The secret behind Groupon's discount?

February 14, 2011

By Kris Ashton, Daily Deal Media

Groupon have had a string of missteps and bad press that they just can’t seem to shake. In this most recent blunder, Groupon teamed up with FTD to offer $40 worth of flowers for $20 just in time for Valentine’s Day. Over all a great sounding deal, but customers found that prices they were paying for the flowers were actually as much as $20 higher than on the retailer’s web site.

It was speculated that FTD hiked the price to make up for the loss they knew they’d be taking from the discount as well as Groupon’s 50 percent take on the deal. By the time users started noticing the price difference 3,300 vouchers had already been sold.

According to FTD President, Rob Apatoff, the company did not inflate the prices of the flowers for Groupon customers.

“Absolutely not,” he said. “Because there was some confusion with a few, we decided to step up and do the right thing to make sure everybody was happy,” he added.

FTD then went on to credit Groupon customers the difference between the retail price and the sale price. Both FTD and Groupon said they would offer full refunds to those who were still not satisfied.

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