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New London – Tony Hsieh, the 46-year-old founder of online shoe retailer Zappos, has died of complications from smoke inhalation, the Connecticut Chief Medical Examiner’s Office reported on Monday. Hsieh’s death was deemed accidental.
Hsieh was injured in a fire on Nov. 18 at a home at 500 Pequot Avenue and died on Friday. His death was reported by DTP Companies, which he founded.
A Broadcastify audio recording of the exchange between city emergency dispatchers, firefighters and police reveals that initial reports from the scene were of a fire and a man barricaded himself in the ‘inside, either was trapped in the house by the water. Firefighters arrived at the house to find people outside and Hsieh still inside. The police were called in to help.
The dispatcher told firefighters that the man still inside was in an outhouse attached to the main part of the house, “and the male is barricaded… he won’t open the door. Everyone is outside the house. They are trying to make it open.
While the dispatcher has repeatedly said “barricaded”, city police on Monday in an updated press release said first responders learned from those at the scene that Hsieh was locked in an area storage in the back of the house and they were unable to retrieve it. outside. Black smoke was observed coming from the storage area.
Emergency personnel broke down the storage area door, took Hsieh out and put out the fire, police said.
Fire chief Thomas Curcio told The Day that firefighters performed CPR on Hsieh, who was unconscious, and took him to hospital. Firefighters, in audio recordings of the incident, also reported that they were assessing a person at the scene with a hand injury who refused transport to hospital.
Hsieh was taken by ambulance to Lawrence + Memorial Hospital for treatment of possible burns and smoke inhalation, then airlifted to the Burn Center at Bridgeport Hospital.
The cause and circumstances surrounding the fire are still part of an ongoing investigation by the office of the Fire Marshal and city police detectives.
The five-bed, four-bath home was purchased by Rachael Anne Brown in August for $ 1.3 million. A woman with that name was listed as an employee in a zappos.com post last year titled “Meet the Women Who Changed Zappos’ Story”. According to the Zappos website, a Rachel Brown who worked at Zappos was one of the company’s first 100 employees in 2004, hired as a temporary representative over the phone. After two months in this role, Hsieh asked him to lead a team to teach employees about “corporate culture”. Brown is also a renowned cellist.
Brown began hosting Zappos culture onboarding programs that have become mandatory for all company employees, not just those working in customer service. According to Zappos, Brown left the training team in 2010 to oversee production of Zappos’ quarterly show of hands meetings.
Brown is also a cellist with Nina Di Gregorio’s Bella Electric Strings Ensemble in Las Vegas, according to the band’s website. According to a Facebook profile, Brown lives in Las Vegas, where Zappos is headquartered, and is originally from Niantic. The property records did not show that Brown owned property in East Lyme.
Hsieh retired from Zappos in August. Zappos was sold to Amazon for $ 1.2 billion in 2009, but Hsieh remained with the company until his retirement. According to his LinkedIn, his business mantra was “Inspire, Connect, Educate and Entertain”. He graduated in 1995 from Harvard University.
In a statement, Zappos said: “Although Tony retired last summer, we know what a huge impact he has had on Zappos and Zapponians, as he has spent the past 20 years focusing on the success of the company and our employees. “
The company called its former leader “a formidable visionary and an incredible human being.”
“We recognize that not only have we lost our inspiring former leader, but many of you have also lost a mentor and friend. Tony played such an important role in building the successful Zappos business we have today, as well as his passion for helping to support and animate our corporate culture.
Hsieh also founded a Las Vegas company called DTP, a for-profit company that was started in 2012 with the goal of revitalizing downtown Las Vegas.
Megan Fazio, spokesperson for DTP companies, shared a statement on Instagram about Hsieh’s death in which she described the businessman as “a humanitarian.” Forward thinking thinker who saw happiness before dollars. Connected businesses, community and all walks of life. Visionary.”
Fazio wrote that Hsieh revitalized downtown Las Vegas and believed in people’s passions and was deeply loved.
“There is no human who met Tony [and] didn’t fall in love with her humanity, ”she says.
Fazio said that DTP’s success is largely down to Hsieh and his vision.
Fazio, who worked with Hsieh as a publicist for DTP, recalled memories of Hsieh handing out food from the White Castle fast food chain to “bring happiness” to people. She said he always treated his employees as his equals and liked “experiences and relationships over material things”.
She described him as having a “childish wonder” and said the people in his life fiercely protected him.
“His relatives protected him at all costs, because his kindness was so exceptional,” she writes.
In a statement, Zappos said they are working on ways to celebrate Tony’s “extraordinary life” and invited people who know Tony to share their memories of him by sending them to [email protected]. The memories will be shared with Hsieh’s family, the company said.
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