Scaramucci recalls Amazon origin

Anthony Scaramucci used an April 11 post to revive an old Amazon idea: books were the opening move, not the endgame. (x.com) Jeff Bezos launched Amazon on July 16, 1995 as an online bookstore, and by March 1998 he was telling shareholders the company planned to “pursue the online commerce opportunities in other areas.” Amazon said 1997 revenue reached $147.8 million and customer accounts topped 1.5 million. (aboutamazon.com) Bezos gave the basic logic in a 1997 interview: books had more than 3 million active titles worldwide, including more than 1.5 million in English, which made them a category that fit the web better than a physical store. He said an online bookstore could offer selection that “couldn’t exist any other way.” (cnbc.com) Amazon moved beyond books quickly. It opened a music store in June 1998, added video later that year, and by January 1999 said those expansion areas accounted for 25 percent of sales. (press.aboutamazon.com, press.aboutamazon.com) That sequence is the part people were arguing over online this weekend: whether Amazon’s bookstore identity was a mission or a wedge into general retail. Bezos’ own 1998 shareholder letter described books as a lead position the company wanted to “solidify and extend” while it entered other markets. (aboutamazon.com) The company’s later history supports that broader-retail reading. By July 1999, Amazon was launching electronics and toys and games, and it described itself as the internet’s top music, video, and book retailer. (press.aboutamazon.com) Amazon’s business mix is now far removed from a bookseller. In its 2024 annual results, Amazon reported $638.0 billion in net sales, while its filings said service sales include third-party seller fees, Amazon Web Services, advertising, Prime memberships, and digital subscriptions. (sec.gov, sec.gov) Books still matter to Amazon’s origin story because they solved an early internet problem: how to build a store with selection no shelf-based chain could match in 1995. Scaramucci’s post landed because Amazon’s first category now looks, in hindsight, like the narrow door into a much larger company. (cnbc.com, x.com)