With unrestricted discounts (as is now typical for Groupon) customers with discounts will come in droves during peak times, and the profit of the merchant may even decline since regular customers are substituted with coupon-bearing customers. Think about it: filling a restaurant’s capacity on Saturday evening with Groupon customers is probably not the savviest business decision[...]
So why do most deals on Groupon and other similar web sites feature no time restrictions, and why are an increasing number of web portals removing activation thresholds? Because, unfortunately, what is in the interest of the business owner is not in the interests of Groupon and its competitors. Groupon and other web portals get a cut of total revenues channeled through the deal so Groupon gets nothing if the deal is not on. That is, with no activation threshold and with deals active always, Groupon itself gets the best deal… And the merchant gets a raw one.(de aici)
Problema mare cu Groupon si multi altii (majoritatea copie 101% dupa Groupon) este ca promotile printr-un astfel de site pot sufoca un business daca nu sunt impuse anumite limite de timp si/sau cantitate. De gandit, planuit si implementat pentru 2014.