Amazon.com’s quarterly report this afternoon disclosed a $7 million loss for the company, but there was another notable number farther down in the earnings release: 97,000.

That is the company’s count of full- and part-time employees as of June 30 — more than three times the 28,300 employees reported by Amazon at this point in 2010. The stat doesn’t include temporary workers or contractors.

[Also see: An open letter to Jeff Bezos: A contract worker’s take on Amazon.com]

Amazon’s total does include workers at its fulfillment centers around the world, so the comparison to other tech companies isn’t apples-to-apples, but the chart above shows just how much Amazon has grown in relation to both Microsoft and Google over that time period.

It also helps to explain why the Seattle company needs all that extra space in Seattle’s South Lake Union and Denny Triangle neighborhoods. (Check out these pictures of the company’s planned biodomes.)

Of course, the higher employment numbers is one of the major factors contributing to higher operating expenses for Amazon, squeezing its already thin (and in the case of this quarter, non-existent) profit margins.

Microsoft is still slightly larger than Amazon, at more than 99,000 employees (also excluding contractors), but the online retailer appears poised to surpass Microsoft in total direct employment as early as the current quarter.

Related: Amazon, Google employees ranked as ‘least loyal’