SWOOPO

Online auction site with an alternative bidding system. As of April 2009, Swoopo auctioned over 10,000 products per month and had more than 1,200,000 registered customers. How it works: online customers buy “bids” in advance. They cost $0.75 each and are sold in packs of 30, 50, 100, 300 or 700. Bidders have the choice of placing single bids, or, using an electronic bid assistant called the “BidButler”. Alternatively, customers can bid via the phone. Every bid plac... ed, increases the price of the product by 15c and the auction countdown by up to 20 seconds. To help keep track of the money spent on bidding, each auction displays the amount spent on bids by the customer and how much the bidder would save overall, if they won the auction at that moment. The ‘last bidder standing’ when the countdown reaches zero, wins the auction – usually at a very low price; winners save, on average, 65% when compared to the recommended retail price.More