Amazon is the largest online retailer in the world, and there’s no way you haven’t heard of them before… in fact, you more probably have a room full of goods ordered from them!
Amazon – A Guide and Discounts
What started as an online bookstore has now blossomed into a huge retail empire selling everything from consumer electronics to food and drink, clothing to pet accessories. There’s almost nothing that you won’t find online through Amazon; either sold directly from them or through third-party retailers. Amazon allows other retailers to advertise and sell through the site under their branding for a small fee charged on each sale made – but the size of the marketplace at stake means that very few retailers don’t make a profit as a result… it’s just so big!
GET STUDENT DISCOUNT >Now that Amazon has become an almost one-stop-shop for everything you could imagine, the business is growing and developing into new industries and retail experiences on what seems like an almost daily basis.
AmazonFresh takes on traditional supermarkets with a grocery delivery service available in the US, Japan and Germany, with launches planned in India and Australia… and there’s little doubt that it’ll end up in the UK soon! Amazon Prime is a paid subscription service allowing you free next day delivery on purchases as well as a range of downloads to stream. The Amazon Kindle was the first mainstream e-reader and is now ‘Kindle’ is a household name used as a noun for such devices worldwide.
The latest must-have from the Amazon is Alexa and the Amazon Echo. These AI devices are personal assistant devices that can source information from the internet, order products from Amazon stores, playback music, set alarms and make to-do lists. These ‘intelligent assistant’ devices are now being copied far and wide and seem set to be a staple in all households in 2018.
Whether you’re looking for textbooks, outfits, smartphones or household items for your uni flat, Amazon will have something to offer. The marketplace is big enough that you can really shop around and compare deals and different items to make sure you get the best possible deal. Unlike many other online retailers, Amazon also allows people to sell second-hand items – a godsend when it comes to things like books and electronics as they’re often considerably cheaper than buying them brand new!
GET STUDENT DISCOUNT >Amazon is run from a variety of data centres online that feed through orders to ‘local’ depots and delivery offices in each region. Offline, they have trialled physical bricks-and-mortar stores in the US; primarily focused on books and study materials. A success thus far, it’s rumoured that more Amazon shops could open as part of a new business direction across the US and in Germany. For now, there’s no talk of these plans for the UK, though, so we’ll have to stick to online purchases until we hear more.
So if you’re looking for an Amazon student discount, then check out our fantastic guide page where there is a minimum 10% off code plus more money-saving tips.
History
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos started the company out of fear of not taking part in the dotcom boom (FOMO, as it’d be called now!) and originally called it ‘Cadabra’… but hastily re-branded when people misheard it as ‘Cadaver’. Narrowing down a list of all of the things we felt would sell well online, he finally settled on books and negotiated wholesale deals for the site. Within 2 months, Amazon was supplying the whole of the USA and in 1999, ventured into publishing for the first time.
Fast forward to 2011 and the site we recognise now had taken shape, employing over 300,000 people worldwide. It has merged with and acquired a number of retailers spanning a range of industries and sectors and continues to grow at an unprecedented rate.
Today, Amazon owns over 40 subsidiary companies, invests in a number of supply chain and manufacturing innovations, and attracts over 130 million customers monthly in the US alone.
