Groupola, the rather opportunistically named UK Groupon clone from the same company behind MyVoucherCodes, has ceased offering any deals.
A quick check in on the website today, for example, reveals no current live offers, and we’re hearing that this has been the state of play since late November. A sign that Groupola is heading to the deadpool maybe? It wouldn’t be the first Groupon-clone to throw in the towel. Hell, Snippa did it in record time.
So what exactly is going on?
Well, it’s true that Groupola is on hold, the company has confirmed, but only for the short term. In fact, the site is being rolled into its much better known sister brand, MyVoucherCodes, and specifically, the latter’s “Local” offering, which launched in August and opened its doors proper last month. At the time, we noted that MyVoucherCodes Local competed with Groupola so perhaps it makes sense for the stronger brand to absorb the other.
Related to this is that Groupola will still source its own deals but that these will be offered up alongside other aggregated local offers. So technically, I suppose, Groupola has avoided the deadpool.
Meanwhile, in other group buying news, Deal Romeo, the UK Groupon-clone aggregator appears to be up for sale (asking price is £50,000). We’ve put in a request for information, such as the reason for wanting to offload the site and we’ll update the post should we hear back. Another candidate for the deadpool maybe? I suspect so.
(Update: Deal Romeo has written in to say that it was considering a sale but is putting those plans on hold at least until the Christmas period is over.)