Daily deal sites are springing up by the day with US player Living Social the latest to get in on the game
My article in the print version of the Listener this week looks at the sudden proliferation of daily deal websites and even more sites have launched since I wrote the article!
My old New Zealand Herald colleague Karyn Scherer writing in The Business notes US player Living Social launched last week in New Zealand.
Scherer also writes:
“The site that started the whole trend, the phenomenally successful Groupon, is also expected to launch here any day. Hailed by Forbes as the “fastest-growing company in history”, Groupon turned over US$760 million last year, and expects that to hit the billions this year.
“Groupon has already turned down a US$6 billion offer from Google in favour of an IPO later this year.
“Needless to say, both Google and Facebook have also jumped aboard the group-buying bandwagon. Just last week, Google launched Google Offers – at about the same time one of its senior executives was poached by Groupon.”
With so many daily deal websites popping up, navigating them is a bit of a nightmare. I was planning to feature a list of then outlining their various features and quirks, but someone has already done it for us at Love One Day Sales, a useful aggregation website that features information on the dozens of daily deal sites operating in New Zealand.
The website helpfully categories the daily deal sites which often specialise in everything from electronics to t-shirts and nutrition supplements.
One of the largest of the New Zealand faily deal websites, Grabone, last week released some figures on how business has been going in its first 10 months of existence:
· GrabOne is the only site of its kind to have deals in 13 cities across New Zealand and has launched in eight locations across Australia.
· New Zealanders have bought 1,003,338 GrabOne coupons to 2700 different businesses, saving them $31,971,935
· Since launching, GrabOne have employed on average two new staff per week – bringing their initial team of five part-time staff to a crew of 60 (and climbing).
· One of GrabOne’s most popular deals to date was SnowPlanet’s $37 for Day Pass, rentals & drink which sold 7,749 coupons and generated $286,713 in gross sales.