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Facing Cash Crunch, Retailer Jet.com Racing to Complete Funding Round

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Re: Facing Cash Crunch, Retailer Jet.com Racing to Complete Funding Round

#51

Post by gojomo »

dewitt wrote: post #13

I put in an order when Jet launched. No joke, from the best I can tell, they sent someone to a physical Walmart, where they purchased the product at full retail, for more than they charged me , packaged it up, and shipped it to me with free two-day delivery. But they'll make it up on volume, right? Smart people have said, "do things that don't scale." I guess Jet took that at face value.

To do this for everything, indefinitely is obviously a problem. But to do this for a subset of products, even a very large subset, while building capabilities may be a good idea.

It lets them start winning customers by demonstrating their planned comprehensiveness, much earlier. Any entry to this retail space is going to require big risks, big capital, and a long climb. Amazon needs competitors. Succeed or fail, I applaud Jet for trying.

Re: Facing Cash Crunch, Retailer Jet.com Racing to Complete Funding Round

#52

Post by swingbridge »

unclebucknasty wrote: post #2

Jet.com doesn't seem to understand that Amazon can take losses in retail because they have margin from other sources--like AWS--as well as an overall ecosystem. And now, Amazon shows quarterly profits. They can go even deeper with discounts in retail. Jet is just not going to win by simply undercutting Amazon as a pure retail play. They're just adding to the already exorbitant burn rate generated by their marketing t…

Excellent point. Amazon makes huge margins on AWS (despite the prices seeming rather low to many people). That's a giant recurring war chest of cold hard cash that they can and do use to fuel their other businesses.

If one is going to poke Amazon in the side it needs to be a niche play. Find a market where they aren't established (hard but not impossible) and then get acquired. Jet's current play of trying to beat Amazon at being Amazon is pure insanity.

Re: Facing Cash Crunch, Retailer Jet.com Racing to Complete Funding Round

#54

Post by bcassedy »

dayaz36 wrote: post #43
dikaiosune wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious to see what items this applies to. I buy most things from Amazon, and when I comparison shop the prime shipping usually negates any price difference with other online retailers, and the price is very rarely beat by any in store prices where I live. Anecdotal to be sure, and I stick to items fulfilled by Amazon or direct from Amazon (mostly due to prime), but I see a lot of savings this way. And that doesn…

Actually most stores now do price matches to Amazon (including best buy and target among others), so there is no use for Amazon for me now. I used to go to best buy just to test the equipment before buying on Amazon, now I just show them the Amazon price on my phone and they match it. No shipping fee no waiting and cheaper. I think I'm going to have to try Jet.com now that Amazon is worthless

Most of the time when I try to price match at Best Buy or the like it turns out the model available on Amazon with the exact same specs and similar lower price point has one char changed on the SKU. It's become pretty common for there to be BB version, Target version, and Amazon version of all kinds of electronics.

Re: Facing Cash Crunch, Retailer Jet.com Racing to Complete Funding Round

#55

Post by sethherr »

dayaz36 wrote: post #43
dikaiosune wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious to see what items this applies to. I buy most things from Amazon, and when I comparison shop the prime shipping usually negates any price difference with other online retailers, and the price is very rarely beat by any in store prices where I live. Anecdotal to be sure, and I stick to items fulfilled by Amazon or direct from Amazon (mostly due to prime), but I see a lot of savings this way. And that doesn…

Actually most stores now do price matches to Amazon (including best buy and target among others), so there is no use for Amazon for me now. I used to go to best buy just to test the equipment before buying on Amazon, now I just show them the Amazon price on my phone and they match it. No shipping fee no waiting and cheaper. I think I'm going to have to try Jet.com now that Amazon is worthless

There's no shipping if you have prime. So you're using sub-standard Amazon.

Here in Chicago I get everything within 48 hours of ordering, often less, and don't pay shipping fees. Some items are free same day shipping.

You must make wildly different hourly rates to think visiting a store and paying the same amount is cheaper than a few clicks on Amazon.

Re: Facing Cash Crunch, Retailer Jet.com Racing to Complete Funding Round

#56

Post by rstupek »

bcassedy wrote: post #54
dayaz36 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually most stores now do price matches to Amazon (including best buy and target among others), so there is no use for Amazon for me now. I used to go to best buy just to test the equipment before buying on Amazon, now I just show them the Amazon price on my phone and they match it. No shipping fee no waiting and cheaper. I think I'm going to have to try Jet.com now that Amazon is worthless

Most of the time when I try to price match at Best Buy or the like it turns out the model available on Amazon with the exact same specs and similar lower price point has one char changed on the SKU. It's become pretty common for there to be BB version, Target version, and Amazon version of all kinds of electronics.

Definitely not a new thing. Electronic stores, furniture stores, etc have always had store specific SKUs so they never have to match price

Re: Facing Cash Crunch, Retailer Jet.com Racing to Complete Funding Round

#58

Post by nostromo »

MichaelGG wrote: post #47
dayaz36 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually most stores now do price matches to Amazon (including best buy and target among others), so there is no use for Amazon for me now. I used to go to best buy just to test the equipment before buying on Amazon, now I just show them the Amazon price on my phone and they match it. No shipping fee no waiting and cheaper. I think I'm going to have to try Jet.com now that Amazon is worthless

I guess you're one of the folks that would not pay a premium to simply not deal with ever having to set foot in a Best Buy. Returns? Gotta go to the store. Want a sightly different model (for instance the newer Canon Powershots are a downgrade) - wait for them to get stock. Plus the obnoxiousness of going to those stores. It's great you like getting out, dealing with retail and advertisements. But I think you aren't…

Judging by the size of offline vs online retail, he's very representative.

Re: Facing Cash Crunch, Retailer Jet.com Racing to Complete Funding Round

#59

Post by fraserharris »

Jet.com's strategy is to get large enough that the brands have to list on their site (like they do an all major marketplaces). Many of the larger brands are currently sitting on the sidelines "seeing how it goes". You can think of their current strategy as "buying one side of a two sided marketplace". This may or may not work, but calling the strategy stupid just demonstrates a lack of familiarity with ecommerce marketpaces.

If Jet.com's strategy does work then its cemented itself as a multi-billion $ marketplace. In an era of near-zero % interest rates, funds are willing to take that risk for the potential return.

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