Kozmo.com
|
|
Kozmo.com was a venture-capital driven online company that promised free one-hour delivery of anything from DVDs to Starbucks coffee. It was founded by young investment bankers, Joseph Park and Yong Kang in March 1998 in New York City. The company is often referred to as an example of the dot-com excess.
Kozmo promoted an incredible business model; it promised to deliver small goods free of charge. The company raised about $280 million including $60 million from Amazon.com. The business model was heavily criticized by business analysts, who pointed out that one-hour point-to-point delivery of small objects is extremely expensive and there was no way Kozmo could make a profit as long as it refused to charge delivery fees. Not surprisingly, the company failed soon after the collapse of the dot-com bubble, laying off its staff of 1,100 employees and shutting down in April 2001.
As of February 2000, it operated in San Francisco, Seattle, Boston, New York, Washington, San Diego and Los Angeles. Its headquarters were located in New York City. It entered a five-year co-marketing agreement with Starbucks in February 2000, in which it agreed to pay Starbucks $150 million to promote its services inside the company's coffee shops. Kozmo.com ended its deal in March 2001 after paying out $15 million.
Although Kozmo filed an IPO with Credit Suisse First Boston, it never went public.
A documentary film e-Dreams (2001) portrays the fate of the company.
See also
External links
- Archived versions of kozmo.com (http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.kozmo.com/) at the Internet Archive (to see the website, look for archives dated before June 1, 2001).
- Kozmo to shut down, lay off 1,100 (http://news.com.com/2100-1017-255710.html) News.com, April 11, 2001
- Kozmo may deliver itself to the public February 29, 2000 (http://news.com.com/2100-1017-237445.html?tag=bplst) News.com, a scoop article that disclosed Kozmo's IPO plan.
- Kozmo.com sees more sales in Starbucks deal (http://news.com.com/2100-1017-236857.html) News.com, February 14, 2000