We’re announcing an exciting partnership with Buy.com today! Buy.com, known as the Internet Superstore, today launched its new “Household Essentials” store, giving shoppers a budget-friendly way to stock up on everyday basics by partnering with Alice. We’re joining Buy.com’s marketplace of name-brand sellers like Toys R Us, Baby Universe, Tiger Direct, J&R Electronics, Tilly’s, Ice.com, and more that offer competitive pricing on millions of products.

To view the new household essentials store, visit http://www.buy.com/alice

Consumers shopping through Buy.com will still receive all the benefits of the Alice service including always free shipping and great prices. The full press release is available here.

The Hive Awards are designed to reward all the unsung heroes of the internet: the coders, programmers, user experience designers, content strategists, information architects, planners and the like: the people who innovate and create but rarely get the credit.

Alice was awarded recognition as a top e-commerce website in the packaged goods category. We’re thrilled that our software engineers, developers and designers are receiving well-deserved credit.  View all the winners >

Alice.com was also profiled in CGT (Consumer Goods Technology) magazine, the leading resource for consumer goods executives, as a standout SMB company in CGT’s April issue. Each year, CGT profiles ten small to mid-sized companies that the rest of the consumer goods market should watch for inspiration. We’re honored to be included in this year’s list.

EXPO, the first video-based community specifically created for consumers to share their unbiased opinions about the products they buy, and Alice.com have joined forces to provide Alice shoppers with access to the world’s largest library of product-related videos.

Consumers shopping on the Alice.com marketplace now have easy access to hundreds of EXPO’s short, unbiased consumer videos, enabling shoppers to quickly find the best products based on their needs.  Alice.com is the first eCommerce site selling Consumer Packaged Goods to partner with EXPO to directly integrate product videos into its shopping experience.

In each EXPO video, real people create their own product reviews and consumer reports, and share their unbiased opinions. The videos are integrated on the Alice.com product pages, including, for example, at these links for Herbal Essences Split End Protector and Dove Body Mist.

Read full Press Release >

Consumer Packaged Goods marketers have a big challenge:  how do you create engaging content to effectively support your  digital marketing?  The digital consumer isn’t passive; you need to provide them a quality reason to pay attention to you.

Rob Go summarized this challenge nicely in a post yesterday in which he predicted a massive shift in CPG ad $’s to the web:

Auto companies can get a lot of engagement in their ads because people love looking at pretty pictures of cars.  But not a lot of people really want to watch a great online video about paper towels. 

Exactly. 

That’s why I found it so interesting to read in AdAge this week that some big CPG marketers are experimenting with the latest darling of the SXSW crowd—Foursquare.  I haven’t spent a lot of time on Foursquare, but I’ve really enjoyed watching their growth and speculating about all of the advertising opportunities that evolve from their location-based mobile platform. 

The Mayor of Pampers?

The AdAge piece, entitled “Would You Check in to Box of Tampax? For Charity?”, summarizes the efforts to P&G and Kraft to jump into this new location based world.  Using an app from start up CauseWorld, these CPG heavy weights allow consumers to “check into” their actual products on the store shelves (scanning the bar code) to accumulate points that can be donated to charity.

Will this work?  Are consumers willing to engage in this behavior?  If CPG can make this work on a location based mobile platform like Foursquare, getting consumers to engage in more mainstream web formats like Facebook should be a cakewalk.    

My opinion is that this kind of app will have an extremely small appeal, although I’d love to see it succeed. 

Commerce is the Key to Engagement with CPG

I think charitable efforts have a lot of potential for digital CPG advertising, but the mainstream consumer isn’t going to engage with CPG brands online without some tie in to actual commerce. 

Without the opportunity to buy or save money on my paper towels, I’m not going to pay any attention to them in the digital environment.     

Want proof?  Look at some of the data coming out of Facebook, which is clearly taking over the world.  Following a brand on Twitter or Facebook will make you more likely to buy a product from that company, according to a recent study by market research firm Chadwik Martin Bailey (results here and here).  But the study also revealed that the top reason people friend a brand on Facebook was to receive discounts and special promotions. Commerce is king. 

Want more evidence of the important of commerce to digital advertising?  Consider a recent experiment by P&G on Facebook.  P&G ran a special promotion to its Facebook fans last month that allowed fans to buy a new Pampers Cruisers product before the product hit the store shelves.  The promotion was a huge success, selling out the 1,000 packs it allotted for the effort in less than an hour (coverage here).  I think there is amazing potential here.   

I salute the creativity of P&G and Kraft in experimenting with Foursquare, but the real payoff involves tying digital marketing to some form of actual commerce.

 Agree or disagree?  I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Why are storefronts important to CPG manufacturers?

Supporting an online store with the Alice.com platform provides a host of benefits for manufacturers, including:

Engaging with Mainstream Consumers

CPG consumers are busy, and they aren’t likely to engage in a meaningful way with a CPG branded site that lacks the ability to actually buy the product.  Offering an online store is an effective way to attract and enter into an ongoing relationship with that mainstream consumer.  

Gaining a “Learning Lab” of Consumer Insights

CPG manufacturers need to get closer to their consumer.  With a direct commercial relationship, CPG manufacturers can transform their websites into “learning labs” that deliver a rich set of consumer insights that help inform marketing/positioning, product development efforts, and brand building.  And most importantly, these insights can be shared with the manufacturer’s retail partners to drive more impactful promotions and increase sales through the retail channel. 

Delivering Direct Response Capabilities to Online Advertising

Manufacturers can now use the direct response capabilities at their own storefronts as a centerpiece of their digital marketing campaigns.  This helps to ensure that their digital marketing is accountable, measurable, and optimized to deliver the most value over time. 

Meeting Underserved Demand

Between the rise of store brands and retailer sku rationalization, the retail shelf is getting smaller every day.  Supporting an online store allows manufacturers to find a home for their “misfit toys” that aren’t able to secure retail shelf space, but still have demand from consumers.

Gain Incremental Revenue

Multi-channel revenue is increasingly important in today’s economy, and an online storefront can provide another important incremental revenue stream

Why the Alice platform?

Manufacturers in non-CPG industries are increasingly using the online channel to sell direct to consumer (for example, Internet Retailer recently announced that manufacturers selling direct to consumer is the fastest growing online retail category in their Top 500 Guide).

To date, however, CPG manufacturers have had a difficult time joining in that trend and putting up a storefront of their own.  At Alice, we asked ourselves why.  There are a host of eCommerce platforms in the market today that can be used to power an online store.  Why aren’t CPG manufacturers using them and launching their own stores?  The reason, we believe, is because the existing platforms that create stand-alone storefronts aren’t optimized for the peculiar needs of the CPG shopper.  Let me explain.

When we shop for CPG products, we typically fill our shopping cart with dozens of products from multiple manufacturers in a single trip.  Are you really going to replace that shopping trip with an online experience that makes you visit 10 different manufacturer store fronts (from toothpaste, to trash bags, to toilet paper), to order 10 different products and pay shipping fees for each box to reach your door?  And are you going to replicate that process each and every time you run out of a product?  That’s a lot of extra hassle, a lot of cardboard, and a lot of extra shipping fees.

CPG manufacturers are realizing that in order to meet the needs of the mainstream CPG shopper, they need to serve up three things within their storefront experience: 1) free shipping ; 2) a broad assortment of brands that can be purchased in a single basket; and 3) an easy way to plan purchases to avoid running out of items and making emergency store trips.

The Alice.com eCommerce platform allows manufacturers to meet these needs by directly tying into, and sharing, the Alice.com customer experience, including a unified checkout and fulfillment process.  This shared experience enables manufacturers to sell direct in a completely new way—one that allows consumers to easily purchase (and repurchase) from multiple CPG manufacturers in a single shopping trip and receive one box of bundled goods direct to their door with free shipping, overcoming the barriers to mainstream CPG sales online.

A Growing Trend

We are working hard to make this new innovative platform a tipping point for the CPG industry to finally unlock the value of the online channel and transform their websites into learning labs that drive sales across all their channels.  In fact, we believe that by the close of 2010, every major CPG company will either have a storefront up and running at their branded property, or will have a plan to launch one.

Agree or disagree, we look forward to your comments and we are extremely excited to work hard this year to help move the industry forward online.

For all you CPG veterans out there, did you ever think you’d see the day when major retailers would open up their stores up to competitors?  A day, for example, where a small retailer could waltz into WalMart and put an identical product up on the shelf?

It’s happening online.  Today Sears joined WalMart and Amazon as the third big boy to launch a “marketplace” that opens up its online store to third party sellers (see news here, here and here).  eCommerce is certainly changing what it means to be a retailer.

For these big retailers, I can see how the marketplace concept makes sense, namely, by allowing them to leverage the power of their brand to expand their product selection for customers and gain incremental revenue without disrupting their own customer fulfillment costs (Sears, for example, charges each seller a listing fee and the seller drop ships products directly to buyers).  In many ways, it seems like a win for everyone involved.

Can this work for CPG manufacturers that are interested in selling direct to consumer?

In my humble opinion the answer is no for a very simple reason:  Shipping fees.

The mainstream CPG shopper expects to fills her basket with dozens of items from multiple manufacturers and take one bundled basket of goods home in a single trip.  That same shopper is not going to be excited about shopping online for these goods in a marketplace in which she has to pay shipping fees for 10 different manufacturers to drop ship a standalone box to her door.  10 boxes with 10 shipping fees doesn’t seem to work.

Is there a way to drop the shipping fees?  One method Amazon uses with their Subscribe and Save program is bulk CPG buying.  So instead of buying a four pack of bathroom tissue, I have to buy 48 rolls in order to get free shipping.  But is this really mainstream?  And even without the bulk, do I want a stand alone box on my door for bathroom tissue, toothpaste, trash bags, pain reliever and the dozens of other products I stock in my home on a regular basis?  That’s a lot of cardboard.

We’re taking a different approach at Alice.com, which like the marketplaces mentioned above, is open for manufacturers to sell direct to consumer.  But instead of consumers getting multiple boxes, they receive one Alice box of bundled goods from multiple manufacturers shipped free to their door.  By sharing the box and shipping costs (rather than drop shipping), the manufacturers can offer consumers the convenience and free shipping they demand.

Bottom line for CPG manufacturers?  The lines of what it means to be a manufacturer and a retailer are blurring online, and opportunities abound to innovate in how you get your goods into the hands of the consumer.

To their credit, CPG manufacturers have responded aggressively to this trend, introducing a host of manufacturing, packaging, and ingredient changes to their products to satisfy changing consumer demands.

One next big step for the industry will be to help consumers separate true innovation from the sea of marketing claims being made in the sustainability realm.  Simply put, consumers need quick, reliable information about CPG products at the point of purchase.

That’s why we are pleased to announce today that Alice.com is teaming up with Good Guide to incorporate the Good Guide product ratings into our Alice.com shopping experience.

By integrating GoodGuide’s independent  rankings and data into our product inventory, we’ve helped put important  information about the sustainability and health impacts of products at the point of purchase where consumers need it most.

Alice.com is excited to be the first eCommerce site integrate GoodGuide’s independent  rankings and data in this fashion. Shoppers choosing products on Alice.com can now see GoodGuide’s independent health, environmental and social responsibility ratings for everyday items such as cereal, cleaning products and baby shampoo.  GoodGuide is also integrating links on its site to Alice.com providing consumers with an easy option to purchase products they have researched on GoodGuide.

You can read more in our press release. We’re excited about this improvement to the Alice.com site and look forward to hearing what you think.

Since opening the Alice.com service to the public on June 23, 2009, the company has experienced rapid customer growth, and is currently averaging more than 1 million unique visitors to the service on a monthly basis.

“We have been extremely pleased with the reception that the Alice.com platform has received in the marketplace from both consumers and manufacturers alike,” says Brian Wiegand, CEO.  “Direct to consumer sales by manufacturers is a growing trend online, and the Alice.com platform is helping the CPG industry open up a direct channel to its mainstream consumer.  It’s a win-win that brings great value to the end consumer, and critical consumer relationships and insights to the manufacturer.”

Read the full press release >

This price per unit feature has been requested by many of our customers, and we are happy to be able to respond to their requests.  Here’s how it works:

On all of our products, you will now see the cost per unit listed next to the quantity on that item. For instance, if you’re looking at a pack of 104 diapers at a cost of $20.24 on Alice, you can easily reference that the price is $0.19 per diaper. You can also sort by the Price Per Unit feature to quickly find the lowest price.

In today’s economy, every purchase is more considered, and we are happy to bring this new functionality to market to help make buying CPG goods online even more powerful for today’s consumer.

1. Free Samples Tab
If you have ordered recently, you might have found a goodie bag from Alice in your shipment that included a personalized free sample (or two) and maybe a little something extra from us.  To help you keep track, we added a Free Samples tab for you that will show if your next box will arrive with a goodie bag, and what coupons are available on the samples you receive. Coupons are automatically applied when you add the product to your cart.

2. New Product Rooms
As we’ve expanded our broad assortment of products, we’ve also expanded the ways to shop for them, including offering new rooms under “Shop By Room” to make navigation easier.

3. Product Videos.
In an effort to offer useful information as you decide whether a product might be best for your household, we’ve added relevant product videos to view. If a video is available, you can view it on the super shelf and/or the product detail pages.

We hope these updates make your Alice experience even better.  Please let us know if there are other things you’d like to see added to Alice to enhance your shopping experience.

What do you think?  Do you like the updates?  Are there other things you’d like to see added?