From Alternative to Zydeco, Hip-hop to Bebop, Amazon.com Has It All

SEATTLE, Wa (June 10, 1998): In order to provide its customers with the ultimate music shopping experience, leading online retailer Amazon.com, Inc. (Nasdaq: AMZN), is set to launch its highly anticipated music store Thursday. The Amazon.com music store offers 10 times the CD selection of the typical music store at everyday savings of up to 40%, including 30% off Amazon.com's 100 bestselling CDs.

From Alternative to Zydeco, Hip-hop to Bebop, Amazon.com's customers will find everything from the latest releases to hard-to-find gems in nearly 300 musical genres. Music fans can search for their favorite music by CD title, artist, song title, or label and listen to more than 225,000 song samples. In addition, the new Amazon.com music store features expert and customer reviews, interviews, essentials lists, the hottest CDs from around the country and the world, music in the news, and music recommendations.

"We received ideas, opinions, and suggestions from more than 20,000 individuals when we reached out to customers and asked them to help us build their dream music store," said Amazon.com's founder and CEO, Jeff Bezos. "Many of the features in our new music store are the direct result of these suggestions. Our customers told us they wanted a site that is as rich in musical selection and content as the Amazon.com bookstore--with the same great prices, features, and customer service."

The Amazon.com music store is divided into four easy-to-navigate areas--Browse Styles, Chart Toppers, Featured in the Media, and the Recommendation Center.

 

  • Browse Styles -- Amazon.com offers music in nearly 300 genres in 14 main categories, including Alternative, Blues, Country, Dance/DJ, Folk, International, Jazz, New Age, Pop, Rap/Hip-Hop, Rock, R&B/Soul, Soundtracks, and Miscellaneous. Customers can also view thousands of reviews, editors' picks, articles, interviews, bestsellers, and lists of essential titles that can help start or expand their musical collection.
     
  • Chart Toppers -- Music lovers can stay up to date on the hottest CDs from around the country and around the world at Amazon.com. They will find Amazon.com's 100 bestselling CDs--all at 30% off--and can check out the Billboard Top 30 and CMJ college radio chart. They can even see what's hot in the U.K., Germany, Japan, and Brazil.
     
  • Featured in the Media -- Amazon.com makes it easy to find the music everyone is talking about. Customers can find CDs recently featured in 20 leading media outlets, including Rolling Stone, Spin, NPR, Entertainment Weekly, The Tonight Show, and the Late Show with David Letterman.
     
  • Recommendation Center -- Amazon.com offers customers a simple, fun way to discover music based on their mood, preferences, and similar artists. Music fans can even find out what CDs their favorite artists listen to and sign up to receive free e-mail music recommendations.

Senior Editor Keith Moerer leads Amazon.com's team of well-known and experienced music editors. Moerer has 12 years' experience editing national and regional music magazines, including Rolling Stone, Request, and Bay Area Music Magazine (BAM). Amazon.com's editorial team members have also been published in Entertainment Weekly, Rolling Stone, Spin, Billboard, Downbeat, Salon, Pulse!, Request, Microsoft's Music Central, No Depression, MTV Online, Musician, Stereophile, Hi Fidelity, Musician, Windham Hill, The [Seattle] Rocket, Alternative Press, Blues Revue, The Washington Post, The New York Times, and The Village Voice, among others. In addition to its experienced staff, Amazon.com features the work of over 200 nationally respected contributors

Drawing on its experience as the leading retailer on the Web, Amazon.com has also significantly redesigned its store. The company has focused on providing customers a secure, convenient, seamless shopping experience for books and music. The new store design allows customers to move easily between the book and music areas, making it fast and simple for customers to find exactly what they are looking for. Customers can also take advantage of an integrated shopping cart, 1-ClickSM ordering, and consolidated shipping.

About Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc., is Earth's biggest book and music store. Amazon.com offers a catalog of more than 3 million book, music, and other titles, plus easy-to-use search and browse features, e-mail services, personalized shopping services, secure Web-based credit card payment, and direct shipping to customers. Amazon.com has virtually unlimited online shelf space and offers customers a vast selection through an efficient search-and-retrieval interface, as well as streamlined ordering through 1-ClickSM technology. Amazon.com pioneered the concept of syndicated selling on the Internet and has more than 60,000 members in its Associates Program, including AOL.com, Yahoo!, Netscape, Excite, the AltaVista Search Service, the @Home Network, the Prodigy Shopping Network, and iVillage.

This announcement contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties that include, among others, Amazon.com's limited operating history, the unpredictability of its future revenues, and risks associated with capacity constraints, management of growth, and new business opportunities. More information about factors that potentially could affect Amazon.com's financial results is included in the company's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 1997, and quarterly report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended March 31, 1998, both filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission..

Amazon.com, Earth's Biggest Bookstore, and 1-Click are service marks of Amazon.com, Inc. All other names are trademarks of their respective owners.