Much more common is a fate like Overstock.com. It grew revenues 18 percent last year (to $1.3 billion) – about the rate of overall e-commerce growth – but to do that, it spent 46 percent more on marketing than the year before. The result, excluding a one-time tax gain, is $16 million in profit (roughly 1 percent margin). That’s a lot of work to sell stuff for a buck that costs you 99 cents, and hence a market cap of 0.4-times-sales, compared to Zulily’s seven-times ratio.