Amazon’s retail manager Jeff Wilke, who helped the company transform itself from an online bookstore into a global colossus, will retire early next year.
Wilke, 53, has been with Amazon for more than two decades and was considered a potential successor to founder and CEO Jeff Bezos. His responsibilities grew along with the company, running not only Amazon.com, but the Whole Foods grocery chain and its physical bookstores.
Wilke is often referred to in Amazon as “The Other Jeff” to distinguish him from Bezos. The two have worked closely together since Wilke joined the company in 1999, four years after Amazon.com began selling books online.
He will be replaced by Dave Clark, who runs Amazon’s warehouses and delivery network, the company said in Seattle Friday. Clark, who also joined the company in 1999, has accelerated delivery times by expanding Amazon’s fleet of vans and jets, making it less likely to rely on UPS and the postal service.
However, the growing power of Amazon has brought increased control from lawmakers in the US and abroad. Last month, Bezos was questioned by Congress about how the company treats its third-party sellers, who list and sell goods on Amazon.com. Bezos told Congress he could not guarantee that employees were not looking for vendor data to create competing products, an accusation that the company and its executives had previously denied.
Last year, at an Amazon conference in Las Vegas, Wilke said he welcomed the check.
“I think substantial entities in the economy deserve control,” Wilke said at the time. “Our job is to build the kind of business that conveys that control.”
In an email to staff Friday, Wilke said he has no other job.
“So why leave? It’s just time,” he wrote in the email. “Time for me to take time to explore personal interests that have taken a back seat for more than two decades.”
Wilke said he will focus her on running the company through the holiday season, which adjusts to the busiest one yet for Amazon. Sales have grown as an online sales boom during the pandemic.
“He’s just one of those people without whom Amazon would be completely unrecognizable,” Bezos wrote in a memo to staff. “Thank you, Jeff, for your contributions and your friendship.”
