Groupon

[Mike Hughes]

I've heard a few of these stories about groupon offers but like this one. A bakery owner who offered 75% off a set of cupcakes ended up selling a thousand times more than she normally makes in a week (at a loss).

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/n...ake-maker.html

Clearly powerful stuff Groupon. It does sound like you have to be careful about take up though.

has anyone hear tried it? Or even discussed any offers with groupon?

Mike

[guccij]

Wouldn't touch Groupon with the proverbial even if they offered me the moon (although what would I do with a moon anyway).

This baker woman made a stupid business decision. She probably makes them all the time. Groupon got lucky with another sucker, that's all.

[Mike Hughes]

I tend to agree with you. If there's one thing you can say about groupon users it's that they're only using it to get stuff cheap.

Not sure they're the kind of people who will ever pay full price for something or ever turn out to be loyal customers.

Mike

[grantos1]

I've just read that story, I can see how things could go horribly wrong if products were made to order, but if items were held in stock, perhaps old items in stock to get rid of etc. Couldn't this be beneficial? Can you set an order cut off?

[jont]

Can you set an order cut off?

Yes - you can set a limit on how many you have to offer.

Groupon works very well with service based experiences - spa days, beauty treatment etc - where the product cost is low but the perceived value very high. Even then they need to be offered on specific quiet days.

If you have end of line / distressed stock this can work very well as well where you can clear out the stock and get some return back which would otherwise be sat gathering dust.

Promoting items made to order is asking for trouble unless you can still make a profit and not just write it all off to advertising which is the usual Groupon sales pitch.

KGB are quite aggressive in this area at the moment and provide a better split on the monies

[jont]

Wouldn't touch Groupon with the proverbial even if they offered me the moon

They would offer your 25% of the moon with Groupon taking 50% of that less moon VAT .. essentially a pebble. On to which you could paint a smiley face and place on a window ledge.