Walmart and Amazon have been rivals in e-commerce for a long time now, but Walmart has lagged behind and can't seem to catch up to Amazon anytime soon . Both of these retailers have their own strengths and business models that have allowed them to become some of the most profitable businesses in recent years. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get Original Essay Walmart started small as a discount store in Arkansas and has seen some of the fastest growth in a short period of time. This has been contributed by their approach to offering some of the lowest prices anywhere, attracting a huge customer base. This approach was complemented by their ability to purchase items in large volumes, therefore dictating the price at which they received products from suppliers, the suppliers obeyed because they had become dependent on Walmart's high demand. Walmart has used the traditional brick-and-mortar retail approach where they build physical stores and consumers would have to physically visit them to make purchases. They have tried to incorporate this approach with an e-commerce approach in order to compete with other online retailers and Amazon in particular. Amazon started as an online book seller with founder Jeff Bezos using his garage as a store from which he shipped. Within two years Jeff Bezos began selling CDs and DVDs alongside books, and within another two years he said he wanted Amazon.com to become an "everything store." In this way, Amazon has greatly expanded its business and customer base, and in 2013 its revenues exceeded $74 billion. Amazon's e-commerce model has allowed them to reduce costs incurred by Walmart, such as building physical stores. The central warehouses used by Amazon and other online stores from which products were shipped also reduced costs by reducing the workforce required. They also charged lower fixed costs and a great selection of books which helped them increase their market share. These two companies had grown significantly despite using different models, and Walmart saw fit to develop an e-commerce model while maintaining the physical model. This is partly because the value of the online retail market has grown significantly since 2008, when its value was between $132 billion and $200 billion in 2012 and a projected growth of $371 billion in 2017. The online battle has begun here and both companies have moved to try and gain the largest market share in terms of online sales. Walmart viewed online sales as an extension of physical sales and didn't seem to pay much attention to the online approach. Their website was poor and attracted criticism from many people who thought it was an embarrassment. Walmart's deliveries were not well managed which resulted in late or even failed deliveries. Amazon on the other hand had started selling everything, including products sold at Walmart. Amazon went further and even hired some of Walmart's staff members to provide them with information on new products. Their online market share was increasing significantly and was gaining a big lead over Walmart. They made a move to allow other people, including their competitors, to take advantage of the site's traffic and sell products on Amazon.com. In 2000, Walmart.com split off and partnered with two companies before opening a store in California. They closed their website for updates, which was not a wise move given that the.