[skinny90]

Originally Posted by mathepac

The growth potential for the idea is immense.

Once all the data are in place, home-shoppers can key in their favourute (branded items) and a personal auto-shopper scans through the prices and picks the best priced items to be consolidated and packaged for collection at each shop by the consumer at the customer service desk (an adaption of the rather soul-less Argos model).

Multiples with low prices get repeat business, enabling them to either take their profit or run 'specials' on fast-moving items with assistance from their suppliers.

Another possibility is that the "over-all best value" trolley of groceries gets delivered free to the consumer once the order is placed with a shop. The personal shopper scans through all the prices and shows all the totals by shop for the shopping-list, makes a recommendation based on all items being in stock with current pricing, displays the 'receipts' to the shopper and allows him/her to make a choice as to where to place the order with the greatest savings, with optional free delivery. Payment processing is for any on-line shop with 'points' allocated to the shoppers loyalty card as appropriate.

There is little different in this scenario than with other price-comparison web-sites for car-insurance, for example.

Hi,
Whilst the concept is very good yet original I dont think it would work.Who finance's the project?a third party?if so how does a 3rd party make their money?This is only the start.Now on to the nitty gritty stuff.just look at tesco or dunnes.How many products do they sell?How often do prices change?lets just take figroles for example as it was mentioned here somewhere.how many different brands are there,what about other variables such as the item size/weight vs price or even more important promotional packing ie 2for 1 multipackaging where theres special promotional pos on the product that may be on the shelf for a day-2days pending on agreement with suppliers. I dont mean to critisise because its good thinking? I didnt read threw this thread fully but do you not think that if it could be done,It would have been done already?
With car insurance comparison websites variables are alot easier to manage,believe me it is very different.

[mathepac]

Originally Posted by skinny90

... I didnt read threw this thread fully but do you not think that if it could be done,It would have been done already?
... .

Well facebook, Skype, Google, ebay / Paypal hadn't been done before either until someone went and did them. The two Steves, Wozniak and Jobs refused to listen when the rest of the world said Windoze was the only way to go. One of them lived long enough to see the company he started become (briefly) the single most valuable corporation in the world, now with better revenues, a more valuable installed base and a bigger bank balance than their former rival Microsoft.

Originally Posted by skinny90

...
With car insurance comparison websites variables are alot easier to manage,believe me it is very different.

There are no complications that simple on-line retail grocery shop will throw up in comparison to production and materials planning systems, insurance, airline, car or hotel reservations systems.

Thanks for your support.

[skinny90]

so how will the concept make money?

[skinny90]

Originally Posted by mathepac

Well facebook, Skype, Google, ebay / Paypal hadn't been done before either until someone went and did them. The two Steves, Wozniak and Jobs refused to listen when the rest of the world said Windoze was the only way to go. One of them lived long enough to see the company he started become (briefly) the single most valuable corporation in the world, now with better revenues, a more valuable installed base and a bigger bank balance than their former rival Microsoft.
There are no complications that simple on-line retail grocery shop will throw up in comparison to production and materials planning systems, insurance, airline, car or hotel reservations systems.

Thanks for your support.

If you feel so strongly about the idea then go for it,prove me wrong....By the way the reason the two steeves where succesful was the fact that they came up with concepts and business models that up to then had never existed. This idea is good but as a business it wont work. And im not even going over reasons that was already mentioned by other posters.

If you think the concept is like that of an insurance comparison site you are incorrect.At present the main streams of revenue are either flat fee based,hits per page based based on customers clicking on a link and it redirecting it to the business's website or mainly commision based.In fact majority of them are commision based.so when the website preforms the transaction they get their cut and the rest goes to towards ryanair,Aviva,durys hotel etc http://affiliates.ebookers.com/faq.php

Alot of commision comes from business's which require specific information from the customer so the system can research and retrieve what the customer needs ie car insurance-driver details etc flights, destination-personal details etc,
Will Dunnes/Tesco traditionly seen as a high volume/low margin business pay a comission towards a potiental increase or decrease in its customers?doubt it
will customers want to be entering in specific details in order to get the save a euro on a 250g block of cheese?I doubt it

[MOH]

Originally Posted by mylastparadigm

are we taking nuking japan terrible or jewish concentration camp terrible? or are you just prone to hyperbole when you are commenting annonymously?

Originally Posted by mylastparadigm

jees, there seems to be an awful amount of neysayers taking the idea to extremes, using hard cases to make this seem like a bad idea. the rattle is being thrown out of the pram big time over a very trivial and simple idea. i assure you though, it is not a bad idea. It is a well-known fact that we see the faults in other's works more readily than we do in our own.

so, lets make it really simple.
in the realm of supermarkets and convienence stores. take tesco, dunnes, musgraves, and spar and other multiples.

all the prices come from head office anyway. they forward this information. simple as. no huge cost.


but overall, if people went to the stores for the cheapest item, the stores would have to compete with each other on regular pricing rather than 'special offers' and loss leaders.

i can never understand that the very people who are being ripped off are the first inline to defend the status quo. its not like im proposing a communist revolution here. just evolution into the 21st century.

Eh, what?

I think something is a terrible idea, I give reasoned arguments why, and you start talking about nuking japan and concentration camps and accuse me of hyperbole? Lol.

You don't seem to have read your own OP properly. It states "all items that are for retail in the country". There's no mention of "large multiples", with "head offices" who decide everything. You said every retailer of everything, and then when people pointed out issues with that, moved the goalposts to talk about large multiples and claimed they were the ones taking arguments to extremes.

You also seem to think every Spar shop in the country has identical prices set by "head office", with no variation. And then you say people disagreeing with you "know f all about it", (based on you mentioning one argument no one had presented yet).

So where does this end up in the long run? Homogenous pricing everywhere, and less competition. Which always works out well for the consumer.

It is a well-known fact that we see the faults in other's works more readily than we do in our own.

Definitely agree with you on that 100%.

[Srameen]

Originally Posted by mathepac

There are no complications that simple on-line retail grocery shop will throw up in comparison to production and materials planning systems, insurance, airline, car or hotel reservations systems.

Thanks for your support.

You are seriously deluded. Each supermarket chain stocks thousands of products. many carry differing brands. Daily offers apply in retail. Absolutely no comparison with Insurance products of flights. maintaining a grocery database would be hundreds of times more consuming than those products. Sorry but has this been fully thought through? Do you actually do a weekly shop for a family that includes from nappy wearing toddlers to teenagers?

[mylastparadigm]

Originally Posted by Srameen

Sorry but has this been fully thought through?

you'd swear this was dragons den!

no, this has not been fully thought through. this is simply an exercise in teasing out what is possible and the pitfalls or problems with doing something like this. you can absolutely depend on annonymous posters on an internet forum to sit back and take shots at any idea they didnt think of themselves. its useful to me because i can learn about the idea, the likely objections and likely arguements against it.

[mylastparadigm]

Originally Posted by skinny90

so how will the concept make money?

its not ment to make money! once you start putting ads on a site like this concept you lose independence. its ment to be a public service idea.

what about the cost? well, in a world where we are spending 67billion paying off debts we didn incur, i think we could manage it.

[MOH]

Originally Posted by mylastparadigm

no, this has not been fully thought through. this is simply an exercise in teasing out what is possible and the pitfalls or problems with doing something like this. you can absolutely depend on annonymous posters on an internet forum to sit back and take shots at any idea they didnt think of themselves. i

You post a suggestion on a forum, then bemoan "anonymous posters" taking shots at it when they don't agree with it - what do you expect, photographic ID along with every criticism.

You make no effort to respond to any arguments made against it, but resort instead to taking shots at anyone who criticises your idea.

I'm not sure what you're expecting to get out of this. It's all quite amusing though.

[Bandana boy]

Any price that a company advertises is just an invitation to treat
They do not have to actually match that price at the checkout.
There are several law cases that back this up
So if you made legislation that every supermarket had to advertise a price they could all just advertise 1p for all items and still be within the law.

Problems with your suggestion if you where to get around common law

1. Not all chains in a supermarket chain have the same price so does Dunnes have to load a price for every store in the country
2. prices change through out the day already ,how often do they have to update their prices?
3.who enforces this advertised price on the shop
4.Increased legislation on any industry increases the cost to the consumer ,in some cases this more beneficial to the consumers than the cost or is a long term saving so the market bears it.
In others their is an ethical benefit that the market as a population welcomes.I do not believe the market sees a problem with the current scenario hence would not be willing to take an increase in the cost of goods to pay for this scheme.

[mylastparadigm]

Originally Posted by MOH

You post a suggestion on a forum, then bemoan "anonymous posters" taking shots at it when they don't agree with it - what do you expect, photographic ID along with every criticism.

You make no effort to respond to any arguments made against it, but resort instead to taking shots at anyone who criticises your idea.

I'm not sure what you're expecting to get out of this. It's all quite amusing though.

have you anymore to say on the topic or are you happy to waste your time talking about me? im flattered.

[skinny90]

Originally Posted by mylastparadigm

its not ment to make money! once you start putting ads on a site like this concept you lose independence. its ment to be a public service idea.

what about the cost? well, in a world where we are spending 67billion paying off debts we didn incur, i think we could manage it.

So basically u ask for an opinion and then get annoyed when I give you honest feedback,take it on the chin or else come back to me with a valid argument

[mylastparadigm]

Originally Posted by skinny90

So basically u ask for an opinion and then get annoyed when I give you honest feedback,take it on the chin or else come back to me with a valid argument

that was not an annoyed response. all i said is its not ment to make money. there is no arguement there. its not a money making excercise. its a public service.

sorry if you took offence. it was not at all intended.

[MOH]

Originally Posted by mylastparadigm

have you anymore to say on the topic or are you happy to waste your time talking about me? im flattered.

There's a couple more problems with your idea I could suggest, but since I'm just some anonymous internet troll who spends my day ripping apart any idea that's not mine, it seems a bit pointless.

[skinny90]

Originally Posted by mylastparadigm

that was not an annoyed response. all i said is its not ment to make money. there is no arguement there. its not a money making excercise. its a public service.

sorry if you took offence. it was not at all intended.

Ok well as a public service this would receive massive critism towards it as it will be passed on the customers,tesco dunnes are a high volume low margin business they won't absorb the cost.if its made legal for business's to accept this that won't look good for the business's setting up in Ireland if everything is gonna be published online and then compared to competitors. Sites/systems like this are great for certain types of goods-mainly services offered.
Services in generall have a higher margin to give commission to the website