Amish Acres online shopping Website featured in U.S.News & World Report cover story
December 8, 1998
Nappanee, Indiana The cover story of the December 7th issue of U.S. News & World Report and U.S.News Online, www.usnews.com, "Shopping on the Web: Click ‘til you drop" by William J. Holstein, features Amish Acres General Store Website. The article begins, "Nappanee, Ind., is a long, long way from Silicon Valley—in both a geographic and a technological sense. Many of the folks who live in and around Nappanee are Amish and Mennonites, who are deeply resistant to modern ways. …But even Nappane is going online. Just a couple of weeks ago, Richard Pletcher, founder and president of Amish Acres, listed his General Store on Yahoo!’s newly expanded shopping channel. …His bestselling item: shoofly pie, a molasses-based treat…. The orders are coming from as far away as California and Italy, not just from regional tourists."
The five page article, written after AOL’s take over of Netscape, estimates that online retail sales this holiday season are expected to reach $2.3 billion, double last year’s total. Yahoo! now offers 2 million-plus products from more than 27,000 stores. Many major retailers are hurriedly opening online stores. The Gap sells more over the Internet than any of its stores, save one.
Mr. Holstein, a senior writer who was world editor at Business Week, specializes in following the domestic impact of global economic trends, concludes that, "Ultimately, online shopping may level the playing field between small and medium-sized retailers on one hand and big discount chains and department stores on the other. If Amish Acres can use the Net to reach a wider audience, without the burden of national advertising or major physical presence, they will compete on a more equal footing with the big guys. At least that’s what they are hoping in Nappanee. "Obviously, with national exposure of this magnitude, interest in our site has increased dramatically." said Pletcher, "Our online sales are running away with us; luckily, this time of the year we’re not hosting the Arts and Crafts Festival.
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