Amazon’s 1994 launch offered “proof of concept” for e-commerce

Ben Bradford Jul 5, 2019
HTML EMBED:
COPY
An Amazon company timeline starts with the founding in 1994 at the Amazon Fulfillment Center on August 1, 2017 in Robbinsville, New Jersey. Mark Makela/Getty Images

Amazon’s 1994 launch offered “proof of concept” for e-commerce

Ben Bradford Jul 5, 2019
An Amazon company timeline starts with the founding in 1994 at the Amazon Fulfillment Center on August 1, 2017 in Robbinsville, New Jersey. Mark Makela/Getty Images
HTML EMBED:
COPY

Exactly 25 years ago today, a company called “Cadabra” (as in Abracadabra) incorporated in Washington State. A few months later it would change its name to Amazon. A quarter-century later, it’s the world’s largest retailer, worth almost a trillion dollars, with side businesses that stretch across industries, while thousands of brick-and-mortar stores have closed around the U.S.

There’s a lot happening in the world.  Through it all, Marketplace is here for you. 

You rely on Marketplace to break down the world’s events and tell you how it affects you in a fact-based, approachable way. We rely on your financial support to keep making that possible. 

Your donation today powers the independent journalism that you rely on. For just $5/month, you can help sustain Marketplace so we can keep reporting on the things that matter to you.