Amazon apparel site online

Monday, 02 September 2002

Amazon.com switched on its widely anticipated apparel department
yesterday, announcing it in an e-mail message to many of its customers.
The site included clothing and footwear from 400 retailers and
manufacturers including Gap, Nordstrom, Eddie Bauer, Foot Locker, Guess
and Phillips-Van Heusen. The apparel department is available through the
Internet site, www.amazon.com/ruby.All participating companies are
declining comment.
Apparel, which was slow to sell online at first, is now one of the
biggest categories in online shopping in the United States, driven
largely by the traditional catalog retailers.

Yesterday, Amazon's apparel site was filled with technical problems.
Many products lacked photographs. Other products, which were listed as
available for immediate shipping, could not be ordered. Some bras were
listed in the men's section. Contrary to earlier speculation all
shopping in Amazon's apparel section occurs on its site, and customers
complete purchases using the addresses and credit card information they
have on file with Amazon. It was first believed Amazon would mainly
generate visitors to the manufacturers sites.