Three-year-old Massdrop, an e-commerce startup that bills itself as online community for enthusiasts — e.g., audiophiles, backpackers, stylists, etc. — where like-minded people band together to “group buy” things in bulk for cheaper, is now taking its financial direction from a 13-year Amazon.com veteran. Julie Todaro is Massdrop’s new chief operating officer, and one of her first goals is to bring some of the Seattle-based retail giant’s frugal ways to the startup business down the coast in San Francisco.

“The nice thing about Amazon is that frugality went to the top,” Todaro says in this article that appeared in Forbes. “There was no perk that executives got that lower employees didn’t. In fact, your cell phone was paid for until you were either a director or vice president and then it wasn’t.”

Todaro is hoping to bring that same sense of leanness and more-can-be-done-with-less approach instilled into workers at Amazon to Massdrop. Like Amazon, Massdrop is growing rapidly, having expanded from 10 employees in June 2014 to more than 70 today. Furthermore, just as was the case at Amazon, Massdrop’s “spirit around frugality” begins at the top.

Massdrop’s 26-year-old CEO Steve El-Hage didn’t pay his founding teams salaries for his company’s first 12 months of operation and only paid half salaries the following year. Most important to El-Hage is that he and Todaro share similar principles on how to run a business.

Amazon-Taught Management Skills
On the job at Massdrop for a little over four months, Todaro has made several decisions that are reminiscent of her time at Amazon as vice president of books and, later, consumer electronics. For example, Todaro’s keeping a close eye on the amount of money Massdrop is spending on snacks — she nixed a decision to purchase individually packed bags of coconut chips that cost $4 each — as well as instilling a community-first mind-set.

A focus on community is something Todaro has reinforced and adapted from Amazon’s “customer-centric” approach, which shuns employee luxuries — and sometimes profits — to ensure that prices are kept low for shoppers.

At Massdrop, decisions are made to keep happy the enthusiast communities that are the company’s foundation, says Todaro, whether that’s introducing hobby-specific content to keep users engaged or avoiding unnecessary marketing expenses and passing those savings on to members.

“We don’t ever make a decision that could harm the community in any type of way,” Todaro notes. For example, consumers won’t see product ads from Massdrop.

Site Moderator
In addition to creating a customer-centric culture at Massdrop, Todaro is responsible for keeping its communities of customers in line. Since Massdrop mimics the functionality of web forums for the sake of commerce, it encourages user interaction — e.g., voting on goods a group should buy, providing product reviews. However, that interaction could easily devolve into off-topic or offensive situations; it’s Todaro’s job to make sure it doesn’t.

“Years ago there was an issue claiming that Amazon was pro pedophilia, which was obviously not true … but there were some books [from third-party sellers,]” Todaro told Forbes. She also referenced a recent instance where Amazon stopped the sale of Confederate flags after customer complaints.

“Figuring out how to balance censorship and making a difference so a customer is happy is very difficult,” Todaro said. “The best thing you can do is try to prevent that from happening in the first place and putting in some types of boundaries so that it doesn’t ever bloom.”

One difference between Amazon and Massdrop — and it’s a big one — is that the latter isn’t trying to be the “everything store” like Todaro’s previous employer is.

“We don’t have to be in everything,” Todaro noted.