In this year’s American Customer Satisfaction Index, the most authoritative study of customer satisfaction, Amazon.com scored an 88, the highest score ever recorded—not just online, not just in retailing—but the highest score ever recorded in any service industry. In ACSI's words: “Amazon.com continues to show remarkably high levels of customer satisfaction. With a score of 88 (up 5%), it is generating satisfaction at a level unheard of in the service industry…. Can customer satisfaction for Amazon climb more? The latest ACSI data suggest that it is indeed possible. Both service and the value proposition offered by Amazon have increased at a steep rate.” Second, while focused on customer experience, we’ve also been lowering price substantially. We’ve been doing so broadly across product categories, from books to electronics, and we’ve eliminated shipping fees with our 365 day-per-year Free Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. We’ve been taking similar actions in every country in which we do business. Our pricing objective is not to discount a small number of products for a limited period of time, but to offer low prices everyday and apply them broadly across our entire product range. To illustrate this point, we recently did a price comparison versus a major well-known chain of book superstores. We did not hand pick a choice group of books against which we wanted to compare. Instead, we used their published list of their 100 bestsellers for 2002. It was a good representation of the kinds of books people buy most, consisting of 45 hardcover titles and 55 paperbacks across many different categories, including Literature, Romance, Mystery and Thrillers, Nonfiction, Children's, Self-Help, and so on. We priced all 100 titles by visiting their superstores in both Seattle and New York City. It took us six hours in four of their different superstores to find all 100 books on their list. When we added up everything we spent, we discovered that: • At their stores, these 100 bestselling books cost $1,561. At Amazon.com, the same books cost $1,195 for a total savings of $366, or 23%. • For 72 of the 100 books, our price was cheaper. On 25 of the books, our price was the same. On 3 of the 100, their prices were better (we subsequently reduced our prices on these three books). • In these physical-world superstores, only 15 of their 100 titles were discounted— they were selling the other 85 at full list price. At Amazon.com, 76 of the 100 were discounted and 24 were sold at list price. To be sure, you may find reasons to shop in the physical world—for instance, if you need something immediately—but, if you do so, you’ll be paying a premium. If you want to save money and time, you'll do better by shopping at Amazon.com. Third, our determination to deliver low price and customer experience is generating financial results. Net sales this year increased 26% to a record $3.9 billion, and unit sales