Which huge company started as an online bookstore in 1994?

Answer

Jeff Bezos founded it in Washington state and went on to sell almost everything.

Context

Jeff Bezos left a senior post at the New York investment firm D.E. Shaw in 1994, after noticing how fast use of the web was growing, and moved to the Seattle area to start an online retailer. Britannica says he worked from his garage with a handful of employees to build the software, and named the company after the South American river. Amazon sold its first book in July 1995.

Books suited early online selling because there were far more titles than any physical shop could stock, they were standardized products that buyers did not need to handle first, and wholesalers already had catalogues. Amazon's own 1996 press release already described it as the world's largest bookseller by selection. The company expanded beyond books quickly, adding music CDs in June 1998, videos later that year and auctions in 1999.

Growth was rapid in revenue terms: Britannica cites annual net sales rising from about $510,000 in 1995 to roughly $600 million in 1998. The company went public in 1997 and was famously unprofitable for years while it invested in warehouses and technology. The 1994 date refers to the company's incorporation; the website itself did not start selling until 1995, so sources sometimes give both years.