Wednesday, August 09, 2000
Wilkinson bets on book venture
Former governor's ecampus.com sticking with business plan
The Associated Press
LEXINGTON — While other Internet textbook sellers are trying to find a new niche, former Gov. Wallace Wilkinson said his online textbook retailing venture is in a unique position to succeed.
Rivals VarsityBooks.com and Bigwords.com are Web sites that rely on third-party distributors to supply and ship their products.
In contrast, Lexington-based ecampus.com owns its own text books, its own customer service center and its own 250,000-square-foot warehouse.
“We are self-contained, and we own it all,” said Mr. Wilkinson. “We have a great business model, and we're going to stay with it and make it work.”
While Mr. Wilkinson is declaring confidence in ecampus' business model, VarsityBooks is morphing into a different kind of e-venture.
The Washington, D.C.-based company has laid off 40 workers and overhauled its plans, turning its 1,000 student representatives into a marketing network for other companies hoping to reach the coveted college demographic.
This fall its student reps will hand out 700,000 VarsityBook book bags stuffed with promotional items from companies like AT&T Wireless and Adidas.
San Francisco-based Bigwords is also rethinking its strategy, and hopes to become a portal site filled with both content and e-commerce for college students.
Just over a year ago, Mr. Wilkinson raised $50 million to launch ecampus.com as a spin-off of his Wallace's College Book Co.
The plan for ecampus was to capture a large percentage of the $8.5 billion that college students spend on textbooks every year.
Mr. Wilkinson predicts profitability by the third quarter of next year, with $280 million in sales during 2001.
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