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Re: GNOME Store

+1 for Zazzle.

Thanks for putting together the info!

Stormy

On Tue, May 12, 2009 at 1:53 PM, Paul Cutler <pcutler foresightlinux org> wrote:

I spent some time researching Zazzle and Cafepress, and put up a page on lgo
at http://live.gnome.org/GnomeMarketing/Merchandising.

I didn't find a lot of information about competitors to the two of them.

Overall, they're both very similar.  Both offer similar merchandise,
affiliate programs, customizable look, embeddable content and more.

My personal recommendation would be Zazzle.  Zazzle hosts more (and arguably
better) brand stores for companies than Cafepress.  If you assume they went
through a RFP selection process, there is probably a reason the likes of
Disney, Mozilla and Mattel (Barbie, Hot Wheels) chose Zazzle.

Cafepress has a slight edge on pricing, on average 5-10% (though they do
charge $60 for a premium store) but Zazzle handily beats them in assortment
of products to choose from.  I encourage you to look at Zazzle's t-shirt
offerings, especially the women's selections as a comparison.

I also liked Zazzle's choice of posters and print offerings better.

Most of the novelty items, such as mugs, stickers, magnets, etc were priced
similar between the two.

Please review the wiki page I added at
http://live.gnome.org/GnomeMarketing/Merchandising and let me know if there
are any areas you would like additional information on.

Paul

On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 10:23 AM, Paul Cutler <pcutler foresightlinux org>
wrote:


Ok, that helps with the direction.

I agree with Stormy that it would be neat to have our own designs -
especially when we can get the community involved, or have things like
limited edition runs.

I spent some time yesterday comparing Zazzle's and Cafepress's premium
store options.  I'll type up a comparison over the weekend and send it to
the list.

If anyone has any other suggestions of companies to look at, please let me
know.

Paul

On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 10:17 AM, Stormy Peters <stormy gnome org> wrote:


There's also Threadless, but they only do tshirts.

Currently, Hackerthreads decides what merchandise with which logos and
asks the board for approval. Some of the issues I know we currently have
with them, and we've told them, are issues with the user interface and
payments.

I would like to have the Zazzle/Cafepress model where we could make up
our own designs and decide which merchandise they could be offered on.

Stormy

On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 9:07 AM, Paul Cutler <pcutler foresightlinux org>
wrote:


Dave, thanks for linking the lgo page below, that was very helpful.

I guess the first question I have is, are we unhappy with
Hackerthreads?  Specifically, financially?  Has anyone reached out to them
to see if it's possible to assort more merchandise, and change the look and
the feel of the store?

As far as more merchandise goes, looking at their other stores /
affiliates they host, I don't think there is, as they appear to specialize
in t-shirts.

I don't think any of the requirements have changed much in the last 5
years sine that was put together.

Looking at the work that was done back then, and the stores that were
under consideration:

* Zazzle: Still in business, now has Mozilla as a client
* Cafepress - the wiki page mentions
* OpensourceFactory:  Specializes in books and software only
* Sorucewear  / Mayopi:  Don't appear to be in the merchandising
business anymore


Other than that, the only other site that was similar that I could find
was Printfection.com.

Paul

On Thu, May 7, 2009 at 6:01 AM, Dave Neary <dneary gnome org> wrote:


Hi,

While the project didn't go through to completion because the company
we
signed with went out of business, we have gone through this process
before - I documented the process and hit on some of the very same
issues you mention - gnome.org URL, selection of products, and Zazzle
was among the companies I talked with.

The process is documented in
http://live.gnome.org/FoundationBoard/MerchandisingAgreement

As I understand it, Zazzle will do specific custom deals for high
volume
brands. For lower value brands such as our, you can easily set up a
custom shop-front with the Zazzle store management software like this:
http://www.zazzle.com/southpark

I also understood from our discussions that Zazzle could set up vhosts
for a store.gnome.org sub-domain, but that they couldn't do a fully
custom interface for us - it would be a standard Zazzle shop-front.

Cheers,
Dave.

Paul Cutler wrote:

Hi, I wanted to continue a conversation regarding a GNOME store that
I
had sent to the foundation-list

(http://mail.gnome.org/archives/foundation-list/2009-April/msg00060.html)
and per Stormy's last email in the thread, continue it in marketing.

We currently have an affiliate store set up at Hackerthreads:
http://www.hackerthreads.com/items.asp?Cc=GNOME&Bc=
<http://www.hackerthreads.com/items.asp?Cc=GNOME&Bc=>

I'll be the first to admit I don't have all the information on the
current setup, including adding products and the revenue model.
However, in my experience at a former employer running e-commerce
sites,
having a punch out site with a different URL decreases customer
conversion to buy.

One alternative that came up in #marketing in IRC last week was using
Zazzle, who manages the Mozilla store (http://store.mozilla.org/).

Some ideas around a GNOME store, that may help increase sales &
revenue:

* GNOME URL (store.gnome.org <http://store.gnome.org>)
* User generated logos / content that can be added to merchandise
* Limited edition merchandise (Could we create demand by having
certain
artwork / logos available for a limited time?  Or create a campaign
or
use merchandise to support a larger campaign for GNOME)
* Greater selection of products

Of course, this would probably cause more work - setting up the
store,
managing inventory (Mozilla has a clearance store), HTML, requesting
and
approving logos and artwork from the community, etc.  My idea may be
totally crazy considering all the other work around the website
that's
going on as well.

I'm not sure what value added services Hackerthreads or Zazzle can
offer
around these ideas, or what other ideas the community may have to
add,
but these were some things I thought we may want to think about.

I'd like to gauge if there is any interest in the community around
this
idea?  If so, we may want to create a small team that can help screen
artwork, choose what kinds of merchandise to sell in conjunction with
a
fulfilment partner, and work with the web team to get a store
implement.

Thoughts or concerns?

Paul



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