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18 commentsTuesday, July 8, 2008

CafePress Acquires Imagekind

Details unclear, overall direction upscale

Anyone who's been dying to own a really fancy t-shirt or coffee mug may be in luck; reports indicate that CafePress has acquired Imagekind, a sort of artists' community and marketplace.

CafePress offers posters and framed prints in addition to t-shirts and mugs, of course, and Imagekind's focus meets it there.  Another instance of product overlap between the sites occurs where greeting cards are concerned.  But while CafePress puts "Chairman Meow" and "I Want to Believe" images on display, Imagekind lists names like M.C. Escher, Andrew Wyeth, and Norman Rockwell.

CafePress
 CafePress

To achieve this sort of "cultured" upgrade, CafePress probably paid in the neighborhood of $15 million or $20 million, according to Eric Eldon.  Since CafePress now has a semi-lock on the low- and highbrow, he states, "The purchase also suggests that it may be too late in the game for new startups to try to create their own t-shirt, art, and gift-selling online marketplaces."

Keep an eye out for some sort of integration between CafePress and Imagekind in the weeks ahead.  There's been no official word on the matter, though, and as the demand for Pierre Auguste Renoir boxer shorts is likely to be small, the two sites may continue to operate as distinct brands.

News Tags: Deals, CafePress, Imagekind
About the author:
Doug is a staff writer for WebProNews. Visit WebProNews for the latest eBusiness news.

Interesting

I sell my art through both Cafepress and Imagekind, I'm really curious how this will all come together. I think it will be a good thing for Imagekind, Cafepress knows how to market itself and hopefully that will rub off on Imagekind.

Cafepress taking over Imagekind

This is going to be a wild ride in my opinion. Seems very  settled at the immeidate moment but I  feel this will end up to be an affiliate war between cj (curent Cafepress Affiliate)   and SAS (current Imagekind affiliate) - No immediate plans to combine the 2 PODs  but  2009 may bring aobut changes tha will effect both Cafepress shopowners and Iagekind gallery owners.

There have been many changes internally for shopkeepers, including  limitations on shop size etc.  One has to wonder if this was  in the plans for this recent aquisition of Imagekind?

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