CPAP.com/CPAP-Pro.net

General Discussion on any topic relating to CPAP and/or Sleep Apnea.
Janelle

CPAP.com/CPAP-Pro.net

Post by Janelle » Mon Mar 14, 2005 8:00 am

Why are there two companies with the same physical address on the net? Are these not the same identical company, offering the same products? And it appears at the same prices?

I guess I am just totally naive but very curious. If cpap.com is out of stock of the Aura, are they still in stock at cpap-pro.net?

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wading thru the muck!
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Post by wading thru the muck! » Mon Mar 14, 2005 8:54 am

Janelle,

They have atleast three sites that I know of. The two you list and also cpaponline.com. My guess is they use these alternative sites for a number of reasond including testing out new formats etc...

As far as backorders, I sure if one is out all are out since it all comes from the same place. If I'm wrong on any of this maybe Johnny can correct me.
Sincerely,
wading thru the muck of the sleep study/DME/Insurance money pit!

-SWS
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Post by -SWS » Mon Mar 14, 2005 9:12 am

Re: testing different formats toward market appeal. Waaaaayy back in college I had a friend whose dad was an exec at Proctor and Gamble. My friend told me that P&G liked to test nearly identical products against each other with different labels. They would have two liquid dish soaps on the market, two nearly identical laundry detergents, etc. They never obscured the fact that these competing line ups were from P&G. They were most interested in finding out what does and doesn't appeal to the public. The best way to accomplish that was to offer alternate formats so that incoming data relative to market appeal would be fully available from both line ups for comparison toward improvement.

I can't say that's exactly what CPAP.com does, but like P&G you can clearly see in the detailed text exactly who you are dealing with as a consumer.

Zees Pleez
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Post by Zees Pleez » Mon Mar 14, 2005 12:11 pm

My guess (and that's all it is) is that it is to increase market share. You go search for a specific mask and then go look at 5 vendors from the results to compare prices, not realizing that 2 or 3 are the same. And I am not accusing them of doing anything underhanded; lots of vendors do it and you lose a competitive edge if you don't.