There are over 2,000 direct clones of the Groupon business model. However, there's an equal amount of proof that the barriers to success are enormous. In spite of all those competitors, only a handful are remotely relevant.
If you don't have those moments where you go too far, then you're probably not going far enough.
I find myself using the word 'executives' now.
I don't get stressed out.
Generally, what people tend to underestimate is the cyborg nature of Groupon. We are a company that has the DNA of being both a technology company and a heavily operational company.
Local commerce, without question, will be one of the fundamental use cases enabled by mobile devices over the next several years.
Most small business owners are not particularly sophisticated business people. That's not a criticism; they're passionate about cutting hair or cooking food, and that's why they got in the business, not because they have an MBA.
When you think of couponing, you picture a mom cutting coupons out of the back of the newspaper.
I'm appalled that an industry has grown around teaching a practice as wholesome and spiritual as yoga, so I decided to create my own free video to help people get started.
Life is too short to be a boring company.
I think if there's any difference between me and a traditional CEO, it's that I've been unwilling to change myself or shape my personality around what's expected.
The popularity of Groupon has almost rendered the group-buying element of it obsolete, because we're able to deliver so many customers that the merchants are very happy with even the smallest number that we can provide.
Everybody loves a deal on a restaurant or skydiving or laser-hair removal.
If you look at Myspace, Facebook was a better product. It's as simple as that.
If I told people that I knew what I was doing, nobody would believe me, so why even try and fake it?
One of the challenges of innovation is figuring out how to wipe your mind clean about what you should be doing at any given moment, and not having a religious attachment to what's gotten you there thus far.
I think the big thing about Groupon is just people had never seen anything grow quite so fast.
I own over four ties.
Am I as experienced, or mature, or smart as others CEOs? No probably not, but there's something, I think, very useful about having a founder as the CEO.
A lot of people can raise money.
