Groupon Helps Segway of Newport Rack Up Sales

Hundreds of people will be getting their Seg-legs for half-price thanks to a deal that slashed the normal rate of a Segway tour that guides visitors all around the City by the Sea.

Segway of Newport partnered with daily e-coupon giant Groupon this week, offering up their tour that normally goes for $75 for a mere $37.

The price must have been alluring to Grouponers, since the required number of buyers to seal the deal, 30, had been purchased just a little more than an hour and a half after the deal went live at 6 a.m. Thursday morning.

With a little less than a day remaining, 372 people have already bought the Groupon. If numbers continue to rise like they did on Thursday, the number could surely double by midnight.

Segway of Newport is hardly the first Aquidneck Island business to take advantage of the Groupon craze. Restaurants like (931 sold), yoga studios like (221 sold), and fitness centers like (38 sold) are just a few others that have partnered with the company in recent months. The premise is simple: sign up for a daily Groupon e-mail, then each morning in your inbox receive local specials that typically offer more than half off a product, service or meal. Groupon has been expanding across the world since it launched in November 2008 and, according to its website, has sold about 32 million Groupons to date. Here in Rhode Island, the coupon company sends about two new deals to Providence-area e-mail subscribers each morning. Many companies with similar missions have since sprouted up in the wake of Groupon's success, including LivingSocial and Wow.com. Providence Radio 92ProFM is one local company also trying something similar. No matter which service is used, the message seems clear: people love the convenience and allure of these deep deals.

But while deals like Groupon benefit the patrons, what impact does it have on the businesses themselves?

Up in Cranston, Ruggieri's Meat Market Michael Ruggieri said he was not prepared for the that offered Grouponers $40 worth of items for just $20.

"Trust me, I'm a mathematical genius," Ruggieri said at the time. "But I missed something this time."

In just four hours, 854 people bought Groupons. Ruggieri said he underestimated the demand for the coupons and the experiment ended up costing him a pretty penny. Multiply 854 by $20 and you get what Ruggieri calls a fluke.

"It started when I was watching CNBC," he said. "I said 'can it hurt?' 'a phone call?'"

Before he knew it, he was signed up for the deal and watching the number of buyers soar from the get-go on the morning of the sale. By the time he finally issued the order to end the deal, he knew he was in deep.

"I'm the first one to admit when I made a mistake," he said.

But it might not have been much of a mistake.

It turns out that more than half the Groupon customers hadn't shopped at Ruggieri's before. That means Ruggieri might have tapped into a brand-new clientele that has been stuck in the habit of going to the large supermarket chains.

This is Segway of Newport's second time around with Groupon, said Ryan Maccione, of the segway and bike shop. Maccione said the shop offered another deal on Groupon before it had a large following in Rhode Island and still found success in the group deal.

According to Maccione, folks come come from several states just to take the tours, saying he’s had customers come from Connecticut, Massachusetts and further just to roll down the streets to tour the mansions or the waterfront.

“Groupon deals have brought us business from folks that had zero intentions of coming to Newport," he noted. "Folks have come here just for the tour and drove back home."

Maccione said Groupon contacted them to get involved and that the volume potential was attractive. His goal for this year’s Groupon is 500 buyers.

“We really don’t want much more than that as we will have thousands of other customers to satisfy this season,” he said.

The tours run either along Ocean Drive or around Newport’s mansions down Bellevue Avenue and through Salve Regina University’s campus. Segway of Newport runs six tours a day with groups of between six to eight people.

Maccione said the schedule would be able to accommodate the extra Grouponers.

“We hope to do well and to get a financial boost from this offer," he said. "We will see some folks again I’m sure."

So don’t be surprised if you see an inordinate amount of people scooting around Newport on the hovercraft-like machines beginning April 9. If they have an extra-big smile on their face, it's probably because they got it at an extra-low price. 

Reporting by Patch editor Mark Shieldrop is included in this report.