CHICAGO, IL, Jul 16, 2002 (INTERNET WIRE via COMTEX) -- In response to feedback from its growing consumer-to-consumer auction community, uBid today announced a new fee model for its Consumer Exchange marketplace. The new fee structure is designed to provide sellers with a less expensive alternative to other auction providers such as eBay, while improving both the quality and quantity of uBid's consumer-to-consumer auction listings.
"We are committed to providing the best environment possible for both sellers and buyers," said Christian Feuer, president and chief executive officer of uBid. "Launching Consumer Exchange without listing fees helped us to establish and grow a dynamic consumer-to-consumer community that has now become a leading alternative to eBay and the no. 2 auction and e-commerce marketplace on the Web. We believe the time is now right to evolve the marketplace with a reasonable fee structure that also helps to improve both the volume and relevance of the auction listings. Importantly, by leveraging our uBid Direct service of business-to-consumer auctions, we are able to keep the new fees at a level which is still highly cost-effective for our members, while generating new revenues to fund the expansion of uBid moving forward."
Currently, eBay charges sellers between $0.30 and $3.30 to list an item for auction plus commission fees starting at 5.25%. Under uBid's new fee structure, which includes a graduated success fee and a small listing fee, sellers will incur a listing charge of just $0.05 to $0.75 per item, plus commission fees starting at only 5%. The new fee structure will be applied to all auctions that open on or after 7am CT on July 18, 2002.
uBid's consumer-to-consumer auction marketplace, Consumer Exchange offers individual sellers the opportunity to reach millions of potential buyers through the uBid online auction community. Unlike uBid Direct, sellers in the Consumer Exchange list their items directly and manage all aspects of their listings, including product descriptions, bid prices and shipping.
About uBid
uBid, based in Chicago, Ill., is the Internet's No. 1 business-to-consumer auction and e-commerce marketplace. Founded in 1997, uBid is committed to being the high value, low price e-tailer on the web. The Company specializes in providing customers with savings on brand name, mostly warranted items acquired through its relationships with leading manufacturers such as Sony, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Compaq, AMD and more. Through its online marketplace, which consists of uBid Preferred Partners and Consumer Exchange members, uBid enables both businesses and individual consumers to auction virtually anything to millions of customers every day. uBid recently launched a fully integrated logistics solution for handling the return, repair, refurbishment and re-marketing of technology products. This Refurbishment Center further strengthens uBid's relationships with leading manufacturers by addressing the challenge of product lifecycle management, enabling faster processing and significantly improving cash generation. uBid is a majority-owned operating company of CMGI, Inc. (Nasdaq: CMGI). For more information, visit
www.ubid.com.
uBid and uBid.com are trademarks of uBid, Inc. All other products and services mentioned may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
This release contains forward-looking statements, which address a variety of subjects including, for example, the expected ability of uBid to auction products. The following important factors and uncertainties, among others, could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in these forward-looking statements: uBid's success depends on the continued and increased acceptance of its website and the Internet as a medium; consumer preferences for the products offered by uBid may change rapidly; uBid's technologies may not successfully interoperate with those of third parties; and increased competition and technological changes in the markets in which uBid competes. For a detailed discussion of these and other cautionary statements, please refer to CMGI's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including CMGI's most recent Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q.
