Amazon History Timeline: Bookstore to Tech Giant

The story of how another tech giant, Apple, got its name is somewhat similar. “He walked into the garage one morning and informed his colleagues of the company’s new name…and he registered the new URL on November 1, 1994,” Stone wrote in his book. Yet Stone writes that CEO Jeff Bezos’ first lawyer pointed which of these companies was first named cadabra inc out that the reference was too obscure. Plus, when you were on the phone, people sometimes heard “Cadaver” instead. Accounting for the companies 3 share splits, all coming before Y2K, the stock closed its first day of trading under $2. It raced to a then all-time high, just over $100, in 1999.

Also on This Day in History July 5

He purchased a $40,000 skeleton of an Ice Age cave bear and displayed it in the lobby of the company’s headquarters. Next to it was a sign that read “Please Don’t Feed The Bear.” It’s still there today. According to Brad Stone’s book “The Everything Store,” “Cadabra” was a reference to “abracadabra,” to suggest using the store would work like magic. The Cadabra name didn’t stick around for long, though.

History

1. According to Brad Stone’s book “The Everything Store,” “Cadabra” was a reference to “abracadabra,” to suggest using the store would work like magic.
2. Other possibilities were slightly more esoteric—like MakeItSo.com, an earlier suggestion from Bezos’s colleague Jeff Holden that was inspired by the catchphrase of Star Trek’s Captain Jean-Luc Picard.
3. They would bring their friends and family and would often sleep in their cars before going to work the next day.

Those equations were  called “fitness functions,” and tracking those goals is how Bezos managed his teams. So that summer, Stone writes, Bezos and MacKenzie, who is now his ex-wife, decided to brainstorm on a bunch of new names for the company. The husband-wife duo resigstered several domain names including Awake.com, Browse.com, Bookmall.com and Aard.com.

Expansion and Growth: Beyond Books

Articles with the “HISTORY.com Editors” byline have been written or edited by the HISTORY.com editors, including Amanda Onion, Missy Sullivan, Matt Mullen and Christian Zapata. Other possibilities were slightly more esoteric—like MakeItSo.com, an earlier suggestion from Bezos’s colleague Jeff Holden that was inspired by the catchphrase of Star Trek’s Captain Jean-Luc Picard. And Aard.com, from the Dutch word for earth (aarde), which would all but guarantee that Bezos’s company would sit atop any alphabetically arranged list.

Every employee had to take a graveyard shift in the fulfillment centers to meet orders. They would bring their friends and family and would often sleep in their cars before going to work the next day. The US Military has embraced private enterprise like never before to rejoin the space race. Foreign threats are on the rise, led by Russia and China.

Jeff Bezos originally wanted to give the company the magical sounding name “Cadabra.” In the time before Google Search ruled the internet, being at the top of alphabetical lists still mattered. That’s what led Bezos to awake.com and another name, “Aard.” Sign up now to learn about This Day in History straight from your inbox.

The couple at one time also considered naming their company Relentless.com but they decided against it. Employees would be organized into groups of fewer than 10 people — the perfect number to be satisfied by two pizzas for dinner — and were expected to work autonomously. Those equations were called “fitness functions,” and tracking those goals was how Bezos managed his teams. Originally, it was an online bookstore called Cadabra.

You want their names to mean something interesting, something meaningful. Yet you want to keep it simple to avoid spelling errors and pronunciation mistakes. Yet you also don’t want other kids to make fun of them because of their names. That shift from “Jet City” to “Cloud City” has been good for business, for recruiting employees, and “for the morale of the Pacific Northwest, and civic pride,” Selipsky said. Alberg, co-founder of Seattle investment firm Madrona Venture Group, said Seattle was lucky that Bezos chose the city over Portland or the Bay Area to launch his startup. “A lot of the political conversation a hundred-and-some years ago was around what role should the federal government play in regulating or creating a balance to these incredibly powerful companies,” she said.