Book Stacks Unlimited was an American online bookstore created by Charles M. Stack in 1992, three years before

Jeff Bezos Jeffrey Preston Bezos ( ;; and Robinson (2010), p. 7. ''né'' Jorgensen; born January 12, 1964) is an American entrepreneur, media proprietor, investor, and commercial astronaut. He is the founder, executive chairman, and former preside ...

launched

Amazon.com Amazon.com, Inc. ( ) is an American multinational technology company focusing on e-commerce, cloud computing, online advertising, digital streaming, and artificial intelligence. It has been referred to as "one of the most influential econo ...

. Stack's store, selling new books, began as a dial-up bulletin board located in

Cleveland Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S. ...

. The Books.com website opened in 1994, eventually attracting a half million visitors each month.

History

Stack devised the concept in 1991 based on his personal fascination with reading and books, as he recalled in 1998: :I've always read a lot, so that was the germ of the idea. I'll pick a subject and read every book ever published on it. That's hard to do if you shop at a walk-in bookstore. Even the superstores don't have more than a couple of titles per topic. My dream was to have a bookstore that had every book ever published to feed my own habit.Soeder, John. "CyberScene: Book Sale,"''Inside Business'', March 1, 1998. Offering 500,000 titles, Book Stacks had 35 staffers who gave their book recommendations to visitors. Other features included a daily literary journal, summaries of new books, RealAudio interviews with authors and forums in which customers could ask questions and discuss books. Books could be searched by title, author, subject, keyword or ISBN number. In 1996, Book Stacks became a wholly owned subsidiary of

Cendant Corporation Cendant Corporation was an American provider of business and consumer services, primarily within the real estate and travel industries. In 2005 and 2006, it broke up and spun off or sold its constituent businesses. Although it was based in New Yo ...

, a consumer services company based in Stamford, Connecticut, and previously known as CUC International. In 1997, Book Stacks became part of Cendant's virtual mall, netMarket, a one-stop Internet shopping site which included an

online music store A digital music store is a business that sells digital audio files of music recordings over the Internet. Customers gain ownership of a license to use the files, in contrast to a music streaming service, where they listen to recordings without ...

and an online video store, both operating from the Book Stacks offices in downtown Cleveland. The books.com url was subsequently sold to Barnes & Noble; www.books.com now redirects to www.barnesandnoble.com.

References

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External links

Smart Business: "Visionary in Obscurity"
1991 establishments in Ohio Book selling websites Independent bookstores of the United States Retail companies established in 1991 Defunct companies based in Cleveland 1997 disestablishments in Ohio 1996 mergers and acquisitions Internet properties established in 1991 Internet properties disestablished in 1997 Retail companies disestablished in 1997