Tony Hsieh, an American internet entrepreneur and venture capitalist currently serve as the CEO of Zappos, an online shoe and clothing retailer. Formerly, he co-owned the advertising network LinkExchange before Hseih sold it to Microsoft for $265 million in 1998.
The Harvard University graduate is also in the board of directors of JetSuite, a private jet charter company. Despite being a multi-millionaire, Tony lives in an Airstream trailer.
Business Success Through ‘LinkExchange’: How Much Is Tony Hsieh’s Net Worth?
Tony Hsieh, after his graduation, worked at Oracle Corporation, however, left after 5 months.
In 1996, he co-founded LinkExchange with Sanjay Madan, and later put hands in other business ventures: Venture Frogs, Zappos and JetSuite.
According to Celebrity Net Worth, the 46-year-old entrepreneur has a net worth of $850 million as of January 2020. Back in 2017, the Illinois-born entrepreneur was worth $780 million.
Source: The New York Times
The credit to Hsieh’s massive fame & success goes to his innovative business ideas & investment in different ventures.
The 2007 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award recipient co-founded an advertising network called LinkExchange, which launched in March 1996 with Tony being its CEO.
As reported, the network gathered 20,000 participating web pages along with the banner display of 10 million times, in just within 90 days.
Source: Tech Zulu
After 2 years of the LinkExchange run, they sold it to Microsoft in November 1998 for a whopping $265 million; had 400,000 members along with 5 million ads rotation per day.
Current CEO Of Zappos: Post-LinkExchange Success & Investments
In 1999, after a year of LinkExchange sales, Tony co-founded an incubator & investment firm Venture Frogs, LLC with Alfred Lin and serves as its General Manager since its foundation.
Hsieh’s got further success in business, as his company Venture Frogs partnered with Zappos founder Nick Swinmurn in 1999, with an idea of selling shoes online.
The American entrepreneur became the CEO of Zappos.
Starting with a yearly gross of $1.6 million from 1999 to 2000, the company hit the billion dollars market in 2008, made $1 billion in annual sales.
Source; Las Vegas Sun
Here is annual sales growth rate of Zappos, which was launched under the domain name Shoesite.com:
- 2001- Made $8.6 million in sales
- 2004- Grabbed a drastic rise to $184 million gross sales
- 2005- $840 million
- 2006- $840 million
- 2007- $840 million
- 2008- Entrance in the $1 billion market sales
Sale Of Zappos
Amazon-owned by Jeff Bezos announced to acquire Zappos on July 22, 2009, for $940 million in a stock and cash deal, which finalized in November 2009 for $1.2 billion.
As reported, the shareowners of Zappos were given 10 million Amazon.com shares & Tony Hsieh made $214 million from the sales.
Still now, Tony is the CEO of the company. The Zappos recorded a revenue of $2 billion in 2015.
Investment In JetSuite
In 2011, he joined the board of directors of JetSuite, a private jet charter company founded in 2006. Hsieh then invested $7 million in the company, allowing the addition of two Embraer Phenom 100 jets for JetSuite.
Lives In An Airstream Trailer: Revitalization ‘Downtown Project’
Currently, Tony Hsieh lives in a 240-square-foot Airstream trailer in the downtown Las Vegas, which costs him $1,200 a month, including utilities and Wi-Fi.
Source: Instagram @mvh.lv
Since 2009, he organizes major re-development and revitalization project for downtown Las Vegas.
He transformed an abandoned parking lot into a micro-living oasis named Llamapolis, which consist of 30 Airstream trailers and tiny homes.
Moreover, the residential neighbourhood also has 2 alpacas Marley and Triton, roaming around.
Surely, it’s a surprise the multi-millionaire entrepreneur prefers to airstream trailer over luxurious mansions. Though, he is not the only wealthiest figure to have some odd habits.
As for a fact, Warren Buffett lives in the same house he bought in 1958 while Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg prefers jeans and t-shirts over the expensive suits.
Short Bio: Family & Education
Tony Hsieh was born on December 12, 1973, in Illinois, the United States. His parents Richard and Judy are immigrant of Taiwan. The entrepreneur has 2 younger brothers: Andy Hsieh and Dave Hsieh.
Hsieh graduated with a degree in computer science from Harvard University in 2005.
The entrepreneur released his first book Delivering Happiness, a book about his entrepreneurial endeavours, in June 2010. It debuted at #1 on the New York Times Best Seller List and remained there for 6 months.
