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About thepurplebook ®
thepurplebook was founded in 2000 by Hillary Mendelsohn, whose first late-night attempt at online shopping led her to a revelation – and a new venture.
Having typed a “very specific” query into a search engine, she received no less than 367 matches. Only seven had any relevance. With no available resource guide on the market, Mendelsohn began to create online shopping lists for herself. They proved popular among her friends, so popular, in fact, that Mendelsohn spent three years compiling the ultimate resource, thepurplebook.
A simple guide to hard-to-find online shops
thepurplebook is not an overview of Internet shopping; it is a comprehensive guide that features e-retail sites handpicked by Mendelsohn and her team. You won't find major retail sites listed in thepurplebook unless they offer a special particular product only online, such as Gap's line of maternity clothing.
Ironically, almost all of thepurplebook's research is done off line. Mendelsohn gathers magazines, newspapers and regularly monitors the Internet for new online shops and products. She also accepts suggestions from visitors to her Web site, www.thepurplebook.com.
When she finds a product she likes, she works backwards, locating the manufacturer, the retailer, and finding out if the product is available online. Once a site has been located, she tests the site for user-friendliness, shipping terms, product cost, and product availability. Each listing contains easy-to-understand icons that let readers know right away if a shop really does ship overnight and so on.
thepurplebook helps online business owners and consumers
The shops featured in thepurplebook usually do not have the resources to purchase advertising on or receive favorable treatment from major Internet search engines. When a great new online shop is listed in thepurplebook, its owners are instantly exposed to an entirely committed audience of online shoppers.
For example, one particular shop offered handmade "vintage" football jerseys. Mendelson included the site in thepurplebook and even took a couple of the jerseys with her during an appearance on The Today Show as a sampling of the great products featured in the guide. The following day, the owners of the shop received a call from Sports Illustrated. The once three-person start-up now employs over 50 people and requires a distribution center to keep up with the demand.
Mendelsohn loves both sides of the coin - helping consumers find unique and high-quality products online and helping smaller online businesses receive the recognition they deserve.
Specialty Editions
Some areas of online shopping are just too large to cover comprehensively in thepurplebook. Therefore, Mendelsohn has published specialty editions of the guide that cover specific areas of interest. The two most recent releases are thepurplebook green, which is a guide to eco-friendly products online, and thepurplebook wedding, which provides brides-to-be with all the best bridal Web sites as well as handy tip sheets, timelines, and other planning materials. Mendelsohn is contemplating a special travel edition and a senior edition for future release.
Annually updated editions highight e-retail trends
Mendelsohn knows long before the big marketing firms which Internet shopping trends are growing and which are retreating. Today, they call her to find out what online shoppers are into.
thepurplebook is updated annually, which means new shops are featured and some are removed. Removal from the guide could be due to a decline in customer service or simply because the site no longer exists. Shoppers get the most up-to-date information in the current printed guide but can search archived data from years past for free at www.thepurplebook.com.
