Everything Amazon does seems to make news. 

A recent article in the Wired magazine by Paris Martineu and Louise Matsakis highlights “WHY IT’S HARD TO ESCAPE AMAZON’S LONG REACH” 

In the article, the authors begin by explaining

The company is known as the “everything store,” but in its dogged pursuit of growth, Amazon has come to dominate more than just ecommerce. It’s now the largest provider of cloud computing services and a maker of home security systems. Amazon is a fashion designer, advertising business, television and movie producer, book publisher, and the owner of a sprawling platform for crowdsourced micro-labor tasks. The company now occupies roughly as much space worldwide as 38 Pentagons. It has grown so large that Amazon’s many subsidiaries are difficult to track—so we catalogued them all for you. This is our exhaustive map of the Kingdom of Amazon.

You might be wondering, why Amazon? After all, other tech firms, including Google and Facebook, have also expanded outside their core businesses in recent years. But few other companies can claim leadership in sectors as disparate as videogame streaming, online fabric sales, and facial recognition. Amazon also employs far more people than its competitors. Roughly 613,000 people work at Amazon, more than twice as many as work at Alphabet (94,000), Facebook (33,000), and Microsoft (135,000) combined. Most of those workers labor in one of Amazon’s more than 100 North American logistics centers, or at one of more than 450 Whole Foods stores.

You might be wondering, why Amazon? After all, other tech firms, including Google and Facebook, have also expanded outside their core businesses in recent years. But few other companies can claim leadership in sectors as disparate as videogame streaming, online fabric sales, and facial recognition. Amazon also employs far more people than its competitors. Roughly 613,000 people work at Amazon, more than twice as many as work at Alphabet (94,000), Facebook (33,000), and Microsoft (135,000) combined. Most of those workers labor in one of Amazon’s more than 100 North American logistics centers, or at one of more than 450 Whole Foods stores.

A while ago, we ran a few features on the eCommerce giant:

What’s the big deal about $1 out of every $2 spent online in the US going to Amazon? The report highlights how “behind the packages on the doorstep and the inviting interface, Amazon has quietly positioned itself at the center of a growing share of our daily activities and transactions, extending its tentacles across our economy, and with it, our lives.”

Amazon’s Day 1 thinking: eCommerce giant to retain a startup mindset? Amazon, by all accounts, is a multi-billion 400-pound-gorilla in the eCommerce Space. I reviewed Amazon’s growth and reach in an earlier article of mine “What’s the big deal about $1 out of every $2 spent online in the US going to Amazon?” (link) In the article, I examined the topic building on the report in ILSR, “behind the packages on the doorstep and the inviting interface, Amazon has quietly positioned itself at the center of a growing share of our daily activities and transactions, extending its tentacles across our economy, and with it, our lives” –

• Half of all U.S. households are subscribed to the membership program (Amazon Prime)
• Half of all online shopping searches start directly on Amazon
• Amazon captures nearly one in every two dollars that Americans spend online.

Amazon extends franchise model by ordering 20,000 Mercedes-Benz – Amazon has been pushing forward on the program by extending its Delivery Service. In June, Amazon announced that it was rolling out its Delivery Service Partner program to increase its package delivery and logistics service capabilities. It also aims to enable entrepreneurs to set up their own businesses to deliver Amazon packages. The e-Commerce giant describes the program to prospective franchisees.

If you’re a customer-obsessed people person who loves coaching teams in a high speed, ever-changing environment, becoming an Amazon Delivery Service Partner is an ideal opportunity for you. As an owner, you will operate with 20-40 vans and have 40-100 employees. You’ll be fully responsible for hiring and developing a team of high-performing, hardworking drivers, while we take care of getting you set up and ready to operate out of an Amazon delivery station in your city. You’ll be expected to provide consistent coaching and support for your team to ensure the successful delivery of packages in a 7 days/week, 365 days/year operation.