PUMA PG Saddle shoes at Zappos.com - $94.00
O'Neill Bermuda shorts at Zappos.com - $44.00
Linda Long dancing on the table at Zappos.com gathering - PRICELESS

(A little background: It was a Thursday night. The marketing department and other Zappos friends took over the Roadrunner patio. There was a farewell party for our friend Neill. There were friendships blossoming. There were funny stories being told. It started to get dark. There might have been a full moon? Hmmm...and then it happened...our very own Linda Long up on the table! Linda, we can probably never live up to that moment again but you set the standard high - you go girl!)

You can take the mandals out of the man, but can you take the man out of the mandals? Now that is the question! What are mandals you say? Well, some may call it a fashion atrocity; others may say they are simply, man sandals.

Ah, yes…meet Ned, ladies and gentleman! He's our fearless Affiliate Program Manager, commonly known for his keen fashion sense – polos, shorts at all times of the year, and an extreme love of mandals.

Those who know Ned would probably never believe me when I say that he was recently spotted without mandals at the Shop.org conference in Scottsdale. Ask him and he may deny it, but take a peek for yourself! Proof is in the pudding, my friends! And by the way, Zappos.com has a huge selection of mandals!

"There would be more peace in the world if everyone wore mandals" - Ned Farra

Welcome to the very first pulse-pounding post from Zappos.com’s HR and Training departments! For all you feverish fans out there, this is the place to learn about the activities, events, and just plain wackadoo things that we do, straight from the source!

So without further ado, let’s get to it!

From Shannon “Shanadoo” R., one of our truly amazing Recruiting Assistants:

“Early one morning, while pondering the state of the world, Eric, Jacob and I bantered back and forth about holding a company-wide typing contest. The more we talked, the grander the plans became….and the more real! Soon the call went out to all Las Vegas Zappos.com employees:

So Your Momma Can't Dance and Your Daddy Can't Rock & Roll---But CAN YOU TYPE?! Thus, the first ever typing competition becomes a reality!"
Below is a video account of our first ever typing contest!

In other news, Training Manager, Rachael B., has a weird thing for bubbles. I sit facing her and I can tell you I’ve never seen anyone sooo excited over bubbles. My phone and desk are permanently encrusted with bubble residue. To share her bizarre fascination with the rest of the company, she got HR and Training together and a Bubble Parade was born! In true Zappos (and HR / Training) fashion, wackiness ensued…

Here’s the bubble head herself, the lovely Rachael B, in the midst of the parade!


HR and Training in full bubble regalia. ‘Nuff said. ;)


Some parting notes:

What makes Recruiting blow milk out their collective nose:

Coming Soon:
-Zappos.com Annual Employee Picnic! (oooh…)
-HR’s Monthly Outing! (ah….)
-And, Random Rozzy Thoughts!! (wha…???)

Oh, and we’re hiring!!!

Today we handed out our 2008 Zappos.com Print Ad Creative postcards
to Vegas employees! They are a sampling of some of the visuals being
used in our print ad campaign, which hit the newsstands this week!

All employees received five cards to send anywhere to anyone in the world! (I suggested we send them all to Val Kilmer. I don't really know why. First person that popped in my head.)In true creative service/marketing style, we just wheeled them around the office in a wagon and dove headlong into the seas of madness that are the CLT and Merchandising Floors.

Our Creative Service and Marketing crazies filled the aisles in a very non-disruptive.....well, ok, rather disruptive manner to hand bundles of postcards to the un-suspecting masses. Every employee has been given free reign to do what they want with them...who knows, you may be receiving one yourself!
These cards are a part of the 2008 Zappos.com Print Ad Creative, which is also coming along the same time as our brand spankin' new television commercial that began airing a few weeks ago. It is airing on multiple networks throughout the U.S. T.V.-O-Sphere, maybe you've seen one....if not, and if you're nice, I'll post it right below. I'm considering it......I'm considering it.....alright, you won me over. But barely. : )
It's a great new direction for us and we are very excited about it!
Anyway, back to filling out postcards, I'm sending one to my favorite
New Kid on the Block! (I won't say who)

I've never personally been one of those butterflies-in-the-stomach, cuddle-loving, super mushy romantic types. I've had great loves, to be sure, but some aspects of love have always been beyond my comprehension. For example- having never experienced it first hand, I've always viewed such concepts as "love at first sight" with a somewhat skeptical eye.

Not to mention, I'm a creature of habit. It's not that I'm afraid to try new things, I'm just stubborn in my tastes and don't often venture outside of my box. Basic observation of the world around me, and the people therein, has lead me to the belief that when it comes to fashion, I'm a far cry from the minority in that respect. I know the brands I like, and tend to loyally stand by their side through thick and thin.

Although I don't think these are inherently bad traits, they're not exactly things to brag about. I've been working on the self improvement section of my brain. I'm trying to open myself up to new and exciting possibilities on all fronts, and working at Zappos has certainly helped in that regard (see Core Values 2, Embrace and Drive Change, 4, Be Adventurous, Creative and Open-Minded, and 5, Pursue Growth and Learning). Since Zappos.com carries so many brands (1,175 and growing!), we will occasionally have brand representatives come in to familiarize us with their products- supplying information about any new merchandise, new styles, new avenues into which they may be venturing.

Yesterday, I met our Camper representative. Admittedly, I didn't know too much about the brand going into the meeting, so I wasn't sure what to expect.

How do I explain what I saw, what I experienced? I'm still trying to process it, to be honest. They say a picture is worth a thousand words...



I never thought I'd say it, but it was love at first sight. I fell hard and I fell fast. It was my first time experiencing the sentiment, and I wasn't sure how to respond... and with Camper the hits just kept on coming.



It was unnerving at first, but it didn't take long for me to give in to the wanton, uncontrollable, fantastic, wonderful, all-consuming enthusiasm that filled my heart. And it took even less time for my favorites page to grow exponentially.

What I've come to realize is that although loyalty and caution are certainly valuable sentiments, it is worthwhile on occasion to break out of routine and try new things. Have you looked through our brands list lately? You may be surprised by how quickly the love bug can come up and bite you!

Yesterday was book fair day at Zappos, wherein half of our cafeteria was transformed into a small book shop. It really brought some of us developers back to the days of elementary school where such events were not uncommon. Perhaps this feeling was strongest of all for Shane, who discovered a gem of a book entitled High School Musical : All About Dancing.

Part story book and part instructional dance manual, nobody had seen anything quite like it before. It's true that one can get away with a great many things by saying "It's for my daughter", but I happen to know for a fact that Shane is a man who loves to dance! As soon as the recess bell sounded, Shane grabbed Becky and the two started cutting a rug- with director of development Brent calling out dance moves from the book. I was pretty surprised, but the three of them managed to pull off a pretty good show for not having had any rehearsals!

Incidentally, 10% of Shane's book purchase (and all of the other books sold that day) will be donated to the Nevada Childhood Cancer Foundation. Thanks to Suchi for the great action shot!

In the spirit of Zappos Core Value #5, Pursue Growth and Learning, Jeanne and I took a group of Assistant Buyers, Merchandising Assistants and members of our Product Information team from Casual Lifestyle on a one-day, turn-around round trip to Southern California to tour the Magdesians shoe factory. One of only a few left in California, the Magdesian family was gracious enough to open their doors to us.

They have an incredible laser cutting machine that eliminates the need for costly dies and is also 30% more efficient in terms of raw materials. For those of you who don't know, a die is, in essence, a metal "cookie cutter" traditionally used to cut the upper pattern from a sheet of leather or other material. As each size and width combination required a separate die, this is one of the highest costs to a manufacturer in production. By using this new technology, Magdesians can keep the costs, and in turn, the retail prices of their U.S. made shoes significantly more affordable.

Thank you VERY much, Magdesians! It was a great trip and very educational for all!

I suppose some introductions are in order. My name is Nikki W., and I'm the latest (greatest? Time will tell!) blogger on the Zappos block. In addition to blogs, we've got some really exciting balls rolling in the way of video content- known around the interweb as ZapposTV- that I'm super thrilled to be a part of as well. Feel free to check out the new channel. We've got a bunch of great stuff on the way, so stay tuned!

To correspond to John H.'s Zpartans blog, we created the following silly short for your viewing pleasure.


Random randomness: I love the show Cheaters (it's a guilty pleasure- don't you judge me!). Some of my favorite brands are Roxy, Privo, Puma, Earth, MBT, and Betsey Johnson. I think life is what you make it, and for me it's an ever evolving, expanding, and always thrilling adventure.

That's it for now- I'll see you around the blog-o-sphere!

Last Friday was Chrissie's Birthday and like all Birthdays here in Finance
we decorated her desk in a very crazy way, this time we added something a
little out of the ordinary!

Why cans you ask? Chrissie's desk is in a location that gets a lot of
foot traffic and visitors who stop to chat. When those visitors stop and talk
they usually set their can down on the top of Chrissie's cubicle wall and for
some reason the can is left there. When Chrissie realizes the can is still
there it is usually long after the visitor has gone. Most times the soda is
left unopened and still cold. Nobody knows why or who likes to leave their unopened
sodas at her desk and it drives her crazy. So Patrick (The mastermind) decided
to collect as many cans as he could to terrorize decorate Chrissie’s
desk.

Below is an e-mail from Loren, he participated in last years hot dog eating contest and is doing so again this year in about a week! Here is his e-mail that he sent to the masses at Zappos (with some pics from last years fetivities).

Hello Zappos,

I have heard a lot of people talking around the office about taking the hot dog eating title from me. First off, I welcome the challenge and look forward to the competition, however talk is cheap without the follow through. I was informed earlier today that only one person had signed up to challenge me. If that one person is not you,
please refrain from telling me you are going to "take me down" or "this is the end of your reign" or "Watch out, I'm gunning for you this year." This type of taunting should be reserved for people with the intestinal fortitude to put their name on the dotted line and step up to the challenge. I hope this email inspires some of you trash talkers to give it a go and try to beat me, but as you can see below my technique is unbeatable.

First off, thank you to loyal reader 6! Also known as ZC1788, nice name! There are many like it, but that one is yours! Back on track, hello 6 readers and welcome to the very first edition of Argyle Tentacles. Argyle Tentacles is what I hope will become an ongoing effort to find argyle wearers (like yourself) from across this great country, and maybe even this giant planet (relative to a kickball). The idea was born when I was boarding a Southwest Airlines flight and saw the most creative argyle piece I have ever seen. I was not man enough to snap a pic, so I will try to describe what I saw. There was this woman, from behind I could see glimpses of argyle peeking over her shoulder trying desperately to spread across her back. But no, argyle sweater maker decided that would not happen, this was an argyle in-the-front only sort of shirt. But what made this stand out to me was the fact that the argyle pattern was mixed in with deer! That's right, deer! With antlers. Deer with antlers on a shirt with argyle. Argyle Lodgewear if you will. I was too embarrassed to walk up and get in her face and take a pic for you all, I will suck it up and do so next time. Sorry, don't hate me!

Anyhoo, it seems argyle is not only popular in the Zappos office itself, but even out in little 'ole New York City! Who would have thought that a trend that started in Henderson Nevada would influence the great city of New York. But it has, so just go with it and trust me that it all started in Henderson, Nevada! The pic below is of Aaron, he works at the Adstore, the ad agency that created our latest commercial (among many other things). Not a bad top for an ad guy (sorry guys, don't hate me because I am beautiful - Was that Kelly LeBrock or something?).

But wait, there is more. While on the topic of argyle spreading across the globe (originating in Henderson if you did not catch that twice before) and advertising, I saw the below strapping lad wearing argyle in an ad. Let me give you a little history first. The caveman below toured our office a while back, saw us wearing argyle and he had his our people call our people and we were able to convince them that argyle would help sell more insurance. They bought it, so easy!

Today was an exciting day here in Creative Services; three of our
fellow CS'ers completed their last day of CLT training, and we couldn't
be more proud of them! Fabio A, Kris K. and Phil S. completed their
last day in the four week training course.
CLT (Customer Loyalty) Training consists of three weeks of classroom
time and a full week on the phones that trains all of our fine CLT
Staff! All Zappos employees, no matter what their position, go through
the training. This allows us all to see into the world of CLT and the
WOW that they deliver on a daily basis.
Phil, a graphic designer, Kris, a production assistant, and Fabio, a
web producer, graduated in style, and all of us in CS would like to
say: "Right on, fellas! Proud of ya!"
And to all of our new CLT team members, for those about to WOW, we salute you!!!!!!
-Brett H.

March Madness that is! Like always Finance went all out, this time around Finance
threw a March Madness parade. Helping spread the madness, leading the Allstar Varsity Team was Nothing but Net Jimmy and White Chocolate Johnny dribbling the team through the halls! Frank and Devlyn lead the cheerleaders and the Finance Mascots pumped up the crazy Zappos fans! The Referees and Coaches were on hand to closely watch for any foul plays!! Of course like any sporting event there were plenty of peanuts and cotton candy flying through the air to feed the crowd. Big thanks to Audrea for organizing the Madness!

ZAPPOS FINANCE WILL ALWAYS ROCK YOU!!!

Check our group photos here!

The Zappos Development team (or Dev) is currently made up of 37 people distributed somewhat unevenly across our 3 offices in Henderson and Reno in Nevada, and Shepherdsville in Kentucky. The Henderson team is the largest group and handles much of the development of the website and back office tools to manage products and any other things that might need managing. The team in Kentucky is based out of our warehouse and works primarily on software related to the picking, packing, shipping and returns of merchandise. The Reno office consists of Dave. He generally rewrites things in C (Booyah!), generates several different kinds of graphs and authors lots of LaTeX documents with complicated mathematical formulas.

We work with a pretty interesting mix of technology. Much of our code is written in Perl, but we also have a lot of code in Java and even some Ruby. We love open source software and try to use it whenever we can because it saves us some development time and is easy to customize.

One of the things that differentiates us from a lot of companies is that we don't really hire coders (or people who just write code). Our developers are also expected in some degree to be architects, project planners, designers, database programmers and system administrators. It may sound like our standards are pretty high (and they are - we do a lot of interviews!), but the most important qualities we look is self motivation and a willingness to learn. If you have those, then all of the other skills will come in time. Of course, Dev isn't just made up of programmers. We also have database administrators, QA testers, release engineers, dev support personnel and managers all under our departmental umbrella.

We're very serious about our work, but we're also pretty goofy and like to have fun. Don't believe me? Check out our group on Flickr - there you'll find shots of some of our departmental outings and a recent parade we put on that was featured in a segment on 60 Minutes:

Does it sound like you or someone you know would like to work in Development at Zappos? Check out our jobs page and give us a call. We're always hiring!

We love p-1221 in CLT, and we love it when the project
involves p-1240 and decorations. It has been said, though, that you
have to break some eggs to make an omelet. Such is the case with these
"projects." Exhibit A:

Well, it's really the only exhibit, but I've always wanted to say that
:) This is the east side balcony in CLT. This is also the aftermath
of a
couple years of hard working artists, striving to put to canvas the
creative and insightful imagery floating within their very souls. You
may even see some art within the careful and precise over spray...I
don't think the people who end up having to repair the balcony would
think so. Oh tarp in the background, when will you be put to use?
Only
time will tell.

I leave this entry with a beautiful view of eastern Las
Vegas...suddenly, I'm not bothered by the errant paint beneath my Globes.