Oct to Nov 2010 - Teletimes

Contd. from page 50
advantages. “Groupon” is now
part of the lexicon of online
shopping. But Mason is protecting
his flanks. To take on
more small business clients, he
just announced plans to feature
more than one deal per day in
most markets. An algorithm will
mete out the offers by weighing
customers’ past purchases
and geographic locations. A
hockey fanatic from Chicago’s
far North Side wouldn’t receive
a deal for half-price yoga lessons
in the city’s South Side
Hyde Park neighborhood.
Mason’s other strategy: consolidation.
In May he bought
Berlin’s Citydeal, a group-buying
site with 600 employees
serving 80 European cities (the
price wasn’t disclosed). Mason
says he may strike again overseas
but that “it’s tough coming
in from outside and figuring
out local consumer habits.”
Mason has the capital to expand--profitably.
He estimates
that a metro area like Chicago
should yield 20 deals a day; that
implies nearly 5,000 retailers
per city per year, up from the
250 in most cities now. Groupon
now posts 100 deals per
day in the U.S. Mason figures
he can increase that number by
50 every month to reach 400
come January. Against that
quadrupling of deals he plans
to boost his sales staff by 80%
(200 people) and his writing
bullpen by 100% (70 people).
As for spending himself to perdition,
as did many dot-commers
before him, Mason’s not
sweating it: “There’s never been
anything--radio, tv, newspaper,
whatever--that could generate
small business sales so
quickly.”
The Great Race
Groupon is on pace to pull in $1
billion in sales faster than any
company in history. This list
excludes investment holding
companies (which tend to be
preassembled before formally
launching) and those built
mainly through mergers or acquisitions.
T
15Oct - 14Nov 2010
www.teletimesinternational.com
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