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Amazon is following Walmart playbook. This is what Walmart did to make sure timely (Just-in-Time) Delivery between their warehouse and retail locations. There

by akg_67 11y ago

Amazon is following Walmart playbook. This is what Walmart did to make sure timely (Just-in-Time) Delivery between their warehouse and retail locations. There are business case study on how Walmart used their own freight truck network to beat their retail rivals by dedicating more space in a retail store to retail shelves instead of storing inventory.

ArkyBeagle 11y ago
Precisely. Later, they simply leased the space out to corporations like P&G (or their subs ) and offered logistics/freight service. WalMart was the first retail network to roll up the whole day every day into a single ( green-bar) report on Mr. Sam's desk.
- addicted 11y ago
  This points to what I don't understand about the Amazon financial story. Walmart built up their massive infrastructure business while being simultaneously immensely profitable. However, at Amazon, building out infrastructure comes at the expense of profits. What am I missing that a lot of smart people are seeing in Amazon?
  - akg_67 11y ago
    Pursuit of market share vs pursuit of profit. Amazon seems to want to dominate every market they want to get into. While Walmart focused on dominating one market - retail. I compare Amazon story to Gold Rush. Once Amazon penetrates gold mining business, it wants to move into business of providing tools for gold mining, storage, distribution, and consumption. The profits from the initial gold mining efforts goes into building organizational infrastructure of gold vertical as well as entry into another new vertical.
  - ArkyBeagle 11y ago
    They're deliberately trying to see just how far they can push the envelope of consumer surplus. It's a lot based in Sam Walton's philosophy, only moreso and with the sort of fanatical SiVa approach. My grandparents were from Arkansas ( hence the moniker ) and the frugality ethos Sam Walton lived is how they lived. What you are seeing is people going very long. Everything at Amazon is an API. That's very real leadership. I doubt that will stop until everything everywhere ( except for small reservations of respite from this phenomenon ) is an API. And WalMart is not in any way any sort of aggregator. You bend to their will to sell through them. It's an unpleasant process. I'm not even sure Amazon knows their little stores are there much.
  - Spooky23 11y ago
    Walmart isn't very profitable by tech standards... 3.5%. That's why imo Amazon is a big hype machine. All of these warehouses speed delivery but add overheads. Their stock pricing assumes they are a tech play that they'll magically achieve walmart style scope with high margins. I wonder what happens when rates spike.
    - ArkyBeagle 11y ago
      But Amazon Prime is terrifyingly great. It would now be officially hard to give up.

by akg_67 11y ago

ArkyBeagle 11y ago

Precisely. Later, they simply leased the space out to corporations like P&G (or their subs ) and offered logistics/freight service. WalMart was the first retail network to roll up the whole day every day into a single ( green-bar) report on Mr. Sam's desk.

addicted 11y ago
This points to what I don't understand about the Amazon financial story. Walmart built up their massive infrastructure business while being simultaneously immensely profitable. However, at Amazon, building out infrastructure comes at the expense of profits. What am I missing that a lot of smart people are seeing in Amazon?
- akg_67 11y ago
  Pursuit of market share vs pursuit of profit. Amazon seems to want to dominate every market they want to get into. While Walmart focused on dominating one market - retail. I compare Amazon story to Gold Rush. Once Amazon penetrates gold mining business, it wants to move into business of providing tools for gold mining, storage, distribution, and consumption. The profits from the initial gold mining efforts goes into building organizational infrastructure of gold vertical as well as entry into another new vertical.
- ArkyBeagle 11y ago
  They're deliberately trying to see just how far they can push the envelope of consumer surplus. It's a lot based in Sam Walton's philosophy, only moreso and with the sort of fanatical SiVa approach. My grandparents were from Arkansas ( hence the moniker ) and the frugality ethos Sam Walton lived is how they lived. What you are seeing is people going very long. Everything at Amazon is an API. That's very real leadership. I doubt that will stop until everything everywhere ( except for small reservations of respite from this phenomenon ) is an API. And WalMart is not in any way any sort of aggregator. You bend to their will to sell through them. It's an unpleasant process. I'm not even sure Amazon knows their little stores are there much.
- Spooky23 11y ago
  Walmart isn't very profitable by tech standards... 3.5%. That's why imo Amazon is a big hype machine. All of these warehouses speed delivery but add overheads. Their stock pricing assumes they are a tech play that they'll magically achieve walmart style scope with high margins. I wonder what happens when rates spike.
  - ArkyBeagle 11y ago
    But Amazon Prime is terrifyingly great. It would now be officially hard to give up.