Wide Web site where
they can search among more than 3 million book titles and purchase ones they like
by
entering a shipping address, credit card number, and other information. After the
first
purchase, the customer's shipping and credit card information are stored securely in
Amazon.com's information system. The next time, it only takes a single mouse
click
to complete an order. Amazon.com makes it very easy to buy a book on-line.
Making the customer's on-line experience warm and pleasant is a key
Amazon.com strategy. The site retains information on each customer and even uses
an
information technology called collaborative filtering to recommend books based on
the past purchases of buyers with similar histories. In addition to the
personalization
afforded each shopper, the site allows readers to post their own reviews of books,
offers profiles of authors, and includes staff recommendations. The result has been
a
perception among customers that they share a relationship with the company²one
they value so highly that in February, 1999, when it was revealed Amazon.com
accepted payment from publishers to have books placed on recommended lists,
widespread protests led the company to include disclaimers on the site and to
broaden
its merchandise return policy.

Physical bookstores such as Barnes & Noble, in contrast, must stock up to 160
days of inventory to provide enough selection to satisfy customers. The bookseller
must pay distributors and publishers 45 to 90 days after it purchases the books,
carrying the costs of those books for up to four months.
However, because Amazon.com has no stores for people to walk into, it has to
invest large sums in advertising in order to generate virtual foot traffic, or visits to
its
Web site. One-way Amazon.com works to attract visitors is through links from
other
Web sites, a technique that traditional brick-and-mortar outlets cannot duplicate.
Soon
after its launch, Amazon.com introduced a standing offer: Any Web site that gave
Amazon.com a link (a button on its site that would connect users directly to
Amazon.com) so customers could shop for books related to the site's subject matter
would receive up to 15 percent of the sales that resulted from use of the link.
Today
this Associates Program boasts more than 140,000 participants. Still, Amazon.com
has to pay for advertising space on popular Web sites, and it jockeys with its
competition to forge exclusive arrangements with some of those sites. One Barnes
&
Noble executive compared Amazon.com's marketing costs to the premium a
brickand-
mortar store pays for a good location that will generate foot traffic.

Despite innovations in presentation, Barnes & Noble still faces the challenges
that any physical store must overcome²and that Amazon.com avoids. It must
carry
huge inventories, and it uses information systems to track sales of individual titles
so
that nonperforming ones can be removed from shelves in as little as 120 days. Its
array of more than 1000 stores requires an army of personnel, more than 27,000
employees. Amazon.com employs only about 7600, of which 1600 are for its book
sales. The physical plant of each Barnes & Noble store represents an expense as well.

 

 


 
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