In June I introduced my new post as CEO of ShopCo Holdings. I am happy to announce today we have launched out of stealth, as Wanderful Media!

Wanderful represents a media industry initiative to transform the $4 billion business of traditional advertising circulars through digital innovation. Just as joint media ventures such as CareerBuilder and Cars.com strengthened the industry’s position through the use of new technology, Wanderful Media was created with an even broader set of investors to reinvent the circular advertising business for its partners and extend it to the rest of the industry.

As mentioned in my last post, Wanderful Media is backed by some of the biggest names in the newspaper industry. Media players such as, A.H. Belo, CNHI, Cox, E.W. Scripps, Gannett, Gatehouse, Hearst, Lee Enterprises, McClatchy, Media News Group and the Washington Post, have backed us to the tune of $22M. These financial backers and the media partnerships we bring to the table mean that Wanderful at launch has reach into more that 80 percent of the top US markets and are featured on more than 250 newspaper sites and by the end of the year will reach 600.

As thrilled as I am to announce today’s news, I am even more excited about what we’re rolling out over the next six months. Building upon the innovations of Find n Save, Wanderful Media makes discovery shopping engaging, fun and social, wherever consumers are and whatever they use to shop – tablet, mobile or web. We have targeted Spring 2013 for introduction of a new local discovery shopping collection of media properties that Wanderful Media will deliver.

This is going to be something the industry has never seen.

The new platform will support the full experience of discovery shopping, from casually browsing on a tablet and sharing lists with friends, to in-store reminders and promotions on the phone.

With significant product, distribution and market advantages, Wanderful Media is poised to reinvent local discovery shopping.

As I mentioned in my original post in June, if you want to work with us, you all know I am a relationship focused entrepreneur and I look forward to discovering opportunities to work with you. A good place to connect is this Thursday, Sept. 27th, at my annual event where we shoot some Trap and have some Chardonnay.  So I hope you can find you way to our annual event Shotguns and Chardonnay.