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Baker Has to Make 102,000 Cupcakes For Grouponers
Rachel Brown, owner of the small Need a Cake bakery, became a victim of the old adage, "Be careful what you wish for. You might just get it." More than 8,500 people took Rachel up on her Groupon offer of a 75% discount on a dozen cupcakes, forcing her to make over 100,000 cupcakes to fill all the orders. In the end Brown lost almost $20k. "We take pride in making cakes of exceptional quality but I had to bring in agency staff on top of my usual staff, who had nowhere near the same skills. I was very worried about standards dropping and hated the thought of letting anybody down. My poor staff were having to slog away at all hours — one of them even came in at 3 a.m. because she couldn't sleep for worry," she told The Telegraph. "We are still working to make up the lost money and will not be doing this again."
I seem to recall reading that Groupon allows businesses to limit the number of offers available. That is, rather than having to deal with 8,500 orders, Ms. Brown could have limited the offer to 100 (or some other arbitrary number) people.
If my understanding is correct and such a system exists, it would be foolish for a business to not use it.
She must have had some pretty serious margins to only lose $20k on a 75% discount after paying for extra staff.
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
£26 per bakers dozen cupcakes!? Is this a normal price? That's $40! Are these normal prices in London?!
Groupon should offer a staggered approach. First 100 customers get offered 75% off. Next 100 get offered 50%, then 25%. After a time, the system could float to the discount that was optimal, with some total per day limit.
All ideas^H^H^H^H^Hprocesses in this post are Patent Pending. (as well as the process of patenting all postings)
The math for the odds of winning powerball are 1 in a hundred million. (1 in a hundred M, 1 in 130 M, 1 in 200M same difference, roughly. ) and each dollar you spend increases those odds to $x in 100 million.
According to today's XKCD you need to have over 4 million in investments, which mean that the only prize that really counts for never having to work again is the big one.
So your odds of winning and never having to work again are very small until you start spending millions of dollars on tickets.
If someone is passing you on the right, you are an asshole for driving in the wrong lane.
I've only ever baked for 'mom and pop' affairs, so I wouldn't know about chain stores. The first time was for a boss who started with $500 and 2 credit cards 18 years ago and turned it all into a well known gourmet market in the Atlanta area. Another time was for another well known DIY restaurant/bakery in town.
My mother was a pastry chef who has made cakes similar to those on the website of your wife since I was 3 years old. I know the costs and labor involved to make make breads, cakes and other assorted patisserie fair. There is still an insanely low margin on baking using 'fancy' ingredients.
As for Groupon...Groupon costs a lot in food costs, and 2 years later I hadn't seen any significant change in sales that could've been attributed to their involvement.
I personally think the concept of near "compulsory" tipping as practiced by restaurants in some countries is messed up.
At work I don't get tipped for just doing my job, and if my company's customers gave me money directly for just doing my job, or for doing my job differently/better than normal, that's called corruption or just plain wrong. Heck at some places you're not allowed to accept gifts/$$$ above a certain value (usually low, sometimes even _zero_) from customers.
In theory if your employer isn't paying you enough to do your job, you should find another employer or another job. But in practice the "tipping" system is not likely to change in those countries...
Not that I would ever do such a thing. I tend to avoid hanging out with people who would assign social consequence to buying the Wal-Mart cupcakes. But lots of people who don't operate that way.
paintball
The obviousness of Groupons scam is obvious enough to most but the more subtle one is the lie of advertising. Advertising does NOT work as advertised. That is something to remember, advertising is a product SOLD by advertising agencies. So the companies telling you advertising works because they studied it are advertising companies... conflict of interests?
You have two basics forms of advertising. The first people barely think about but is putting your products and your shop on display. It is not just the sign above your door but prices on your products. Think about this simple thing, did you EVER walk out of store because you couldn't find the price so thought "fuck this". BAD advertising. A lot about this basic advertising is convincing people to enter your shop because they think that what they want can be got at an acceptable price. For stores like bakeries this means charging the right amount for the right amount of convenience and quality. People complain about Starbucks being to expensive but they got fast steady quality service (compared to all the other alternatives at premium locations. I can get a cup at a burger chain for less next door at say Utrecht Central station in Holland but GOD the burger joints service is piss poor).
But if you want MORE customers then pass by traffic. What do you do... advertise? Do you READ advertisements? No? To busy. Exactly. Anyone that can afford a 5 dollar cup cake is far to busy to read the local newspaper. Same with banner ads. Who here sees banner ads? If you see banner ads, you are in a lower class. Elitist? Damn right.
Research has shown the Groupon's claims on age and income of their users are over-estimated. They are an older demographic and a poorer demographic. This is a group who hunts coupon's. They use a coupon and then don't come back unless they get another coupon. They are deal hunters.
If you got something to dump, then deal hunters might be worth going after but if you got a premium product that doesn't get 75% cheaper in total costs with bulk, then Groupon makes no sense.
Groupon works for HP Printers because HP makes its money on ink. It makes sense for products you need to shift now and you got to much off or make a very high margin on but otherwise, it NEVER makes sense.
Food products and services do not work with massive discounts aimed at bargain hunters.
It would be like selling Rolls Royce at 75% discount hoping for repeat business.
Not only do people not NEED two of them but those who buy it at the discount can't afford the regular price AND at the same time you are diluting the price of your product for your regular customers.
Or how would you feel if the person in front of you paid 1/4th of the price charged to you? If I was in that store behind a groupon customer and they tried to charge me full price they would be picking cupcakes out of their ears.
A european chain stunts with taxless days, basically a 20% cut that amounts to the regular sales tax. So... I never buy from them unless they run one of these events because I can wait for them or another chain to run one when buying a TV or such. Turn your customers into bargain hunters and bargains they will hunt.
Stay away from advertising unless you truly and fully understand what it is going to cost and what it is going to deliver you. It is like gambling. Or lawsuits. Casino's, lawyers and advertisers ALWAYS win.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.