41–50 of 151 posts
Sounds like Milo... But compete on.
Yeah, I didn't realize they existed. They were bought by Ebay a couple of years ago for $75 million, so I guess the idea was validated. Don't know if Ebay will dedicate enough time/energy to actually make it happen, so I still think there's an opportunity. Although they do have the corporate connections, which would help in gathering stores etc.
This is a terrible idea[see edit]. What incentive is there for any store to use this system when they're providing their data in a single easy to query location? Brick and mortar stores have custom because of brand loyalty, a large part of brand loyalty is saying "I shopped around twice and both times x was cheaper, I'll assume x is always cheaper and use them". Now imagine if every time a consumer wanted something t…
Your assumption is that people buy based on price only. Far from it - they still have to physically go to the store to buy it and so many other factors then come into play. Are they familiar with the store? Does it have free parking? Is the service good? What is their return policy? I agree with your main point that small stores might not like such a system but then to assume that all buyers will make a decision base…
What if you're standing outside the store and decide to check out a service that will price check for you across EVERY store; you type in the item and it says "this item is $90 at store y" and you notice store y is just 2 doors away. What do you do, do you shop at your regular store or do you shop at the new one? The majority of people will go with the new one, it's stupid not to walk an extra 10 feet to save $10, the new store might even be better!
I've had a similar idea, but it involved supermarkets and selling data to governments and companies for economic statistics and makershare data, respectively.
This is a terrible idea[see edit]. What incentive is there for any store to use this system when they're providing their data in a single easy to query location? Brick and mortar stores have custom because of brand loyalty, a large part of brand loyalty is saying "I shopped around twice and both times x was cheaper, I'll assume x is always cheaper and use them". Now imagine if every time a consumer wanted something t…
Here is what I would do (and yeah I've run my own business for many years, always easier said than done.)
#1 Build this produce but make it specific to a specific retailer or chain.
#2 For #1 to happen, the system needs to be pretty much "free to try" and seamless for the retailer. Think about that one real hard.
#3 Build a checkout system where customers walk in to the store and walk out with the product. All sales happen electronically, payments through the application.
#4 Now instead of "Walgreens App", "CVS App", etc, you consolidate the data in to one system. This sounds far fetched, but is very much the business model Google has employed. Tens of billions of dollars of customers flow through Google's platform. Google's method of consolidation include search algorithm "updates", opaque Adwords "quality score", moving Google Shopping from free to paid, and so on.
If no one manages to accomplish #4, retailers will start doing it internally. To some limited degree, it is already being done.
Accomplishing all of this could take a while. Whats certain is the US has a vast overcapacity in retail, and people waste too much time wandering through stores trying to find crap (and then there is the whole driving to stores thing for the rest of the non-urban areas.)
I don't want to be too harsh but haven't most people had this idea before? I know I have and I immediately dismissed it because you would have to get the business co-operation of many retailers for it to be any use (and what is in it for them?). You would have to develop your own software, ok fine. You would have to integrate with all these retailers archaic inventory systems which you probably would not be allowed t…
Frankly, taking inventory is the easiest part of this. Many places are fine to do it with just pad and paper.
This is a terrible idea[see edit]. What incentive is there for any store to use this system when they're providing their data in a single easy to query location? Brick and mortar stores have custom because of brand loyalty, a large part of brand loyalty is saying "I shopped around twice and both times x was cheaper, I'll assume x is always cheaper and use them". Now imagine if every time a consumer wanted something t…
Read the post, came back to look at hacker news comments knowing the most popular one would say "This idea sucks", was not disappointed. First sentence, boom. But hey you know you'll always get some constructive criticism no matter the idea, and that's definitely worth something.
That's actually a pretty good discussion when we just stop being meta and debate it.
This is a terrible idea[see edit]. What incentive is there for any store to use this system when they're providing their data in a single easy to query location? Brick and mortar stores have custom because of brand loyalty, a large part of brand loyalty is saying "I shopped around twice and both times x was cheaper, I'll assume x is always cheaper and use them". Now imagine if every time a consumer wanted something t…
Where it shines would be for something semi-obscure: "I need a plumbing snake" or "I need some fabric glue". Do they carry that at my grocery store? What about Wal-Mart? Where's the nearest specialty store that might have it? If I can just type the product in and know which stores have it, that saves me a ton of aggravation -- and might, as a byproduct, mean I do some other shopping at that store instead of my normal place.
This is a terrible idea[see edit]. What incentive is there for any store to use this system when they're providing their data in a single easy to query location? Brick and mortar stores have custom because of brand loyalty, a large part of brand loyalty is saying "I shopped around twice and both times x was cheaper, I'll assume x is always cheaper and use them". Now imagine if every time a consumer wanted something t…
Read the post, came back to look at hacker news comments knowing the most popular one would say "This idea sucks", was not disappointed. First sentence, boom. But hey you know you'll always get some constructive criticism no matter the idea, and that's definitely worth something.