Dear Tony,

I wish I could Twitter ‘I love to wake up with Tony in my bed’. Unfortunately I can’t, since I only woke up once with your book ‘Delivering happiness’ besides me (it only took me 3 hours to read it from beginning till end). And that’s why I am writing you this letter.

Tony, overall you WOW’ed me with your book. You don’t pretend to be a marketer, or a business expert. You’re just some down to earth guy telling your story to everybody who wants to read it. And that’s what makes you special. People recognize themselves in you. Even more: you don’t want people to believe that your professional career was all ‘wow’. You had financial problems too. You struggled to survive. You failed from time to time. But opposed to other writers, you just tell you failed without moralizing the failure. Inventing a wisdom like ‘a man must fail to succeed’… no, you are more human than that.

Putting two times the same text block in your book, is that because you didn’t hire a corrector or to highlight the fact that you réally wrote the book yourself? I forgot which pieces I read twice, I think the ones about your culture book and moving your company to Las Vegas. Excuse me if I’m wrong, I am human too.

I loved the part where you explain the financial difficulties you had when investing in Zappos. Especially when you sold all your property to invest all your money in it. And still you don’t mention any ‘I knew in advance it would all turn out just fine’ feelings. No, you just admit it was a wild guess.

Tony, what makes this book (as well as you) special is that is drowned by decisions you made by heart. Not by following your wallet, your friends or the path to success. And that’s why you are one rockstar entrepreneur who deserves all happiness.
And even though you are not a ‘real’ writer, you outperform most of them by your honesty, integrity and humor. I’m looking forward to your next book.

Yours truly,

Judith