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SALT LAKE CITY -- Utah's Overstock.com is reaching out to small businesses across the country, giving them a huge opportunity to market their products.
The partnership, called "Main Street Revolution" was launched just last week ago, and more than 3,500 products are now being seen by millions of online shoppers.
Overstock President Jonathan Johnson III says, "Our Main Street Revolution … we think it's one of the best ideas we've ever had."
Overstock.com, a Utah-based online retailer, has been selling brand name and specialty merchandise at discount prices for a decade. It's a business model that's worked very well."Last quarter, end of the first quarter, we grew our revenues by 40 percent," Johnson says. "We made money, and for a retailer that's always the Holy Grail."
"Main Street Revolution," which you can access from Overstock.com's main web page, is at small mom-and-pop and minority-owned businesses. Even if you are the only employee, company size doesn't matter.
"A lot of businesses may feel that they are too small to be on Overstock.com, but that's not true", says Rosette Keth, Main Street Revolution Buyer. "We are looking for small, homegrown businesses. We'd like you to have 25 employees or less."
"We're looking for a wide range of consumer products. It can be anything --handmade jewelry, clothing, gourmet food that can be shipped of course, furniture, if you make furniture home décor."
Overstock is contacting chambers of commerce in small towns across the country, as well as offices of the small business administration to find small companies. Overstock employees will even wander through a farmers market looking for items that will fit into the "Main Street" program.
"Some of the companies have their own websites, and some don't," Johnson says. "They're just driving around in a van selling to local craft shops and restaurants. Either way we'll take them, because we think it's a great way to expose their product and get customers exposed to great things that people want to buy.
Since the launch, there are 3,500 products from small companies now on the "Main Street Revolution" site. And with 21 million unique visitors coming to Overstock.com each month, it is a huge opportunity for small businesses to grow.
"What we'd like is for some of these small businesses to be the next great manufacturers in America", says Johnson. "Have their sales increase so much that they can't do it out of their garage, so they need warehouses, and hiring people and helping to spur the economy."
You can join Overstock.com's Main Street Revolution by emailing mainstreet@overstock.com.
E-mail: kmccord@ksl.com
