Groupon's Fumbles Continue With FTD Flowers Scandal

Groupon hasn't had the best of luck recently: after an oversold New Year's deal in Japan caused a media shitstorm, the deal website aired a controversial Super Bowl ad only to pull it from the air days later. Now a "confusing" Groupon deal with florist FTD has angered customers. What's going on?

The FTD deal cost $20 for $40 worth of the florist's flowers and gifts. However, it had to be redeemed on a special microsite, and some of the 3,300 Groupon customers who bought the deal were shocked to discover the prices on the microsite were higher than the prices on FTD's normal site. It seems the offer could not be combined with other discounts, and the "normal" prices on the general FTD website actually had some discounts factored into them already. Both FTD and Groupon have apologized for the situation — Groupon called it "too big of a headache for our customers" — and closed the deal a day early.

Meanwhile, the backlash continues against Groupon's Super Bowl ads, despite the fact that the company pulled them off the air, all three nonprofits linked to the ads have defended the website, and Greenpeace even made $100,000 in less than 48 hours. And the New Years scandal has not been the end of Groupon's troubles in Japan: the company oversold a deal for a horsemeat restaurant and the restaurant involved ended up canceling it.

· No love: Groupon Users Revolt Against FTD Deal [Chicago Breaking Business]
· Can Consumers Forgive Groupon's Ad Gaffe? [AdAge]
· Uneven Rise for Groupon in Japan [NYT]
· All Groupon Coverage on Eater [-E-]