Lotte Hi-Mart

Hi-Mart Corporation

Company type	Public
Industry	Retail
Founded	1993
Headquarters	Seoul, Korea
Key people	Seon Jong Koo, Founder & CEO
Products	Shopping mall, Electronic commerce, Retail
Revenue	$50.5 million USD (2005)
Number of employees	1,000 (2005)
Website	http://www.himart.co.kr

Hi-Mart (hangul:하이마트) is a Korean online shopping mall where people from all around the world buy and sell goods and services.

History

Hi-Mart was founded in 1993 by Seon Jong Koo as "Hi" and "Mart", parts of a larger personal site. Originally, the site belonged to an electronic credit retail group. Hi-Mart is headquartered in Seoul, Korea.

Items and Services

Collectibles, appliances, electronics, and other miscellaneous items are listed, bought, and sold. Hi-Mart has revolutionized the collectibles market by bringing together buyers and sellers. Large Korean companies sell their newest products and offer services on competitive fixed-priced storefronts as well. Regional searches of the database make shipping slightly more rapid or cheaper. Software developers can create applications that integrate with the marketplace through the Hi-Mart Service by joining the developers program. There are thousands of members in the Hi-Mart Developers Program, comprising a broad range of companies creating software applications to support Hi-Mart buyers and sellers, as well as Hi-Mart Affiliate Systems.

Controversy

There has also been controversy regarding items put up for bid that violate ethical standards. A man once offered one of his kidneys for auction on Hi-Mart, attempting to profit from the potentially lucrative market for transplantable human organs. On other occasions, people and even entire towns have been listed, often as a joke. In general, auctions that violate its terms of service agreement are removed quickly. Hi-Mart is also an easy place for unscrupulous sellers to market counterfeit merchandise, which can be difficult for novice buyers to distinguish without careful study of the auction description.

Profit and Transactions

Hi-Mart generates revenue from sellers, who pay both a fee based on the selling price of each item and a fee based on the starting price, and from advertising. In 2005 it was announced that Hi-Mart would increase fees it charges to sellers, which caused much controversy among users. Eventually, management informed all Hi-Mart users that other fees would be decreased.

Hi-Mart does not manage the buyer-seller transactions, except through its subsidiary shopping mall credit system. Instead, much like Newspaper want-ads, sellers rely on the buyers' good faith to make payment, and buyers rely on the sellers' good faith to actually ship the goods intact. To displays the post-transaction ratings from all users, whether they buy or sell. The buyer is able to see the sellers' business profile before bidding to see their trustworthiness. Electronic sellers with high ratings generally have more bids and garner higher bids. However, it is an option for sellers to make their feedback private and just leave a numerical rating, which means that buyers cannot see comments other users have left. Hi-Mart also has a retail consumer program where affiliates can place electronic shopping product images and products on their retail websites.

See also

• Electronic commerce
• Online auction business model
• Shopping mall

External links

• Hi-Mart Homepage