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  #13321  
Old Posted Aug 21, 2011, 1:03 AM
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After all these years did I finally get to post a possible development ahead of everyone else, hehe.

Source: Groupon among those in talks to acquire Wrigley Building

The owners of the Wrigley Building confirmed today they are talking to a number of outside parties about the future of the Michigan Avenue landmark -- conversations that reportedly include two co-founders of Groupon.

The Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co., the global chewing gum powerhouse now owned by Mars. Inc., is in the process of relocating its headquarters to its campus on Goose Island in the city.


http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/l...tory?track=rss
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  #13322  
Old Posted Aug 21, 2011, 1:21 AM
Rizzo Rizzo is offline
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Great news! I hope that their purchase will allow this building to move forward with renovation and restorations. The plaza between the two towers looks awful.
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  #13323  
Old Posted Aug 21, 2011, 11:38 PM
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Chalk Preschool in the Tides (Rental Tower) at Lakeshore East: Opens Soon

Photos by EarlyBuyer taken 8/21/11




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  #13324  
Old Posted Aug 21, 2011, 11:50 PM
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Village Market Center at Lakeshore East Opens Late September

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  #13325  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 12:52 AM
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Originally Posted by Hayward View Post
Great news! I hope that their purchase will allow this building to move forward with renovation and restorations. The plaza between the two towers looks awful.
I just hope they don't insist on renaming the building...
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  #13326  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 1:40 AM
the urban politician the urban politician is offline
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Originally Posted by OhioGuy View Post
I just hope they don't insist on renaming the building...
^ I just don't get the hard on some of you have for certain names. It is the design of the buildings that is far more important than the brand name originally associated with them.

The backlash of changing Sears Tower to Willis Tower comes to mind. The almost comical disdain for Willis made no sense to me. Here you have a company reinvesting in a trophy Chicago tower while the earlier company (Sears) long ago bailed on the city and fled to the suburbs, where they continue to try to bleed the State for more tax breaks.

Wrigley is GONE my friend. They are a part of Mars. Wrigley was once a symbol of Chicago. Wrigley is no more. It's time to not only recognize, but celebrate, the rise of a new corporate Chicago. Groupon is one of Chicago's latest corporate success stories and I would be thrilled to call the Wrigley building the 'Groupon Building'. But I get the feeling that Groupon has enough class that they won't ask the building to get renamed anyhow.

Get over the names, people...
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  #13327  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 1:52 AM
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I don't care about the name so much... but if they try to put a huge Groupon sign at the building 's crown, I will scream bloody murder. I'm okay with a sign in the plaza, though.
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  #13328  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 2:05 AM
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They need to demolish that awful 1980s breezeway at ground level that is a cancer to the historic archway. It's all the reason why people tend not to venture in the plaza, it seems like this forbidden place because it's closed off.
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  #13329  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 12:37 PM
aic4ever aic4ever is offline
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Originally Posted by Hayward View Post
Great news! I hope that their purchase will allow this building to move forward with renovation and restorations. The plaza between the two towers looks awful.
Not sure how excited I would be about this, or Groupon in general for that matter. From everything I have read, the company has yet to make a dime of profit, and projects its future profitability by ignoring its marketing costs.

This is the same kind of reasoning that developers have used to "make the deal work," that leaves us with half-finished, abandoned buildings all over the city.
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  #13330  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 1:48 PM
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Originally Posted by aic4ever View Post
Not sure how excited I would be about this, or Groupon in general for that matter. From everything I have read, the company has yet to make a dime of profit, and projects its future profitability by ignoring its marketing costs.

This is the same kind of reasoning that developers have used to "make the deal work," that leaves us with half-finished, abandoned buildings all over the city.
Ditto, most of what I have read likens their IPO to a ponzi scheme. Hard to believe that will all the cash they have rolling in that they are losing even more of it.
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  #13331  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 2:15 PM
Nowhereman1280 Nowhereman1280 is offline
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^^^ What would they be losing it on? They collect 50% of every groupon they sell as revenue... Any company that has grown from $0 revenue to $3 billion revenue in 3 years is going to operate at a loss for some time...

Quote:
Originally Posted by ardecila View Post
I don't care about the name so much... but if they try to put a huge Groupon sign at the building 's crown, I will scream bloody murder. I'm okay with a sign in the plaza, though.
Do you really think they'd try to do that? This is Groupon we are talking about here, not some hoity toity corporate conglomerate. They would probably be more than thrilled to erect a monument sign of the "Groupon G" logo in their Michigan Avenue plaza.

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Originally Posted by the urban politician View Post
^ I just don't get the hard on some of you have for certain names. It is the design of the buildings that is far more important than the brand name originally associated with them.

The backlash of changing Sears Tower to Willis Tower comes to mind. The almost comical disdain for Willis made no sense to me. Here you have a company reinvesting in a trophy Chicago tower while the earlier company (Sears) long ago bailed on the city and fled to the suburbs, where they continue to try to bleed the State for more tax breaks.

Wrigley is GONE my friend. They are a part of Mars. Wrigley was once a symbol of Chicago. Wrigley is no more. It's time to not only recognize, but celebrate, the rise of a new corporate Chicago. Groupon is one of Chicago's latest corporate success stories and I would be thrilled to call the Wrigley building the 'Groupon Building'. But I get the feeling that Groupon has enough class that they won't ask the building to get renamed anyhow.

Get over the names, people...
The only reason people were resistant to the Sears renaming is that Willis is even less loyal to Chicago than Sears is. Seriously. Who the fuck is Willis? They are a competitor to CNA and Aon which are both homegrown Chicago-based companies who own landmark towers that bear their names. Willis is a foreign company that took like what? 50,000 SF in a 3.5 million SF tower and paid extra so they got naming rights? The reason people are against Willis is that they are a shitty brand name with no local connection. If it had been Groupon going after Sear's naming rights, it would not only have been accepted, but probably met with "good riddance" against blood-traitor Sears. Or better yet, there was a chance we could have ended up with "Olympic Tower" or something had the USOC moved here from Colorado Springs. But Willis is a pansy-ass British name that is more bad-teethed and slouchy than it is white-teethed and big shouldered.
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  #13332  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 2:30 PM
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OK, I know this is a little off-subject, but I too think Groupon buying, much less, renaming Wrigley is a huge mistake. In the long-term, their business plan makes no sense. It is labor intensive for an internet company, and they have TONS of competitors that offer the same or a better product.

They have nowhere to go but down. And when that happens, it would be a black-eye for Chicago to have one of our greatest visible architectural symbols be associated with such a failed endeavor.
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  #13333  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 4:49 PM
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Originally Posted by Nowhereman1280 View Post
^^^ What would they be losing it on? They collect 50% of every groupon they sell as revenue... Any company that has grown from $0 revenue to $3 billion revenue in 3 years is going to operate at a loss for some time...
Last check, quarterly revenues were around 650 mil, but they were still losing almost 120 mil. Sorry, but if you can't turn a profit on almost 3 billion in revenue a year, there is quite a bit to question. At the very least it makes purchasing a huge property questionable.
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  #13334  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 5:56 PM
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Mather

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  #13335  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 6:26 PM
Nowhereman1280 Nowhereman1280 is offline
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Last check, quarterly revenues were around 650 mil, but they were still losing almost 120 mil. Sorry, but if you can't turn a profit on almost 3 billion in revenue a year, there is quite a bit to question. At the very least it makes purchasing a huge property questionable.
Again, what are they losing money on? Saying they are operating at a loss is different from saying they are losing money. One can be operating at a loss because they are investing in growth. So the fact of the matter is that each Groupon sold is in fact generating a large profit, but Groupon is spending huge sums of money expanding operations and buying its way into every market on earth that they are using up all those profits and then some. If I remember correctly, Groupon is essentially breaking even when acquisition costs are subtracted from the equation. If you are doubling in size every year and essentially breaking even, that is a formula for huge profits once you've taken all the market share that you can.

It took Google several years to become profitable and that's without buying anyone. Also, it's not uncommon for tech companies of this caliber to be valued at 20-25 times their revenues (as yahoo was when Google first went public). If Groupon falls into those valuations with $3 billion in revenue, then we could be talking Groupon being a $50-75 billion company by next year... Then again that's pure speculation and you could be correct that the best venture capitalists and investment bankers in the world are all scrambling to get a piece of a company that has no chance of ever returning a profit... I mean VC's and I-bankers usually run head first into a company without examining their books at all.
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  #13336  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 7:09 PM
aic4ever aic4ever is offline
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Originally Posted by Nowhereman1280 View Post
Again, what are they losing money on? Saying they are operating at a loss is different from saying they are losing money. One can be operating at a loss because they are investing in growth. So the fact of the matter is that each Groupon sold is in fact generating a large profit, but Groupon is spending huge sums of money expanding operations and buying its way into every market on earth that they are using up all those profits and then some. If I remember correctly, Groupon is essentially breaking even when acquisition costs are subtracted from the equation. If you are doubling in size every year and essentially breaking even, that is a formula for huge profits once you've taken all the market share that you can.

It took Google several years to become profitable and that's without buying anyone. Also, it's not uncommon for tech companies of this caliber to be valued at 20-25 times their revenues (as yahoo was when Google first went public). If Groupon falls into those valuations with $3 billion in revenue, then we could be talking Groupon being a $50-75 billion company by next year... Then again that's pure speculation and you could be correct that the best venture capitalists and investment bankers in the world are all scrambling to get a piece of a company that has no chance of ever returning a profit... I mean VC's and I-bankers usually run head first into a company without examining their books at all.
I think this is basically what the SEC is reviewing in their application for their IPO. There is question, and I am sure to some extent it is valid, as to whether their business model is sustainable. If it turns out that they are ignoring costs in projecting profitability, then that is unsustainable, and needs to be corrected.
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  #13337  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 7:17 PM
pilsenarch pilsenarch is offline
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and maybe I didn't emphasize my point... you can't compare Groupon to Google due to the significantly greater labor costs that Groupon has in their business model compared not only to Google but just about any other successful internet business...

it is too easily replicated (as has already been shown) and Groupon's profits are going to continue to decline per transaction as competition continues to increase...
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  #13338  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 7:50 PM
Nowhereman1280 Nowhereman1280 is offline
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and maybe I didn't emphasize my point... you can't compare Groupon to Google due to the significantly greater labor costs that Groupon has in their business model compared not only to Google but just about any other successful internet business...

it is too easily replicated (as has already been shown) and Groupon's profits are going to continue to decline per transaction as competition continues to increase...
They have yet to lower the rates they are charging so saying "Groupon's profits are going to continue to decline per transaction as competition continues to increase..." is completely misleading as their profits per transaction haven't fallen at all unless you are counting acquisitions as a reoccurring expense.

As far as labor costs go, who cares? Groupon isn't an internet company, it's a marketing company that uses the internet. It's essentially a 21st century version of Montgomery Ward's or Sears using a new means of marketing to push products to it's audience. Also, Groupon isn't selling it's services to the public unlike all the internet companies you are mentioning. It is selling its services to other businesses which always requires a large sales staff. So saying "They have lots of employees and therefore can't be profitable because no other internet companies have lots of employees" is absurd. This is an entirely new business model, no one knows whether it will really work or how and who will adapt it to make it work.

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Originally Posted by aic4ever View Post
I think this is basically what the SEC is reviewing in their application for their IPO. There is question, and I am sure to some extent it is valid, as to whether their business model is sustainable. If it turns out that they are ignoring costs in projecting profitability, then that is unsustainable, and needs to be corrected.
No, the SEC was reviewing it because they tried a type of accounting that ignores marketing costs which would indeed have inflated their potential for profitability. The SEC doesn't review business models for "sustainability", it reviews the applications to see whether or not they are misleading to the public. After all, there are plenty of unsustainable business models that people buy shares in knowing full well it's only going to last 5 or 10 years or whatever. All business models are unsustainable in the long run.
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  #13339  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 8:45 PM
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well, it's kind of silly for us to debate the viability of Groupon on this forum... again, I would like to emphasize that there is no precedent for a successful internet company in this model as you yourself agreed... and, it is a fact that competition from everyone, from amazon to the tribune, has already put pressure on Groupon to lower their commission...

time will tell, in the meantime, you should buy stock in the IPO
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  #13340  
Old Posted Aug 22, 2011, 10:14 PM
Nowhereman1280 Nowhereman1280 is offline
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^^^ I agree, but they haven't had pressure to lower their commission. That's the point I'm making. They are charging the same commission per Groupon now as they were in 2009... That's because, despite the competition, they are the market leader and no one calls the product a "Living Social" they call it a "Groupon".
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