Personally, I tend to hate it because I am convinced that coupons are evil. It is just a way to control people's behaviours and turn them into consumer sheep, which I resent from the bottom of my heart.
I root for startups that empower people and open up new opportunities, not for ones that have found a loophole in the human psyche and exploit it to the maximum.
I wouldn't say they're exploiting a loophole in the human psyche, rather a very well known aspect of it.
It's also a brilliant business model for a recession and financial crisis. In most instances it's win-win-win:
- Groupon makes money
- people get huge discounts, and save money if it was something they were planing to buy anyway.
- businesses both make money (assuming they worked out the math of the deal correctly before accepting it) and gain huge exposure.
I suppose the only losers are wherever people would have spent that money had they not bought the groupon, but that's hard to quantify (bought the same thing at a higher price? bought something else? saved it?).
I can't think of many more innovative business models for a distressed economy.
The losers are the waiters and employees of the featured businesses. I know plenty of people in the service industry who dread the days their restaurants or shops offer discounts on Groupon. Sure it makes money for the company, but in many cases a Groupon deal kills morale within the business.
That on top of the exploitative nature of many (most?) Groupon users, where they buy a Groupon and never revisit the business after they use their discount.
Groupon is a great business, but some concerns about the quality of the leads arise. We need the Glengarry leads.
Groupon is creating new value and opportunities. Small business now have an easy, trackable, pay-per-action source for customer acquisition. It's hardly exploitative of customers either because you can get a refund if you're dissatisfied (see the Groupon Promise).
Outside the US coupons are not a big business, at least in the countries I know. So I wonder if it will translate as profitably in the rest of the world.
Here in brazil (at least in são paulo) there are around four companies (groupon included) fighting tooth and nail for this market, even using black-hat-ish techniques (unsolicited email, misguiding website, impossible-to-unsubscribe mailing lists, deceitful ads, etc).
I think most urban-ish places with a capitalized youth are a ripe market for coupon-type businesses.
I root for startups that empower people and open up new opportunities, not for ones that have found a loophole in the human psyche and exploit it to the maximum.