A study in Contrasts

From the New York Tech meetup, Jetsetter and Stuffbuff are a study in contrasts.

Jetsetter is the travel emails/section of Gilt Groupe.  They tract purchases, clickthrough, types of photos, everything.  And it is an up front purchase and an experience they control.  They choose lux places, they control the prices, the photos, everything.  it looks and feels like what it is, a fantasy website for your fantasy getaway at what appears to be rock bottom (or close to it) deals.  By giving up certain elements of control, you get a deal and amazing amazing choices, the same way Gilt Groupe brought amazingness through a similar rush of choices/lack of choices.

It makes you feel sure you got a deal, and it’s rush its truly addicting.  The guarantees make you feel good too.  The sell is in the content.  And that content, is always sexy.

Stuffbuff on the other hand is based on the premise that you and me are going to buy-sell one item with each other at auction through a flash widget that can be placed anywhere on the web.  If I am the seller, it is to my advantage to progate my auction wherever I can.  If I am the buyer, it is to my advantage to not tell anyone I have found a deal, though I do need to legitimize that the item is of quality and a deal.

Basically, this is a Go F*** Yourself system.  The sell is being the last one standing.  Both the buyer and the seller know the other party in theory can be screwing the other person.  There is no way to control who else is buying (truth of auctions) or who will show up (also truth of auctions).  However, it’s worse when you add to the system from the sellers point of view the ability to have at any point the auction extended, extend, extend, and for it to be placed anywhere.  (Would you want to buy in an auction where you weren’t sure where the item was even vaguely from, and you weren’t sure where the auction was “being held” and people could come and go from the auction as they pleased?)  For an individual seller, it’s a lot of work to get to the best price when an ad on Craigslist or Amazon already specifies what you are willing to sell for, rather than starting at the near zeroth cent.  Because of the way the bid system is set up, the only way for StuffBuff to make any sort of real money (if they gain adoption) is to have a Swoopo! like fee system. (you can’t do minimum bids of a penny and not have that happen)  And everyone will be pissed, because Swoopo! is a bit of a scam.

If you can’t figure out the pieces of who and how you are selling to, you are in a bit of a mess.

The other alternative:  Ebay is losing marketshare.  There is no reason that someone couldn’t do a white label, high end auction site that is stable and somewhat closed (no putting little widgets all over the internet!)

The pleasure from buying for both, is knowing you got a deal.  Stuffbuff takes a lot more research for the 15 minutes in the time a bid exists.  Jetsetter is knowing your choices are closed off, however those given to you are guaranteed.