Recently in our team Hipchat room, one of our engineers shared Jet.com CEO Marc Lore’s “Jet For All” post on Medium (published Oct 7). The company is killing its membership fee, one of the main revenue drivers for the would-be Amazon rival.
We thought the ensuing discussion around Jet’s business model would be interesting for our readers.
These are Jet.com’s target customers: young, digital natives who are also early adopters of emerging tech.
So here’s some free market research for Jet.com’s strategy team and anyone else hoping to take on Amazon.
(The following chat has been edited for clarity)
Alex—10:46am
Jet.com memberships are now free
https://medium.com/@marclore/jet-for-all-e18eb8dd04e3
how do they make money now…?
Charley—10:47am
volume?
Mahd—10:47am
how are they different from other online retailers?
Daniel—10:48am
they’ll add the membership fee back in once they reach critical mass
they are just trying to get volume before running out of money
Victor—10:48am
they’re gonna die
have you ever shopped there? it takes you to the home screen every time you add a new item to your shopping cart
Alex—10:48am
@Mahd they’re very cheap
@Victor mmm no, didn’t do that for me. maybe they “improved” it
Daniel—10:49am
@Victor i don’t recall that but the frustrating things vs Amazon for me were 1) no reviews or suggestions, 2) delivered via FedEx who refuse to ever leave packages with my building or the dry-cleaner next door
Nikhil—10:49am
they might make money off the smart cart
Victor—10:49am
they once delivered my order in six different boxes. I got a bag of potato chips overnighted to me, and a box of tea as well
Charley—10:49am
if you’ve ever spent a Sunday afternoon in line at Sam’s Club…you’ll like this service
Daniel—10:51am
for the first month or so they were apparently just re-ordering things from other online retailers like walmart.com
at least a good portion of their stock
Alex—10:51am
#growthhacking
Chris—10:52am
same thing happened to me, re: a million boxes for small things. + two things were refunded as “out of stock,” which given this new info just means it was out of stock at walmart
Daniel—10:55am
(from an article about the Jet.com launch) “By 2020, Jet expects to have 15 million paying customers, which would generate about $750 million based on the current $49.99-a-year membership cost. Membership fees will be Jet’s sole source of profits, since it says it will relentlessly undercut rivals on product prices and offer free shipping on orders of more than $35 and free returns.”
Nikhil—10:58am
tbh i don’t think the jet model is actually a bad one, just hard to get that same flawless customer experience that amazon has been perfecting for years
what’s weird is that they’re abandoning this biz model without even giving it time to analyze results
Daniel—10:59am
i think they’re just trying to win the volume of customers needed to hit the inflection point as fast as possible
then they will re-instate the membership fees
Alex—11:02am
I think it’s tough to get people to pay $35 right off the bat. you don’t really know what the site is and it’s already asking for money before you can buy stuff… I’d never have bought on Jet without the Accel Partners free membership
Emily—11:16am
maybe that was part of the strategy—attract customers by appearing exclusive then hope the experience keeps them coming back
Lane—11:40am
My two cents re: Jet.com don’t order toilet paper if you’re lower than six rolls left. It will never make it on time and you’ll end up spending $10 for six rolls of the paper-thin kind at the bodega.
Julien—11:44am
that’s why there is prime now. and soon, you’ll get your TP by drone
Emily—11:45am
Amazon started in 1994, didn’t have prime until 2005.
Cameron—11:42am
do you think jet.com is discounting the premium people pay for convenience then?
keeping in mind that i would have paid someone to type that for me
Nicolle—11:46am
took about 10 days for a ream of paper. and five for a 24-pack of water bottles.
you have to have a TON of patience with them… tho i did find a printer there for nearly 50% of what amazon was charging, so that patience can pay off
Ryan—11:58am
My #1 question about Jet.com: What value is it going to provide that Amazon doesn’t?
Considered giving them a shot when they were offering a few free months, but simply didn’t because I really don’t want to be locked into another annual shopping club membership. Now that they’re free I’m assuming they want to compete on price.. The only way that’ll convince me to see what they’ve got is 1) they’re completely transparent with unit prices relative to their competitors, and 2) they give me a monetary incentive to give them their first shot. If it’s only going to save me a couple dollars each month I’m not compelled to account for every future online purchase decision with them in mind. Although, I’m sure the competition will benefit consumers longer term. Right now I’d prefer to remain loyal to Amazon’s enormous ecosystem around the prime membership and another Chrome extension like CamelCamelCamel and Invisible Hand that’s do the comps for me.
< / personal opinion>
#trythoseextensions
Nicolle—12:02pm
the value is just in the savings. they do show you competitor pricing and they give like 10 or 15 dollars off your first order
agreed that if it’s just a few dollars a month it’s probably not worth what is currently terrible shipping reliability
Ryan—12:07pm
Interesting! In what instances would you go to Jet to search before X Y or Z?
Nicolle—12:11pm
i never go to Jet first. it’s what i’ve gotten in the habit of checking right right before i’m ready to finalize an order (which is 98% of the time on amazon) just to see if the savings are big enough to deal with the shipping hassle. that’s how i ended up saving over $60 on a printer once
Ryan—12:25pm
woah I actually just went to jet.com hahaha. The $ incentive is met, so I’d be willing to order from them… but I’m not seeing the transparency yet. Doesn’t feel like perfectly competitive economics so I can’t tell if that $15 laundry detergent is priced fairly or not. Also, haven’t found a price comp extension that weighs against Jet yet
Nicolle—12:26pm
how do you get that on amazon? or if not amazon, where did you come to have that expectation?
Ryan—12:43pm
historical price tracking from CamelCamelCamel where I can set my desired price and they’ll alert me once met. The yellow banner across the top is Invisible Hand, which will search for the item across many other websites. It’s really helpful for electronics. For example, I’ll find the headphones I want to buy via Google and/or Amazon reviews, then Invisible Hand will link me directly to the cheapest open listing on eBay.
Back in the day I noticed some funky math at supermarkets. At a lot of places still, it’s cheaper to buy smaller than larger. For example, the unit price/ ounce of salsa in the plastic family size container would be higher than in the smaller glass jar. This annoys me so I really appreciate the unit pricing.
Nicolle—12:44pm
I’m exhausted by all the research necessary to make sure you’re not getting ripped off!
Ryan—12:45pm
Woah woah woah that’s exactly why I use extensions
Mahd—12:46pm
that’s a lot of extensions!
Nicolle—12:47pm
but even looking at that graph if it came up automatically… i’ll try it out for a while, shopping a lot lately and it’s been a nightmare comparison shopping
Alex—12:47pm
hire someone who can find the best pricing for you! however, you need to find the cheapest person to do that job, it’s not easy…