Pets.com, supposedly the healthiest of the US dogfood e-tailers, is to be put down, but ever so gently. The company ceases trading tomorrow, 9 November, in an orderly wind-down of operations.

Pets.com's biggest asset is probably Sock Puppet, the company's mascot and a popular toy.

The company IPO'd nine months ago at $11 a share. Yesterday, you could buy stock for nine cents a pop. So what went wrong? It's the same old 'too few orders, too much spent on marketing = no more money = cap-in-hand to investors'. Who tell Pets.com to piss off.

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Mothernature.com, the US health goods e-tailer is to close down and return remaining funds to shareholders. The plan, which is contingent on shareholder approval, will see the company try to sell certain assets - intellectual property and the like. But it reckons it will have $13.4 million in the pot to return to shareholders by the end of the year. The board reckons another $2.4 million is collectable, to be dished out to shareholders over the next three years. ®