posted on April 4, 2001 07:14:59 PM new
This news never made it to Wall Street yesterday:
Egghead.com Exec to Head Yahoo Auctions
by Andy Roe
April 3, 2001, 3 p.m. PT
"Yahoo today announced the addition of several senior management positions, including a new head of Yahoo Auctions.
Norman Hullinger will join the company in mid-April as vice president and general manager of the company\'s auction site. He will lead the production and operational aspects of Yahoo Auctions and will report to Tim Brady, senior vice president of network and commerce services at Yahoo.
According to a Yahoo official, Brian Fitzgerald, senior producer at Yahoo Auctions, will continue to oversee the day-to-day operations of the site.
Hullinger comes to Yahoo from Egghead.com, where he was senior vice president of sales and operations and part of the senior management team that led Egghead's transition from a brick-and-mortar retail chain to an Internet-only business.
In addition, he guided the operational design and implementation of Egghead.com's Web sites, including its auction site, as well as customer service, distribution and logistics, and sales initiatives.
Prior to his stint at Egghead.com, Hullinger worked at Aaron Brothers Art Marts, serving as the vice president responsible for retail operations, real estate, and distribution. According to Yahoo, he's credited with being part of the executive management team that re-established the company and eventually sold it to Michael's Stores.
Hullinger holds a B.S. in business administration from the University of Florida."
==============================
So it seems like Brian Fitzgerald gets a spanking for the demise of YaWho Auctions. A new position is created to oversee the Auctions group. So let's what his background tells us: Aaron Art Marts: Nothing relevant.
Egghead Software: He helped transform the company from retail bricks and mortar to internet only. Great. He knows something about selling, the internet, and computers. Not only that, Egghead has auctions. Have you ever checked out Egghead auctions? They don't sell 3rd party stuff. It's all closeout items that they buy and dispose of. The 'auctions' all start out rediculously low and are Dutch style.
Say they have 20 Dole Pentium 75 laptops to dump. They start the auction at $9 and as people bid, their bid is accepted as long as it is in the top 20. After that the low bids get bumped. The auction say it will end the next day at Midnight except there is some fine print about that. As midnight approaches if they have 20 buyers at the price they were looking for, the auction ends. Otherwise it gets extended until they get their price or else they cancel it. Every day another 20 of these computers are listed so its an ongoing thing until that batch is gone.
What does this have to do with YaWho auctions as we know them? Nothing. Who did you think they were going to hire, Pierre Omidyar?
Who knows, Norman Hullinger might know all about what's good for YaWho Auctions, but if the past is any clue to the future, I doubt it.
[ edited by zzyzx000 on Apr 4, 2001 07:18 PM ]
posted on April 5, 2001 07:15:58 AM new
I wonder how many folks in the market for computers and such say to themselves, "Hey, I'll check out Egghead auctions!"
posted on April 5, 2001 08:32:44 AM new
I don't know how they're doin lately but they were applauded for closing their retail stores which were going belly up and transforming to a then successful internet only company.
I know about their auction scheme 1st hand because I was one of those attracted by the low bids for computers. Once the auction I bid on was extended, I read the fine print and simply concluded, "ok, you outsmarted me." and never went back to their site.
Maybe YaWho will add that feature to their auctions....keep them going until bidding reaches a level acceptable to the seller. I know it sounds silly, but that's what Egghead does.
posted on April 5, 2001 08:52:25 AM new
Well it can't get much worse and any change holds some promise of improvement.
That may be faint praise but we can a least hope things get turned around.
I'm just listing some duplicate items, using up credits in my account and looking for an additional site to eBay. Not much success elsewhere yet.
I still think YAHOO has the greatest potential of any site, based on established traffic, to build a major alternative to eBay and will welcome any positive change.
I'll keep watching to see what developes but it will take more than press releases stating how great thing are going before I start believing again.
posted on April 5, 2001 06:41:46 PM new
I agree with reston_ray:
It can't get much worse. I am very happy to see Brian gone! What a blemish!
I would certainly hope that someone with some sense (not cents) gets in there and changes things the way they should have been all along! Are you listening Egghead?
posted on April 5, 2001 06:55:41 PM new
Nobody said Fitzgerald was gone. His demotion isn't even "Official." A job was created just above him for the Egghead.
posted on April 5, 2001 11:20:57 PM new
I agree Rollanotherone. zzyzx000 shouldnt have posted this, as if this regards egghead, post it at another board!!!
Besides, Brian did a tremendous job making what Yahoo auction is today! He stopped the spamm, the junk listing, and as twelvepole once said, most of you griping was selling useless unwanted iutems anyway. And now all quality stuff is getting bids!
I do agree rollanotherone, yahoo rocks! And with Brian still have a say, combined with this new guy, it can only get better, but please make sure Brian Fitzgerald still has some say, for he really made yahoo a great place! I listed 15 items, and 14 closed with winners! YAHOO DOES ROCK!!
posted on April 5, 2001 11:31:49 PM new
I think you two should be crowned King of the world and your job would be to censor every post on every bulletin board that dosn't meet your approval. We'd have utopia in no time at all.
posted on April 5, 2001 11:42:42 PM new
Just to add my 2¢, I found the topic to be both relevant and interesting.
I am also still mystified (not to mention mildly offended) by the whole "junk" argument. I wasn't selling junk before the fees. I'm not selling junk now. When my credits run out I won't be selling anything, junk or otherwise, since Yahoo won't accept a money order from me. Not that I'm going to go into any of these issues again anyway, as they are off topic and I'm ready for bed.
posted on April 6, 2001 01:23:34 AM new
There go the two trolling yafools again, desperately trying to cheerlead to a stand of empty bleachers.
YaWho has a few limited pockets of bidding still going on (coins, Dale Earnhardt, Barbies, vintage jewelry, sports cards), and the rest is just about dead....and buried....and succumbing to worms and decay.
My first "return after 18 months absence" batch of eBay auctions ended tonight with 77% sell-through, many at higher "buy it now" prices---this in spite of eBay's constant outages and glitches during the past week. These were the SAME ITEMS I've been trying (without luck) to sell on Yahoo for several months now. It's not a bed of roses over there, by a long shot, and eBad went down early tonight (before all my auctions had closed), but I needed to SELL SOMETHING to get cash flow, and I DID.
I hope this new guy at YaWho has enough sense to make DRASTIC CHANGES FAST, if there's *any* chance *at all* for the Auction to stage a comeback. Things are so bad, they'll have to make listing here ultimately "free" again to lure the sellers back (with feedback credits or something). Then they'll have to provide the BIDDERS and BUYERS they promised us when they implemented the fees.
I don't find it AT ALL encouraging that YaWho's new Auction "chief" has a business degree (along with every incompetent know-it-all middle-manager in Corporate America) and has experience running "scam" Egghead.com business auctions as zzyzx000 described. Frankly, I'd be more heartened to learn that a former Yahoo Auction seller, chosen at random, had been named the new leader.
At least someone from the trenches wouldn't talk to us in infuriating YaWho-robotese....spouting memorized, sanitized, generalized, legalized, Wall Street-aimed "uplifting" empty rhetoric.
posted on April 6, 2001 04:19:32 AM new
Gee,
We are so diverisifed in our thinking. Of course, I have to wonder, why some even bother? If they are so in love with Yahoo, they should be hard at work, listing, listing, listing!
I do not see that roller is doing any better, than before fees, in fact took quite a hiatus.
posted on April 6, 2001 05:17:13 AM new
Yahoo Rocks............Hum, Let's think about this.......
Oh, I get it! Yahoo Rocks...because that is what all of the Company masterminds, heads are full of! ROCKS!
Or maybe...because the ROCKS (walls) are falling in around them!
I certainly have not had any better luck selling there than before, while trying to use my credits. And sure, the junk may be gone, but so is everything else! It looks like a wasteland! Type in a few keywords, to search for something and get either nothing, or just a couple. Personally, I did not mind the "junk", it gave choices!
