Jeff Bezos 1964-1999

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It was the autumn of 1996. Jeff Bezos had just raised eight
million dollars, putting Amazon’s valuation at around sixty
million. Revenue that year was $15.7 million, small yes, but
growing at a huge rate and it had caught the attention of two men
who’d built an empire out of books the old-fashioned way —
Leonard and Stephen Riggio, founders of Barnes & Noble.

Their chain was the heavyweight of American bookselling: hundreds
of superstores, nearly two billion dollars in annual sales, and a
reputation for crushing smaller rivals.

That autumn, the Riggio brothers invited Jeff Bezos to dinner in
New York for what was described as a frank but cordial
conversation. They told him they admired what he’d built,
acknowledged that Amazon had the early lead online. But, they
said plainly, if Barnes & Noble launched its own e-commerce
site, their scale and publisher relationships would allow them to
“surpass Amazon easily” in both selection and price.

They floated alternatives — a partnership, maybe a strategic
alliance, maybe for Bezos to lead Barnes & Noble’s online
strategy.

Bezos declined. Steve Riggio left the dinner unconvinced and said
after the meeting. “That purely virtual model won’t cut it in the
long term.”

Now… to understand how Bezos ended up across the table from the
biggest booksellers in America just over a year after setting up
Amazon, you have to go back to where it all began.