How Netflix went from DVDs in the post to a billion dollar streaming giant after being snubbed by Amazon and Blockbuster

Netflix is widely recognised as one of the biggest streaming platforms in the country. The video-on-demand service, which lets you watch thousands of movies movies and TV shows, has become a staple in most homes.

Latest figures show Netflix currently has more than 230 million subscribers worldwide. It is more accessible today than ever, with the app available on a multitude of devices, including TVs, phones and games consoles.

But there was a time when the company was just a modest start up looking to disrupt the video rental industry that it revolutionised and currently dominates.

READ MORE: Netflix ends DVD-by-mail service after 25 years

Earlier this month it was announced that Netflix will be pulling the plug on it’s DVD-by-mail service which launched the company more than 25 years ago.

It was back in California on August 29, 1997, that Marc Randolph and Reed Hastings founded the company.

Hastings was a computer scientist and mathematician who had recently come into some money after a software he helped develop called ‘Pure Atria’ was sold for $750 million.

Marc Randolph was a marketing director for Pure Atria at the time of the sale and that is how the two met. The pair came up with the idea for Netflix during their commutes to work where they would car share.

Randolph was inspired by Amazon, which back then was still a website to buy and order books. They originally wanted to rent and sell VHS tapes but they were too expensive to stock and too brittle to deliver across America.

The same year of Netflix’s inception in 1997, the DVD was introduced to the United States and the pair found their portable item in which they can sell or rent video content that was fairly cheap to transport and wouldn’t shatter to