Sendwine.Com Case Study

Sendwine.com was founded to help customers send wine and gifts over the internet. The company started with the name The Wine Line which was established to help customers send wine across borders yet bypassing the laws prohibiting the sales of wine across borders. By 1998, the company launched sendwine.com which improved their overall performance. Due to the record breaking 1998 online retail buying patterns, the idea of online shopping became the wave of the future. Websites offering gift items increased and so did the threat to sendwine.com.
1. Yes,
a. Their performance over the last year
b. Good management
c. Branding
d. Innovativeness

a. Their good performance in terms of profitability and the inflow of online retailers showed that the business was viable
b. The fact that they were able to raise an initial N10 million from venture capitalist; signifies investors confidence in the management.
c. Branding- they have shown capacity to be able to adopt a new technology business model to grow their business. The company had ideas for gift offerings that were unique.
d. Innovativeness- they have shown great capacity to innovation. This is clearly exemplified by the fact that they initiated the business idea (in other words; they have the original for the business), and this shows that they could be more innovative in developing new business strategies/models/ideas to stay ahead of competition.

2.
a. Yes, Lannon should diversify during the holiday seasons and use this period to test the new diversification plan.
b. I would consider the Get Big Fast (GBF) approach since the company was already experience in the area of online gift retailing.