America Online and American Greetings.com Expand Strategic Marketing Alliance With New Five and a Half Year$100-Million Agreement
August 4, 1999 08:45 AM
DULLES, Va. and CLEVELAND--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug. 4, 1999--
AOL Intends to Integrate AmericanGreetings.com As Exclusive Provider of Greetings Products Across AOL Family of Brands
America Online, Inc.AOL , the world's leading interactive services company, and AmericanGreetings.com, a leading provider of electronic greetings and personal creativity content and a subsidiary of American Greetings Corporation AM , today announced that they have expanded their existing relationship with a new five and a half year $100 million agreement that will make AmericanGreetings.com the provider of greetings products within the AOL service, AOL.COM, ICQ, Digital City, Netscape Netcenter, and CompuServe.
AmericanGreetings.com's products will also be offered on AOL International services, including Canada, United Kingdom, -ustralia, Japan, Germany, and France.
This new agreement marks a significant expansion of the two companies' 1997 three-year, multi-million-dollar marketing alliance that covered the AOL service. Under the expanded alliance, the companies will operate co-branded sites for each property, to be launched over the next several months. AmericanGreetings.com will guarantee payments totaling at least $100 million to America Online as well as provide AOL with additional promotional considerations, including customized and exclusive content for the co-branded sites.
Through the new agreement, AmericanGreetings.com will provide AOL members and visitors to AOL's Web brands with an extensive line of free greetings products and a newly enhanced subscription service. AOL's Interactive Marketing team will have the exclusive right to sell advertising and sponsorships on the co-branded sites for the first three years. The companies will share all advertising and transaction revenue from these co-branded sites throughout the term of the agreement.
In addition, there will be significant online and offline cross-promotion and branding, and AOL intends to feature AmericanGreetings.com's products in email, instant messaging, You've Got Pictures, Love@AOL, People Connection and calendaring.
AmericanGreetings.com is designed to be a one-stop creative exchange that allows consumers to stay close to family and friends through humor, emotion, entertainment, sentiment and sharing. It offers thousands of online greetings, entertainment items and popular licensed properties such as Dilbert, Betty Boop and the World Wrestling Federation and appeals to consumers' diverse needs to enjoy and express themselves. This depth, breadth and quality of creative content is provided free as well as through a soon-to-be-enhanced subscription service that will also allow users to create and print projects directly off the Web.
"We are delighted to extend and enhance our relationship with America Online and its family of brands," said John Klipfell, President and CEO of AmericanGreetings.com. "We understand the value of reaching AOL's community of 46 million U.S. users and others internationally, and believe that the products and services we've developed will bring online greetings and personal creativity to an exciting new level."
"We are very pleased to expand our successful alliance with a valuable marketing partner like AmericanGreetings.com," said Bob Pittman, AOL President and Chief Operating Officer. "AOL members have greatly enjoyed AmericanGreetings.com's easy-to-use, creative, personalized online greetings on the AOL service to communicate with friends and family, and now we will be able to offer American Greetings branded products to the tens of millions of Internet consumers who use our other brands. The American Greetings brand stands for creativity and this expanded relationship will enable all of our audiences to express themselves creatively online."
About America Online
Founded in 1985, America Online, Inc., based in Dulles, Virginia, is the world's leader in interactive services, Web brands, Internet technologies, and e-commerce services. America Online, Inc. operates: two worldwide Internet services, America Online, with more than 17 million members, and CompuServe, with approximately 2 million members; several leading Internet brands including ICQ, AOL Instant Messenger and Digital City, Inc.; the Netscape Netcenter and AOL.COM portals; the Netscape Navigator and Communicator browsers; and AOL Moviefone, the nation's # 1 movie listing guide and ticketing service. Through its strategic alliance with Sun Microsystems, the Company develops and offers easy-to-deploy, end-to-end e-commerce and enterprise solutions for companies operating in the Net Economy.
About AmericanGreetings.com and American Greetings
AmericanGreetings.com is a leading provider of electronic greetings and personal creativity content for the digital marketplace. The company's award-winning Web site offers thousands of online greetings conveniently available on www.americangreetings.com and through America Online at keyword: AG. With seven titles distributed at retail nationwide, American Greetings is also a leading brand in the print creativity software category through its alliance with Mattel Interactive.
American Greetings is the world's largest publicly held creator, manufacturer and distributor of greeting cards and social expression products. With headquarters in Cleveland, Ohio, American Greetings has one of the largest creative studios in the world. For more information on American Greetings, visit its site on the World Wide Web at www.americangreetings.com.
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