Google India's Great Online Shopping Festival: Reactions Thus Far

Google India's third edition of the Great Online Shopping Festival kicked off on Wednesday, and there has been quite a lot said about it thus far.

Our readers' comments and what people are saying on social media about GOSF 2014 often markedly disagree with the officially marketed tagline of the ongoing three-day shopping festival - 72 Hours of Crazy.

It's not all negative though, as others say they see themselves splurging quite a bit during the GOSF sale, while a few say they are buying things they don't really need, simply because of the offers.

Of those that find GOSF 2014 to be over-hyped, a few say products are available with much the same types of deals as before, with no significant differences in prices. Some users even felt the 'Pre-Party' offers were better than does on the sale itself.

(Also see: Google India's Great Online Shopping Festival (GOSF) Kicks Off Wednesday)

One of the big problems with sales recently has been junk listings. The 'Trending Rs. 299' or 'Rs. 299 Corner' section, which has items available for just Rs. 299 for a limited period, is being said by some shoppers to contain not very useful products they would otherwise not even consider buying. This hurts the overall perception of the shopping festival, as people think it's not worth the time to log in.

However, Google India Managing Director, Ranjan Anandan, says the sale thus far has been a huge success, making the statement, "The GOSF has exceeded the wildest of our expectations with the response that we have had to GOSF."

(Also see: Great Online Shopping Festival (GOSF) a Huge Success This Year: Google)

Reader 'mak' said of GOSF, "There is nothing like festival or any offers. They are just making fool of people. All the retailers are offering the same product prices, which they generally sell on their own portals."

Another reader, 'K', took another tack, saying, "dont buy stuff just becoz of discount...you are increasing the carbon footprint of the world. just think most of the stuff on these portals was stuff without which u survived 10 years ago without even knowing their existence. Then why buy all this now....lead a simple life, think high and donate"

Reader 'anil' was happy with the GOSF sale, but said, "Its great, especially the 299 section.. some goods are having a real good discount. I bought a skill toolset, a laptop bag, watch, wallet-bag-sunglasses-belt combo all for 299. Only problem I think is that I bought things I would not have normally bought, just cause of the discount.."