Groupon will replace 1 in 10 sales staff to ensure growth Groupon CEO Andrew Mason has told potential IPO investors that the company will be replacing 10 per cent of its sales staff in a push to get better deals from merchants and continue to grow. Mason, who was talking to investors in Boston as part of the initial public offering roadshow for the daily deals site, said the company …
From the Economist on the Groupon IPO :
"Groupon will lose $280m on revenues of $1.69 billion in 2011"
"Its business model is unpatentable and simple to replicate, so there are already more than 20 copycats."
"Its marketing costs are expected to be a painful $958m this year."
958 MILLION dollars on marketing in order to lose 280 million dollars.
This all smacks too much of the late 90s. Remember boo.com, a company which "spent $135 million of venture capital in just 18 months, and it was placed into receivership on 18 May 2000 and liquidated" (wikipedia)? But boy did they have some fun.
"This all smacks too much of the late 90s. Remember boo.com, a company which "spent $135 million of venture capital in just 18 months, and it was placed into receivership on 18 May 2000 and liquidated" (wikipedia)? But boy did they have some fun."
Sadly, yes, I do remember boo.com, as well as damn' near every other pointless, VC-sucking .bomb outfit that came and went. I don't know how insane the hype was over there in the UK, but we couldn't get away from 'em here in the Colonies. The US media were continuously slobbering over every goddamn' 20something twat with a newly-minted MBA, a shit-ton/ne of venture capital and a goofy-assed line of shit about Changing The Way The World Does (Insert Everyday Banal Crap Here).
But, fun? You bet it was fun. It was fun watching the vaporous dot-com "boom" do its imitation of the Challenger (i.e. "BOOM!") after all the mindless media hype. I couldn't describe my elation when, after two or three years of seeing one conceited little snot after another parading through the morning talk shows, it was finally Popcorn Time.
then unsubscribed. I would have thought it might appear somewhere in Direct Marketing 101 to ask a few questions about your target audience and tailor your offers towards them a little - I have zero interest in beauty spa offers, for instance, but it seemed there was no way I could stay subscribed to groupon without getting dozens of these offers every week
Sack 90% of the sales staff and provide merchants with a fair, transparent and equitable online mechanism to create and control their own campaigns. It's the pressure sales and grossly unfair terms & cuts of the profits that have caused Groupon to be hated and abandoned by the kinds of business they should be attracting.
The only "deals" you see once Groupon has burned through the local economy are for shit like fish pedicures, eyebrow waxes and so on. Where the business can invent some arbitrary inflated price for their treatment to compensate for the "discount" and Groupon's cut.
What am I saying? I hope Living Social, Groupon and the plague of similar services die a painful death.
What wrong with cheap teeth whitening while you're sprayed with fake tan and your feet are nibbled by fish.
Topped off by a night in a hotel that refuses your booking as they're already full-up with freeloaders.
Like so many others, I signed up for a week, then turned it off. Suggest potential investors do the same, but they won't.
Groupon also get many once only suppliers.
I know one hotel a few miles away who listened to all the Groupon sales person hype, accepted their number of units calculation, and the price.
They ended up selling 30% of their total annual room availability for £99 for 2 nights, B&B and meal, they are now apparently crying to the bank for a larger overdraft, and yes no restriction on season.
By the way the fish nibble the dead skin off you feet, then spit it out, if (BIG IF) the tank has a good filter, UV treatment, and enough water in the tank - then the treatment is safe. Trouble is if you are selling the treatment on groupon - then the tank probably hasn't the afore mentioned as the tanks cost around £600 then you have to get the correct fish and they have to be the right sex!
Anomynous, because I don't want Groupon maoning at me again!
The Groupon IPO will be a non-starter. In my opinion, this is a deeply flawed company with a questionable (to be kind) business model. They are an online equivalent of ValPak - basically junk mail.
http://mankabros.com/blogs/onmedea/2011/01/13/the-trouble-with-groupon/
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
