I’ll be the first to admit I don’t understand iVillage’s business at all. The idea that of a web site that treats women as a niche market, when they’re pretty much half the Net, strikes me as a mistake. The fact that they’re a corporate shill for Hearst’s women’s magazines doesn’t help.
So, why would a company that’s struggling to make its core business work get into a completely different line of business? They might as well put their name on a line of vitamins. Ooops, they’re already doing that.