Articles tagged “groupon”

Groupon is doing everything it can to deemphasize its voucher business, and its new dining service is the latest reflection of the pivot.

The ousted departed with class and posted a farewell letter to employees that went viral so quickly his blogging service crashed. If only Groupon could get that kind of mojo going again.

Critics have long charged that Groupon is not a sustainable business. That's because Groupon tends to turn off merchants because Groupon's cut of sales is so huge. Groupon's decision to take a diminished slice amount to a recognition that the critics were right to a certain extent.

From Groupon to Travelzoo and LivingSocial, the bloom is long off the rose in the daily deals space for travel and beyond. Amazon, which is an investor in LivingSocial, reports that LivingSocial recorded a $905 million operating loss in 2012.

Facebook's and Groupon's just-added Nearby features aren't Yelp killers given its depth of user reviews, but they are right in Yelp's kitchen.

Voucher sales are facing a push-back, and this new Groupon partnership with Switchfly enables the voucher king to move a bit beyond them to get into more traditional sorts of travel sales.

Critics always claimed that the voucher business was built on a house of cards, and now Travelzoo is admitting that the house is falling.

Flash sales and daily deals may just turn out to be less fun than everyone thought they'd be.

In its direct-travel sales, Groupon could be taking a page out of Expedia's playbook -- partner with a company, learn the ropes, and eventually shut them out and do it on your own.

What good was a maps app without directions? This seems like a functional necessity more than a perk, although Groupon must be happy for a chance to reach customers with location aware data -- even if only the few thousand with a Windows Phone.