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Books Still Front And Center At Amazon
from the just-a-side-business dept
So far, the earnings of the major internet bellwethers have been pretty ho-hum, as eBay, Google and Yahoo have all come in with less-than-stellar results. But at least the forth horseman, Amazon, came through, blowing past analyst estimates. For a long time, Amazon's been dogged with the stigma of being just a faux-internet company, since it actually has to deal with things like warehouses and shipping costs. It's been trying hard to transform itself, through its attempts at becoming an e-commerce platform, rather than just a retailer. While these moves have done a lot for the company's reputation, they're still not moving the needle when it comes to the bottom line. Instead, its traditional business continues to carry the day, as it's seeing strong adoption of its Amazon Prime free-shipping plan. It also saw a boost from Harry Potter; although the book didn't come out until the current quarter, interest in it is said to have driven a lot of traffic to the site, which led to sales of other items. Meanwhile, the company's efforts to sell digital goods, like movie downloads, don't seem to be doing much of anything. Until these other businesses actually prove themselves, the company is still highly dependent on the whims of the consumer and whatever hit items happen to be coming out.
