A company that's looking to combine the experiences of an online auction with those of television home shopping channels plans to go live in Reno today.
CrazyBidNow.com will launch with about 12 employees including six hosts of its streaming video programming.
Michael Parness, chief executive officer, said the company expects that it will employ 100 people in Reno within six months.
CBN Inc., the auction site's parent company, has invested $1 million in creation of a 5,000-square-foot studio at 5456 Louie Lane in south Reno. The company leased 7,895 square feet in the building, and Parness said the company also will run fulfillment and other operations from the Reno facility.
CrazyBidNow.com will air live product demonstrations along with interviews with production manufacturers.
Parness said the company was drawn to Reno because of its affordable operating costs for the start-up. The company's chief information officer, Steve Caudle, lives in Reno.
The site's initial inventory is weighted heavily toward consumer electronics. CrazyBidNow.com pitches electronics makers that the site is a good place to showcase new products in front of informed buyers.
Consumers shopping the site purchase "bids" paying $18.75 for a package of 25 bids, for instance, or $375 for 500 bids and use the bids in online auctions.
Each bid increases the price of an item by 1 cent, and each bid adds time to the auction clock.
Parness said CBN is looking to build online buzz among bloggers and Web-savvy consumers with a public relations program that it rolled out in recent days. It hired TransMedia group of Boca Raton, Fla., for the PR work.
That will be followed late this month, Parness said, with paid advertising to support the site.
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