Alice.com, the retail platform for household goods, has closed a $6 million Series B round of funding from private investors, bringing the startup’s total funding up to over $10 million. We previously scooped the startup’s $4 million infusion (which was part of this round) in September. Alice.com raised $4.3 million in Series A funding from Kengonsa Capital Partners and DaneVest Capital in November of 2008.
Launched in June, Alice.com is an retail platform for consumer packaged goods manufacturers, like Procter & Gamble, to sell directly to consumers instead of going through retail channels like Target or Wal-Mart. On the consumer side, Alice.com lets users create a profile of their household (i.e. how many adults, kids, babies) and then the site will keep track of items and reminds users with emails when they are running low and need to reorder. Each shipment is bundled together in a single ‘Alice’ box, delivered directly to the consumer’s door, with no shipping costs.
Alice’s co-founder and CEO Brian Wiegand told me that the new funds will be used to bring on additional home goods partners, such as Procter & Gamble. Wiegand adds that the site has steadily added many of the well-known manufacturers to its partnership base, but declined to name which brands have signed on.
As we wrote in our initial review of the platform, we are fans of Alice.com thanks to a competitive pricing plan, an well-understood business model (the site makes money via advertising) and experienced entrepreneurs at the helm of the startup. Co-founders and serial entrepreneurs Brian Wiegand and Mark McGuire have managed to sell three companies in the past +10 years, most recently flipping social shopping service Jellyfish to Microsoft (which it later used to create Live Search Cashback).
I started using this when TechCrunch reported on them last June. It’s been nice not having to make a trek to Wal*Mart every 2-3 weeks.
I love the service except for a couple things:
a) they charge tax on things that probably shouldn’t be taxed;
b) they don’t carry a lot of the larger sizes, for example 32oz shampoo instead of 12oz shampoo
The convenience easily overcomes negatives for me though. This service is perfect for single guys who hate to shop.
What is so unique about the offering ? Not much.
Why can’t I buy the stuff online from Walmart or target or Shop and Stop ?
If they a niche like diapers.com , I can understand. For house hold goods..naahhhhhh
I agree, the play is similar to Kozmo.com back in the 90’s.
very simple answer- ALWAYS FREE SHIPPING! sure you can go to ANY other site to grab this or that- BUT THEY CHARGE YOU SHIPPING! With alice.com ITS ALWAYS – ALWAYS FREE! So I dont have to pay 1-5 dollars just to order shampoo and a bar of soap or a box of diapers to be shipped to my door! Its the stuff you are already using and buying as is- but now delivered to your door for FREE- which also saves you GAS in this economy thats a major brownie points!
@SkillGuru- Your post is ignorant of the nature of the offering and containing no useful perspective. We can debate the merits of Alice, but you should take the time to understand it first. The service offers free shipping, manages household product inventory, and 20-30% discounts; to simplistically compare it to services that have neither is not helpful. Far from adding value, you detract value from TechCrunch by oversimplifying the companies presented here and misrepresenting their solution.
Well, somebody has to be paying for the shipping… unless they are making up for it w/ very high margins, I don’t know how they can have positive contribution margins on small orders.
I think it’s wrong to say this concept allows big manufacturers to sell “directly” to consumers. If each order is bundled into an Alice box, is Alice not just a traditional online Ecommerce shop, buying and reselling? Doesn’t really sound direct to me, which makes sense, I doubt a major brand would EVER consider selling directly to customers… there business is manufacturing, not retailing. Can you imagine P&G managing an order for 1 bottle of shampoo?
I find it puzzling that people will criticize without checking it out. If you go to the site and read everything and actually try it, you will find out that it’s because there’s no overhead like Walmart or Target has. It’s direct shipping from a warehouse, via UPS. After your first order, there is a 6 item minimum, but once your try it, you will be hooked. It saves time, by having your nonperishables appear on your doorstep in 1-3 days, and only having to shop for foods. The prices are competitive with where I shop, and they have electronic “coupons” that apply automatically, and you can even look at just couponed options. The convenience of realizing you are low on something and ordering it from Alice.com instead of taking time to go to the grocery between regular shopping trips is great. No driving to the store, parking, walking all over the store because what you want is always in the back, standing in line and checking out and then driving home saves so much time!!!!!
There is always overhead. The “efficiencies” look great on paper — not so much in practice.
I’m glad they have a loyal customer w/ Linda, but that doesn’t make up for the fact that drop shipping through UPS costs $$…. and I can promise it’s more than the freight and overhead associated with the same products sold through Walmart.
Common sense would say they are losing money on each sale… I hope the advertising model pans out soon.
Plus… since when did the term “direct” apply to anything sent to the customer from a warehouse? This distribution model is no different than any web grocer.
Either memories are short, or the investors saw innovation somewhere.
” and they have electronic “coupons” that apply automatically”….
Oh-kay, “Linda…” I love it when PR people try to do posts pretending to be real people. Nice try. Like Alice.com and the serial douchebags, all one big fail.
Does not sound like a very compelling model in my opinion. Free shipping or not, UPS is not allowing Alice to use its service for nothing, so either Alice has to raise prices to cover the shipping costs, or it loses money on each sale, which sounds a lot like 1999.
I am just not seeing it.
Paul, you are obviously NOT seeing it because you haven’t looked!!!
The key of this to me is in user experience. The whole “pea pod”, local grocery store delivery concept has already proved a failure because it was too hard for people to input what they needed/wanted.
The iPhone and other smartphones can solve this with barcode scanning (RedLaser app for example). As soon as you are running low…scan it. Add it to you cart. Next thing you know, you have built out a good list of home products. Now, add tagging and you can really get down to business and saving $’s.
It is all in the consumer’s ability to really use these services easily.
Certainly a different way of presenting a shop, not sure about the logo. It seems to be capturing a niche within singles which is obviously growing.
their prices are NOT cheap. Try to compare with target or walmart