Zappos
July 24, 2009 by Colin
Filed under Entrepeneur, Innovation
I attended a birthday party last night and this interesting story came up in conversation so I thought I would share the Fortune article.
Zappos knows how to kick it.
The quirky retailer has a reputation for flat-out fun. But when it cut 8% of its staff, Zappos became a model of how to nurture employees in good times and bad.
Shoe-in: Zappos, debuting on our list at No. 23, hunts for employees who are a little weird.
Thinking out of the box: CEO Hsieh learned how a culture could be toxic at his first startup. ‘By the time it grew to 100 people, I dreaded going to the office,’ he said.
NEW YORK (Fortune) — Five things you can learn from the obsessively Twittering chief executive of Zappos: 1. No matter the season, eggnog never works as an acceptable substitute for gravy when nuking mashed potatoes. He’s tried. 2. Everything you need to know about business can be gleaned from playing pohttp://money.cnn.com/2009/01/15/news/companies/Zappos_best_companies_obrien.fortune/index.htmker – act strong when weak and know when to bluff. 3. Despite the crippling economic downturn, sales jumped almost 20% in 2008, passing the $1 billion mark two years ahead of schedule. 4. Pajama party at the boss’s house! 5. The time has come for him to lay off 124 of his friends.
Welcome to Zappos, the Las Vegas-based e-commerce site with 1,500 perpetually chipper employees who have a thing for parades and a CEO intent on broadcasting all aspects of life, business, and philosophy in 140 characters or less.
The company’s debut at No. 23 makes it the highest-ranking newcomer…
http://money.cnn.com/2009/01/15/news/companies/Zappos_best_companies_obrien.fortune/index.htm
Even more Zappos in the news.
I love them btw but they have fierce competitor at endless.com – far better search functionality when it comes to narrowing down choices.
your shoe loving friend,
jt
http://www.emarketer.com/Newsletter_htm/20090724.html
Even more Zappos in the news.
I love them btw but they have fierce competitor at endless.com – far better search functionality when it comes to narrowing down choices.
your shoe loving friend,
jt
http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1007196
They are such a cool company.. I took a training course called Putting people first and the trainer (who is now a good friend and you would have really liked too) talked abut Zappos and their incredible focus on customer service. She said that if you called them up and wanted them to order a pizza for you that they literally would..
Much different experience than most places these days I tell you!!
Zappos has customer service figured out and Inc recently had an awesome article out regarding this. They do free pick ups from Hotels in Las Vegas so people can tour their facility out in Henderson.
It will be interesting to see how Amazon’s purchase will affect this company. Tony Hsieh apparently did not want to sell but VC’s dictated otherwise and wanted to cash out. I am sure he will get over it because his own pocket and his own fund Venture Frogs (I think that is the name of it) hit pay dirt big time.