Quotes By Jeff Bezos

A brand for a company is like a reputation for a person. You earn reputation by trying to do hard things well.

I think there are going to be a bunch of tablet-like devices. It's really a different product category.

I very much believe the Internet is indeed all it is cracked up to be.

My own view is that every company requires a long-term view.

Mediocre theoretical physicists make no progress. They spend all their time understanding other people's progress.

Market leadership can translate directly to higher revenue, higher profitability, greater capital velocity, and correspondingly stronger returns on invested capital.

We expect all our businesses to have a positive impact on our top and bottom lines. Profitability is very important to us or we wouldn't be in this business.

One of the things it was obvious you could do with an online store is have a much more complete selection.

A company shouldn't get addicted to being shiny, because shiny doesn't last.

The best customer service is if the customer doesn't need to call you, doesn't need to talk to you. It just works.

I think frugality drives innovation, just like other constraints do. One of the only ways to get out of a tight box is to invent your way out.

The book is not really the container for the book. The book itself is the narrative. It's the thing that people create.

It's not an experiment if you know it's going to work.

Percentage margins don't matter. What matters always is dollar margins: the actual dollar amount. Companies are valued not on their percentage margins, but on how many dollars they actually make, and a multiple of that.

It is very difficult to get people to focus on the most important things when you're in boom times.

Strip malls are history.

I strongly believe that missionaries make better products. They care more. For a missionary, it's not just about the business. There has to be a business, and the business has to make sense, but that's not why you do it. You do it because you have something meaningful that motivates you.

I went to Princeton specifically to study physics.

For people who are readers, reading is important to them.

The human brain is an incredible pattern-matching machine.

If you're competitor-focused, you have to wait until there is a competitor doing something. Being customer-focused allows you to be more pioneering.

I don't want to use my creative energy on somebody else's user interface.

Millions of people were inspired by the Apollo Program. I was five years old when I watched Apollo 11 unfold on television, and without any doubt it was a big contributor to my passions for science, engineering, and exploration.

You know, we love stories and we love narrative; we love to get lost in an author's world.

I've always been at the intersection of computers and whatever they can revolutionize.

You don't want to negotiate the price of simple things you buy every day.

Cultures, for better or worse, are very stable.

Infrastructure web services had to happen.

Part of company culture is path-dependent - it's the lessons you learn along the way.

If you only do things where you know the answer in advance, your company goes away.