Press Release
drugstore.com Builds on Strong Online Customer Reviews Program in Partnership with PowerReviews
Top 50 online retailer enhances customer experience with enhanced approach to writing and using reviews for 30,000+ products
Las Vegas, Shop.org Annual Summit, September 16, 2008 - drugstore.com, inc. (NASDAQ:DSCM), a leading online retailer of health, beauty, vision and pharmacy products, today announced a partnership with PowerReviews, the Internet's most comprehensive developer of customer-review solutions for retailers and their shoppers that now makes it easier for customers to read and write reviews about more than 30,000 over-the-counter products on drugstore.com and its wholly-owned subsidiary Beauty.com.
"drugstore.com started posting customer reviews online in 2003 and has long valued the strength of those reviews to help customers and influence purchases," said David Lonczak, Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer at drugstore.com. "By partnering with PowerReviews, we are providing our customers with an enhanced and guided approach to writing reviews which in turn creates richer content."
drugstore.com will launch a new design of its product detail pages in early fall. This will improve visibility and give shoppers a central point of reference to read customer product reviews, write their own reviews or get more information about the product from the manufacturer.
"We're delighted to work with drugstore.com, an online retail pioneer in utilizing independent customer reviews," said Jay Shaffer, VP, Worldwide Sales and Marketing for PowerReviews. "Our research has shown that displaying reviews on a product detail page is a proven way to increase sales and conversion, and we are confident that drugstore.com will see significant benefits from using our technology as a result of their customers' proven passion for writing reviews about products they've purchased."
"In addition to the redesign of the product details page to showcase reviews, drugstore.com is upgrading the online shopping experience with a new version of a customer favorite "your list" which makes it easier for a customer to sort, manage and order from their personal shopping list when they sign into their account," said Lonczak. "We are also improving the video features on both drugstore.com and Beauty.com to enable our customers to order a product by clicking directly on the video and to share the video by emailing it to a friend."
Note: drugstore.com and PowerReviews will join together to present "Analyzing the Customer Experience" at the Shop.org Annual Summit in Las Vegas on Tuesday, September 16th. Jay Shaffer, VP, Worldwide Sales & Marketing, PowerReviews and Alison Jeske, Director of Product Management, drugstore.com put themselves in the customer's shoes to examine live and in real time a wide variety of merchants and the online shopping experiences they provide letting the audience decide what works, what doesn't work and how it should work.
About PowerReviews
PowerReviews (www.powerreviews.com) is an enterprise solutions company that provides customer reviews and social merchandising solutions to multi-channel retailers and their shoppers. Our technology platform for collecting, organizing, structuring and moderating relevance-based reviews helps online retailers significantly boost their sales. PowerReviews' user-generated content and community drives the highest sales uplift in the industry, and in addition to working with more than 260 online retailers, including Staples, Toys "R" Us, REI, Ritz Camera, Walgreen's, Diapers.com and The Sports Authority, we have also launched our own shopping portal, Buzzillions www.buzzillions.com. The company is based in San Francisco and is backed by Menlo Ventures and Draper Richards..
About drugstore.com
drugstore.com, inc. (NASDAQ:DSCM) is a leading online retailer of health, beauty, vision and pharmacy products. Our portfolio of brands include: drugstore.com, Beauty.com and VisionDirect.com. All are accessible from drugstore.com and provide a convenient, private, and informative shopping experience while offering a wide assortment of more than 30,000 products at competitive prices. The drugstore.com pharmacy is certified by the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy (NABP) as a Verified Internet Pharmacy Practice Site (VIPPS) and operates in compliance with federal and state laws and regulations in the United States.
This press release contains forward-looking statements regarding future events or the future financial and operational performance of drugstore.com, inc. Words such as "expect," "may," "will," and similar expressions, are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are based on current expectations, are not guarantees of future performance and involve assumptions, risks, and uncertainties. Actual performance may differ materially from those contained or implied in such forward-looking statements. Risks and uncertainties that could lead to such differences could include, among other things: effects of changes in the economy, changes in consumer spending, fluctuations in the stock market, changes affecting the Internet, online retailing and advertising, difficulties establishing our brand, and building a critical mass of customers, the unpredictability of future revenues and expenses and potential fluctuations in revenues and operating results, risks related to business combinations and strategic alliances, possible tax liabilities relating to the collection of sales tax, consumer trends, the level of competition, seasonality, the timing and success of expansion efforts, changes in senior management, risks related to systems interruptions, possible governmental regulation and the ability to manage a growing business. Additional information regarding factors that potentially could affect the business, financial condition and operating results of drugstore.com, inc. is included in the company's periodic filings with the SEC on Forms 10-K, 10-Q and 8-K. drugstore.com, inc. expressly disclaims any intent or obligation to update any forward-looking statement, except as otherwise specifically stated by it.
Media Contacts
Anne Marshal, drugstore.com: amarshall@drugstore.com 425.372.3464
Jennifer Johnson Avril for PowerReviews: jen@verbfactory.com 718.871.7117