Last year it was "Show me the Money!" This year it's "Make my life easier!" Well, the time is here and life just got a little easier with Dealtime.com. This site, which bills itself on their website as "the Internet comparison shopping service that searches online stores, auctions, classifieds and buying groups for the stuff you want to buy at the price you want to pay." And to properly convey their intent at easing your life with shopping and searching for items, their party in the original Barney's on Wednesday, December 1 was rampant with fun, easy party elements. Talk about extending your brand throughout, they had branded matches with "www.TooManyMatches.com -unfortunately, all you need is one. Dealtime.com" with one lone match peeking out from the book. Then there were the Dealtime.com mints in little branded tins, the perfunctory T-shirt, a water bottle labeled "Shopping? You'll Need This. (And us.) Dealtime.com" For the partier in us, they provided a tall silver martini shaker with a Cranberry Martini recipe and a tag line inviting e-shoppers to do their shopping online with them, so they can enjoy the drink, not need it. And, to top it all off, CEO of Dealtime.com, Daniel Ciporin, was kind enough to send all the guests home with a doctor's note saying that "the bearer is suffering from excessive partying last night and should be excused for the day, or forgiven for arriving late." Thanks Dan!
My involvement at this soiree was kicked off with a small photo shoot for an upcoming article on me in the February 2000 issue of the "Red Herring." I am indebted to Dealtime.com for their generosity in letting me use their space and party for the photo, which I think will do nicely for them too! After the perfect shot was taken, I did my usual run-around and caught up with the artistic Jaime Levy of Electronic Hollywood and Laurel Wells of gURL.com (who was in a cute wool hat and lovely pink sweater). On her way out was Catherine Winchester, CEO, and Mark Lucente, CTO, of Soliloquy, Matt Glitzer, a "new Soliloquist" and Kathleen Kenney, VP, Director of Technology Services of Peppercom. Everyone was dispersing to one of the many other parties in the evening"–and we all stepped out into the frigid air seeking taxis.