Say we sell a groupon for cookies - $20 worth for $10. The customer pays $10 to Groupon, Groupon keeps $5.00 of it and gives the merchant $5.00.
Now, if the customer just does nothing, Groupon still has $5.00 in any case, the only winner here is the merchant, who got $5.00 and didn't have to provide any product.
So how is #2 pure margin for Groupon?
As for #3 - the problem I see here is that there are a lot of Groupon competitors in all the worthwhile niches - including the restaurant space you pointed out. Group-buying, in its current state, is a non-differentiated good. Which is to say, the barrier to entry is low, and customers have no loyalty since they're all peddling pretty much the same thing.
Say we sell a groupon for cookies - $20 worth for $10. The customer pays $10 to Groupon, Groupon keeps $5.00 of it and gives the merchant $5.00.
Now, if the customer just does nothing, Groupon still has $5.00 in any case, the only winner here is the merchant, who got $5.00 and didn't have to provide any product.
So how is #2 pure margin for Groupon?
As for #3 - the problem I see here is that there are a lot of Groupon competitors in all the worthwhile niches - including the restaurant space you pointed out. Group-buying, in its current state, is a non-differentiated good. Which is to say, the barrier to entry is low, and customers have no loyalty since they're all peddling pretty much the same thing.