4 ms·

Amazon, Woot, and You: But Mostly Woot

67 points by icey 16y ago

aditya 16y ago
haha - the entire letter is hilarious. Woot sounds like another good company with a strong culture. The big question is why did they sell? Tony Hsieh and Zappos had investor pressure+needed the cash, what was Woot's reason? Maybe the carrot (cash?) Amazon dangled was a really big amount?
- JoeAltmaier 16y ago
  Come on - a Hyundai full of twenties! Read the letter!
  - benwr 16y ago
    I thought it was the two free downloads... I guess I'm just no good at this corporate mumbo-jumbo.
- WesleyJohnson 16y ago
  I've been wondering this myself. I won't pretend to be business savvy, but if you look at the "woot wage" on some of the products they sale, they make some serious bank. Their "Woot-Offs" seem particularly lucrative because they'll often roll in less desirable items that people will buy anyway just to keep the "Woot-Off" going. Aside from the alleged $110 million being an enticing sum of money, I have to imagine there are other reasons. The letter indicated they were excited to learn and grow using technology from Amazon so I do wonder if that is a big part of it. Woot! has had stability problems in the past, particularly when the infamous "Bag of Crap" is up for sale. Not that it takes getting bought out by Amazon to fix such an issue, but it couldn't hurt. Regardless of the reason, I fully expect to see Woot! expand their reach and product offerings outside of shirt.woot, kids.woot and the like as a result of the acquisition.
- sliverstorm 16y ago
  Amazon seems like the perfect company. Woot sells random stuff; what company is more likely to have lots of extra random stuff sitting around than Amazon?
logic 16y ago
See also: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1476029 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1476029
furyg3 16y ago
Or, if you'd prefer to get your business news from the less-conventional rapping monkey puppet, see their video press release: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnCHCcveteA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnCHCcveteA
sabj 16y ago
Wow, that blog post is so heartwarming and fun that it makes me like Woot a lot more than I ever did before! (I didn't dislike it, but had no particular feelings). Respect.
jrockway 16y ago
I'm looking forward to One Click + Amazon Prime shipping on Woot items. Or actually... maybe not :)

67 points by icey 16y ago

haha - the entire letter is hilarious. Woot sounds like another good company with a strong culture. The big question is why did they sell? Tony Hsieh and Zappos had investor pressure+needed the cash, what was Woot's reason? Maybe the carrot (cash?) Amazon dangled was a really big amount?

JoeAltmaier 16y ago
Come on - a Hyundai full of twenties! Read the letter!
- benwr 16y ago
  I thought it was the two free downloads... I guess I'm just no good at this corporate mumbo-jumbo.
WesleyJohnson 16y ago
I've been wondering this myself. I won't pretend to be business savvy, but if you look at the "woot wage" on some of the products they sale, they make some serious bank. Their "Woot-Offs" seem particularly lucrative because they'll often roll in less desirable items that people will buy anyway just to keep the "Woot-Off" going. Aside from the alleged $110 million being an enticing sum of money, I have to imagine there are other reasons. The letter indicated they were excited to learn and grow using technology from Amazon so I do wonder if that is a big part of it. Woot! has had stability problems in the past, particularly when the infamous "Bag of Crap" is up for sale. Not that it takes getting bought out by Amazon to fix such an issue, but it couldn't hurt. Regardless of the reason, I fully expect to see Woot! expand their reach and product offerings outside of shirt.woot, kids.woot and the like as a result of the acquisition.
sliverstorm 16y ago
Amazon seems like the perfect company. Woot sells random stuff; what company is more likely to have lots of extra random stuff sitting around than Amazon?

logic 16y ago

See also: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1476029 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1476029

furyg3 16y ago

Or, if you'd prefer to get your business news from the less-conventional rapping monkey puppet, see their video press release: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnCHCcveteA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnCHCcveteA

sabj 16y ago

Wow, that blog post is so heartwarming and fun that it makes me like Woot a lot more than I ever did before! (I didn't dislike it, but had no particular feelings). Respect.

jrockway 16y ago

I'm looking forward to One Click + Amazon Prime shipping on Woot items. Or actually... maybe not :)