"This is based on MEALS on DEALS idea ..."
(Please do not assume I know (and/or understand) the Meals on Deals idea. )

They way I understand your idea; I (as a user) want a product or service, and the companies can offer me a deal. So the thing you do is bring consumers and producers/companies together.

problems I see;
- expensive for companies
- if I'd ask for a car; every car company is going to offer me a deal. So they time gain is gone. It's like asking for spam.
- bringing consumers and producers/companies together sounds like a crowded space.

Still, it might have potential.

Dude,

I do appreciate ideas, but PLEASE support your ideas with solid research and analysis. Do not waste people time reviewing some crappy ideas. Many good ideas pass through our brain every seconds, but NOT all are practical. That is why we are still on earth not heaven. Instead of posting 10 loose ideas, it is better to submit a good, well prepared workable idea.

Yoda thanks for adding a comment that 'didn't make sense' to me!

Irrespective of whether YOU think an idea is good, bad or half baked if you take the time to review the idea and find it doesn't make sense to you please try and be a little constructive in your criticisms, that way we can all benefit from your wisdom which must be very considerable with the 'holier than thou attitude' you adopt.

After all, isn't that what idea incubation is all about, someone posts an idea, gets QUALITY feedback and the idea is improved, developed or dropped .. Cambrian House is a process i believe, not a de facto submission of completed idea by one individual .. crowdsource is contribution .. regrettably i see none from you.

Julius, thank you for pointing out a valid frustration .. i am not sure whether it was a question of being lazy, lack of space to present the idea or creative marketing of another idea .. but point well taken:)

I will answer your specific observations first then give more detail to the idea which is lacking here.

You are correct it is a crowded space of matching consumer with supplier but i know of no good example of one well marketed service which allows consumers to put in their purchase requests and invite suppliers to bid for their business and manage the entire process on the one website.

It could be seen as inviting spam but the advantage here is that the spam is not delivered to the customers inbox which is a major plus. Also by putting a registration requirement on the suppliers or registration fee for bidding priviledges, would provide an effective form of spam filtering and it also generates revenues.

Detailed description and criteria of the item required by the customer should reduce the amount of bid replies they receive, for example, specific price bands, geographic area of supply etc. And if i were the customer i would find just dealing with the top five bidders a much more time efficient exercise than trawling the web to get the best deals.

You say you think it will be expensive for companies to use, i respectfully think the opposite is true. If i sell used cars for example, i employ salespeople to convert casual interest into a sale, or to scout out leads and do cold calling etc. Wouldn't it be much cheaper for me if i had a salesperson that could reference a website, request a listing of people that want to buy a secondhand car in my area and do a match and submit a bid. Yes, agreed there is search and bid maintenance time required to apply to this new leads processing opportunity but employed sales people often have time on their hands between sales pitches which can be better utilised. Also, i am sure the conversion ratio of lead to sale would be much higher with people who have requested bids rather than the conversion ratio of casual or cold call selling.

In a nutshell, what i am proposing in this idea is a reverse of the ebay service model where instead of sellers inviting bids on items they have for sale, with the customers having to do the searching, bidding and the work, we supply a model where the customer identifies their needs and invites the suppliers to do the work. After all customers are not employed and paid to do their shopping but employees of businesses are paid to do the work of selling.

The service would be heavily geo targeted to promote cost effective supply and delivery. Regionalisation down to the local town level would increase attractiveness of lead servicing and greatly expand the advertising placement inventory.

Customer benefits are greatly reduced time in getting the best deal for an item without the hassle of salespeople harassment or spamed email accounts.

Supplier benefits are a hot source of sales leads to process with high conversion ratios.

Shop-till-they-Drop would benefit from what i think has a huge revenue upside without rocket science development but it needs great marketing .. which i think is one of the talents of Cambrian House.

I hope i have embellished this idea enough to give it sufficient clarity Julius, if not let me know and i will try some more:)

Ok, I read your Meals on Deals before I got here so I had no problem understanding your pitch.

I love the idea of turning ebay on it head .... Brilliant

I am not a shopaholic, I have better things to do with my time, like reading ideas and voting:)

Yoda - well, your comment doesn't merit a reply except to say mb you have too many crappy ideas buzzing thru your brain to understand a good one when it comes along!