No Such Thing As A Bad Business Model - Only Bad Management

from the interesting-viewpoints dept

Thu, Mar 1st 2001 3:36pm — Mike Masnick

An very good column from James Cramer suggesting that there are no bad business models only bad management. He makes some very good points about Webvan, eToys, and Kozmo. All of these are businesses that had (or have, for the time being) customers that love what they provide. However, all were pushed by bad management and bad VCs to "get big fast" and to ignore basic business principles. Due to this they've run out of cash, rather than built a strong profitable business that people trust. As he says, good business people figure out how to take money and make money with it.

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Ed, 1 Mar 2001 @ 4:02pm

What is a Business Model
This article begs the question of just what, exactly, is meant by the term "business model." Selling something at a loss and hoping to make it up in volume -- isn't that a (bad) business model?
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- Col. Klink (profile), 2 Mar 2001 @ 10:36am
  
  Re: What is a Business Model
  Yes, surely there are *some* bad business models. Look at the CueCat: give away hardware for free on the premise that people will want to start reading their magazines in front of a computer (instead of just reading online magazines), and also insist that everyone use their website in spite of the fact that it is drop-dead simple to use it anywhere else.
  
  Tell me how a good manager could make that work.
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