The mayor of Nashville said he learned through Twitter that Amazon picked his city as a consolation prize in the HQ2 race

Mark Humphrey/AP

Nashville Mayor David Briley.

• Amazon announced Tuesday it would split its new HQ2 between two locations: New York City and northern Virginia.
• The online retailer also announced plans to build an "Operations Center of Excellence" in Nashville, Tennessee - a move Nashville's mayor said he learned about through a tweet, according to the Wall Street Journal.
• Other frontrunners in the bidding contest to win over Amazon reportedly felt snubbed after the retailer surprised them with its decision.

The mayor of Nashville, Tennessee, said he learned about Amazon's decision to grant his city a consolation prize in its headquarters race the same way most other people did - through Twitter.

Amazon announced Tuesday the conclusion of its HQ2 race, in which the massive online retailer searched for a location for its second headquarters. Instead of one location, Amazon decided to split the development project between New York City and northern Virginia.

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Additionally, the company plans to build an "Operations Center of Excellence" in Nashville, Tennessee, as a consolation prize. The Nashville location will handle "customer fulfillment, customer service, transportation, and supply chain," according to Amazon.

Read more: Amazon just announced its 2 new HQ2 locations - but it's also making a big investment in a 3rd city.

However, Nashville mayor David Briley said he didn't know about this decision until Tuesday, when he saw the news on Twitter, according to the Wall Street Journal. Amazon said the mayor's office was notified on Monday.

Other cities felt snubbed by Amazon, the Journal reports, as Amazon mostly kept quiet during the year-long search for a second headquarters, while hundreds of cities tried to win the retailer over with promised tax breaks and other incentives. According to the Journal, the mayor of Dallas, Texas, thought the city was still a frontrunner in the race up until the decision was announced Tuesday.

More than 200 cities competed to host Amazon's new headquarters, which initially promised 50,000 new jobs and a $5 billion investment in the new home city. That will now be split between Long Island City, Queens, and National Landing, Virginia.