We got a new toy today in the Imaging room. Its the Puffer Pig! Others would disagree, but I'd like to think of it as a stress ball. It tricks you thinking you are playing and having fun squeezing his head so his eyeballs burst out at you. Puffer pig is actually reducing your stress levels.

Then you may wonder why in the world is anyone stressin' over here? I mean, we're working at Zappos.com?! The greatest company to work for ever! Its not so much the work as its is, well... Christopher Walken's face-Yep, even though he's all over this room, he's still hidden, watching us. Sometimes he is wearing disguises.

When we leave at night, he dances mostly. He will fly around the warehouse blaring Weapon of Choice. If he isn't in the mood he becomes the best and coolest team member there is. Telling people what to do in the only way he can. Just imagine it. He throws in some cow bell for that fever situation he has.

Thanks for the Puffer Pig, Erin!

Have you ever had one of those Fridays where, your only excuse was "Hey, its Friday man!" That's how it was for us last Friday. Everything was funny, even though it really wasn't. We were all really talkative. Laurie is here from Vegas, and she helped entertain us with her awesome dance moves. Jon drew faces for our Zappos card board cut outs. That was our main team building project.. to get faces for the card board cut outs. Yeah, since it was Friday and all it didn't happen exactly as planned! One of the faces was done by Max. If you know him, you'll know which face was his! I began filming, with no point, and thats pretty much what you'll see! So watch our weird Friday video I put together! Enjoy friends!

Meet Lisa everyone! She is one of our wonderful Seniors in the Images department! Lisa's pretty awesome, and I thought everyone else should know a little bit about this Indiana Jones loving, safety team lady! Being on the safety team here in KY, she is always representing the HOOPLA! She knows her CPR and is always going to meetings and keeping us informed on all the safety rules, and new and fun activities for us to do!

Here is some random questions I asked Lisa so we could know a little more about her:

Favorite Movie: there are tons...Super Troopers is one that I can watch all day, and never feel like its too much.

What do you do on the Safety Team: I get information about things going on in the warehouse and I try to keep my team informed. Just try to keep everyone aware.

Best Pick up Line: A friend of mine used this on some girls "How much does a Polar Bear weigh?... Enough to break the ice, Hi my name is..." and One I heard on the radio, its lame but I laugh. " I'm glad I brought my Library card cause I'm checking you out."

Dumbest thing ever seen: WOW, umm... lets see, when my friend used that lame pick up line about the Polar Bear. It was at a crappy haunted house thing, so can that make it even worse? And Steven Seagal's singing.

Whats the strangest thing: just look around on the Internet, you will find all kinds of gems. Like the Universe, Its strange, unknown, but amazing.

Coolest thing in the world: the Internet, and my Indiana Jones hat.

You may have seen Lisa in Vegas back in March... Here she is -with her mustache! All great men.. and women, have mustaches!

Last Saturday a group of us from the images content team decided to go on a team outing. Newport, KY was the place to be! Newport, which is on the levee, has the one and only Newport Aquarium! It's about an hour and 40 minute drive from Louisville, but it's worth the drive, especially if its as beautiful as it was on Saturday!

It was really windy, but it was on the sunny/warm side. Newport Aquarium is right on the Ohio river across from Cincinnati, so you get a beautiful view as well. Once you're inside they have 70 exhibits and 14 galleries featuring an amazing variety of aquatic life from around the world. They have five tunnels you can walk through, surrounded by marine life. And of course....the shark tunnel! All the sharks, beautiful colored fish and sea turtles wind their way all around you when you walk through. The floors are even transparent so you can see them swim under your feet. It was amazing, really!

The Jellyfish exhibit was also very beautiful! We walked into a low lit room with soft music, huge chandelier and big, round, red, velvet seating. The jellyfish were stunning; drifting back and forth, up and down, just like they were at sea. With the lights so low, they were super bright! We saw alligators, lots of turtles, frogs, tons of fish, eels and so much more!

On the way out they have an area where you can pet sand sharks! Erin, Jessie and Kyle were getting their clothes wet because the sharks looked closer than they appeared, so they were leaning in really far not realizing their sleeves were already wet!

After the aquarium, we went to the Hofrauhaus and had some tasty tasty drinks! They were really crowded with parties and Cincinnati was having a baseball game, so it was going to be a long wait before we could eat. We were really hungry, so after we tried some great beer, we walked down the Levee to find some food and found the awesome Claddagh Irish Pub! We ate lots:Cabbage rolls, meatloaf melts, Irish Monte Cristo, and much, much more. It was great tasting food! I will absolutely go there again!

If you ever visit KY, I highly recommend you to go to Newport on the Levee. You will not be let down! I promise!

Ever walked into that red room, next to the huge blue photo room in the middle of the warehouse? Yes? No? Well, I guess you can't necessarily just walk in, unless you have a special badge to get you in...but you can knock anytime! If you haven't, you should stop by sometime and see what we're all about!
Either way, welcome to the Images room! It's where all the color correcting, switching images, and Photoshop magic happens. Enter at your own risk, to the no bully zone with the huge pictures of our faces, and unexplainable drawings on the board. If its real quiet, all you will hear is the ongoing typing and clicking that comes with image processing that is going on!

Beware if you're near the fridge and an awful smell comes out while you wait under the unearthly, airport-like lighting. What can I say? It is what it is! People love all kinds of food, and we need special lighting! If you don't like it, thats cool, we have a punching bag in here somewhere. I say somewhere, because since we had some mannequins move in our room, we don't go on that side of the room much. It's kind of eerie. They're pretty life like, so it looks like headless nude people standing in a group with clear plastic bags over their bodies. Reminds me of the scene in the Silent Hill movie. Yeah...

While visiting, if you have, you may or may not have noticed the little yellow notes stuck to our walls or our computers, with weird little faces drawn on them. Those are drawn by our very own Jon, sometimes we call him Johnny. He's been at Zappos for almost 2 years now. You know he loves it! We always wondered why Jon draws these weird faces, and what they mean to him. So we decided to bother him and ask. We like to put Jon on the spot!

Here are the many faces of Jon!
Many Faces of Jon -Posted April 30th 2008

Next time you come by, you should ask Jon to get your very own post it face! You never know, he could be famous for it some day!

There has been a pretty big change here at Zappos.com. What was once known as Product Information, Photo and Imaging has now officially made the change to the Content Team. It makes sense when you look at the inner workings of the site.

Here’s a quick breakdown of what each area is responsible for:

Product Information (PI) is in charge of all product descriptions on the site. Yes sir, that means every piece of leather, canvas, nubuck or tweed that is on the site must be described by Product Information first. PI is also in charge of creating the brand “about text” which gives the customers a quick rundown of the brand history and what they bring to the table. PI reads every single customer review as well. No simple feat might I add. There is so much more, but Ash touched on that stuff in his past blog here.

The Photo and Imaging teams in Kentucky and Las Vegas have also fallen under the Content Team umbrella. Photo is in charge of all of the product shots that we have on the site. They make sure the customer gets a good idea, visually, of what they are getting. After Photo takes the pictures, the Imaging team makes sure the pictures are in the right places and that the blue you see is blue and the pewter you see is pewter. How many of you guys would order something with out seeing it? It’s important that we all work hand-in-hand, since I would never buy anything without being able to read about it either.

That’s just the quick nuts and bolts of it all. In short, say hello to the Zappos.com Content Team.

LV Content Team

Look out for the KY Content Team coming soon!