In an exclusive excerpt from Wonder Boy, Zappos’ charismatic founder paid a sycophantic circle of acolytes outrageous salaries—and absurd 10 percent commissions—to deliver him happiness during the last weeks of his life.
Forbes
When it came time for the family to depart, Andy thought twice about leaving. Despite their distance over the years, seeing a swirl of new people he had never met before made him want to stay in Park City and keep an eye on his older brother. Ten days later, he returned and quickly realized that he had entered an ecosystem where people were competing for Tony’s money, pitching projects that didn’t make sense and living in houses they would never be able to afford otherwise.
Andy’s request came with a sense of urgency, as funds had been hemorrhaging from Tony’s accounts for many months. If people had concerns about taking money from a man drifting further from reality due to excessive drug use and other erratic behavior, few had seemed to consider the Faustian bargain they were entering—an oversight that took vivid form when Hsieh found another destructive fascination.
Chef Executive: When Hsieh moved to Park City, he dreamed of creating a utopian community similar to the one he built in Las Vegas with family, friends and loyal Zapponians—at any cost.At one point paranoia also took hold, and Hsieh was convinced one morning that a Zappos executive named Tyler Williams was in town, trying to stage an intervention. The scare prompted him to hire a legion of black-clothed security guards to form a human perimeter around the ranch.
The first iteration of 10X launched with a noble goal: to help Park City reopen amid the pandemic. The plan was to walk around downtown and sell $10 memberships to people, granting them an all-you-can-eat-and-drink pass to local restaurants; participants were given T-shirts and merchandise with a 10X logo.
Lee could also see those vying for Hsieh’s money beginning to fight for it—often motivated by the 10X program. Hsieh’s longtime personal assistant Mimi Pham, for example, had in recent years been paid a flat $9,000-a-month salary from Hsieh, in addition to travel expenses. But after the Park City chapter began, she negotiated a pay raise and was now earning $30,000 a month—an amount that was soon dwarfed by the money she was scooping up in 10X commissions.
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