Competitors Can't Keep Up With Amazon's Growth

In the past decade, the internet has completely changed the way we shop. In the United States alone, e-commerce sales rose from $42 billion in 2002 to almost $190 billion in the past year. As purchasing goods online became more and more common over the years, one company has become synonymous with online shopping: Amazon.com. The Seattle-based online retailer had started off as an online books dealer in the mid 90s, but soon began expanding its product range until it covered virtually every product imaginable.

What's astonishing is the fact that no other retailer has come close to replicating Amazon's online success. Even considering Amazon's head start in the e-commerce business, it would appear that retail giants such as Wal-Mart or Sears should have found a way to compete with Amazon's online success by now. But apparently they haven't. According to Internet Retailer, an e-commerce intelligence portal, none of Amazon's competitors comes even close to matching the company's online sales growth. In 2012, Amazon reached $61 billion in global net sales, which is more than what the next nine largest U.S. e-retailers sold combined. Today's chart nicely illustrates how Amazon's exceptional sales growth has dwarfed the competition's growth over the past decade.