Anyone use Zulily? What makes them special?

snapster thought this was worth mentioning said Fri, Nov 22nd 2013 at 3:19pm ET

The timing of their hugely successful IPO about a month after Fab.com's declaration that flash sales were a dead end is rather enjoyable (they raised another 100 million and now sport a 4 billion public valuation.)

Any Mom shoppers care to share opinion of them? Any existing Zulily fans here?

14 comments, 4 replies
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hales said Fri, Nov 22nd 2013 at 3:29pm ET:

I have a friend that is a new mom and enjoys shopping on Zulily quite a bit. Possibly just for convenience. I've yet to see any pricing from them that actually seems like a deal though. Last time I got an email from them about a "blow out" event I could find lower pricing on the items at Amazon than what they were offering. Maybe that's just me though.

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snapster said Fri, Nov 22nd 2013 at 3:41pm ET:

This is a common curiosity for me recently on several sites: I wonder how much of their volume is being driven by Facebook promotions. https://www.facebook.com/zulily 1.4 million likes - looks like they churn out a few different promotional offerings a day.

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Thumperchick said Fri, Nov 22nd 2013 at 3:44pm ET:

I'm not a mom, but I Zulily and I love them. Every once in a while - you will find a truly great price on something fashionable, their shoes are great, and the shipping gimmick works well for me. (Your first order unlocks free shipping for the rest of the day - or the weekend.)

But what they do well, is put together visually appealing sales. Grouping the right items to create a look or overall theme. It's like someone took a great Etsy collection and made it easy to buy.

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- I was going to say that about their Facebook promos - very well done photography, visually appealing stuff
  
  snapster said Fri, Nov 22nd 2013 at 3:57pm ET
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hales said Fri, Nov 22nd 2013 at 3:48pm ET:

I downloaded the app a while back out of curiosity and pretty much every day at 8:00AM it reminds me that "It's time to shop zulily!"

You'd think I would have turned that off by now...

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- I wonder if it knows you are central time. 6am wake up on the west coast would suck!
  
  snapster said Fri, Nov 22nd 2013 at 3:58pm ET
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- Just checked the settings - it has mine set to CT and also allows you to "set a new time"
  
  hales said Fri, Nov 22nd 2013 at 4:15pm ET
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- my new time will be never
  
  hales said Fri, Nov 22nd 2013 at 4:15pm ET
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joshaw said Fri, Nov 22nd 2013 at 5:39pm ET:

My wife absolutely loves Zulily and has spent an enormous amount of money there. She will flick through the deals for hours. I don't get it. I guess I'll have to ask her about her fascination with it.

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ceagee said Mon, Nov 25th 2013 at 2:01am ET:

I have never found anything on there I couldn't get elsewhere cheaper.

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marcee said Mon, Nov 25th 2013 at 11:34am ET:

It used to be awesome - unique things, great prices. It is no longer. Occasionally they will have an interesting product - but now, instead of buying it at zulily and waiting 6 weeks for it to arrive, I search for it elsewhere, find it significantly cheaper and receive it faster.

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snapster said Mon, Nov 25th 2013 at 11:48am ET:
Ha, that sounds familiar @marcee.

I'm probably a bit weird but thinking through how ecommerce models work is fun to me. making some notes here from reports and observations..
- suspension-of-belief discount style with exclusives driving some optics but merchandising (discount from msrp), flash sale timing doing most of the work.
- superior product curation and photography/design/merchandizing skills
- daily email promotions - nice use of some specialized subject lines for new signups. I bet these are the primary driver of transactions here - I'm guessing more than half of business attributed back to email?
- likely high ad spend (largest use of investment cash I'd imagine) driving repeat
  sales (Facebook likes are indicative of high-spend campaigns there to mine social graph as people sign up) - 25% of sales?
- quality mobile ap making use of notification reminders. (15% sales?)
- new signups driven by a refer-a-friend bonus. (these things are still effective?)
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Sababa23 said Mon, May 5th 2014 at 2:26pm ET:

@snapster did you see the article about Zulily today ?
What are your thoughts ?

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303626804579509402577847362

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Sababa23 said Mon, May 5th 2014 at 2:28pm ET:

they have a solid business model, were they only buy what they need after the sale (more or less) but do you think this will hurt them in the long run ?

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snapster said Mon, May 5th 2014 at 2:46pm ET:

@Sababa23 ha - nice find. I'm sticking to my rebellious thought that you can optimize shipping for different priorities. Sometimes slower shipping allows more selection and lower pricing and that is the right optimization for the style of offer made.

If Amazon was actually transparent on all the added costs that go into their fast delivery, many people would opt for a slower, cheaper option - like 5 day delivery or even slower. That cost wouldn't just show lower on freight amount, it would show up as lower item pricing itself (the two are intermingled once you accept there is logistics cost getting the item to Amazon that is hidden in the item price)

When you need an item in 0 days, Amazon is also not optimized for you.

When you need an item in 1 or 2 days, Amazon is amazingly optimized. I use it often.

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Sababa23 said Mon, May 5th 2014 at 2:54pm ET:

@snapster thanks for your thought. I definitely agree with you. thought you would like that article..

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mehsterious said Mon, May 5th 2014 at 4:25pm ET:

I used to peruse the adult fashion and home items on Zulily and have purchased three times in the last three years. The shipping did take three+ weeks but I expected that. The final sale aspect of the apparel is not appealing to me and I rarely check the site anymore. They don't assume any inventory risk and do only buy what they sell so it's a win for them risk-wise at the sacrifice of customer experience.

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Sababa23 said Mon, May 5th 2014 at 5:22pm ET:

@baslanian they do take in some inventory.

They have a wild system, during the sale there inventory fluctuate based on what sells threw the case pack the vendor give them. I heard it Is really insane.
I know many people that deal with them, and it amazes me how many vendor they have.
In my dads company, Zulily gave them a 800 K order on 1 sale, he couldn't believe it..

@snapster I wonder what that feels like, over a million in sales in one day :)

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