Patents by Inventor Douglas Welzel

Douglas Welzel has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Patent number: 7418405
    Abstract: An interactive merchandising program includes two or more program segments that are organized in a series. Each program segment in the series includes at least one time-limited offer for sequential presentation to the customer. The customer is required to undertake some action with respect to each program segment without knowing the identity of offers in program segments yet to be presented. If an offer is accepted within the time limit of the offer, the merchandising program terminates and the customer's acceptance of the offer is processed. If the customer declines a presented offer, the offer is withdrawn. The merchandising program proceeds to the next program segment in which the customer is presented the next time-limited offer. In this manner, the customer is provided an interactive experience that invites considered decision-making on the part of the customer.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 23, 2003
    Date of Patent: August 26, 2008
    Assignee: Amazon.com, Inc.
    Inventors: Brian Utter, Douglas Welzel, Douglas Irvine, Dwayne Benefield, David Liu, Jason Shaw