World's Largest Seller of Office Products OFFICE DEPOT Signs Deal With Excite

Business Wire, May 12, 1998

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 12, 1998--

Office Depot Online Store Is Premier Office Supply Retailer on

WebCrawler's Small Business Channel And Quicken.Com

Visitors to Excite's flagship WebCrawler site and Intuit's Quicken.com now have a new reason to get excited about the online services' popular Business & Investing Channel and Small Business area. They can access Office Depot's comprehensive and easy to use new on-line, 24-hour store (www.officedepot.com), directly through the WebCrawler's Small Business area on the Business & Investing Channel and on Quicken.com (www.quicken.com). Office Depot Online has signed a two-year, multi-million dollar sponsorship agreement that includes a direct link to officedepot.com, supported by targeted banner advertising throughout WebCrawler's Business & Investing Channel and search results page and on Quicken.com.

"The agreement represents another step in our drive to provide business solutions and convenience to the small business community, which is big business," said Keith Butler, OfficeDepot.com executive director of marketing and merchandising. "Our small office customers have told us they want to shop for office supplies from Office Depot online. By partnering with Excite, we are able to target a large number of additional small and home office professionals who are looking for time and cost-efficient ways to manage, grow, and maintain their businesses. Through the well-known Small Business area within the Webcrawler Business & Investing Channel and within Quicken.com, we can directly reach our target customers."

"Our partnerhsip with Office Depot extends the added value we can provide to our huge base of customers who are buying online right now," said Kenny Wachtel, senior vice president of advertising and sales for Excite, Inc. "WebCrawler reaches small and home offices so this is a perfect `fast, easy and valuable resource' for the WebCrawler audience."

Officedepot.com offers over 7,000 leading brand products, from computers to paperclips to coffee. And with a fleet of 2,000 trucks, Office Depot delivers orders to customers at no charge for orders over $50. The site is completely integrated with the company's other systems. As such, Office Depot offers real time inventory checking at its warehouses as well as its stores for customers who need items the same day. With the unprecedented real time feature, users know almost immediately if the product they have ordered is at the ney add items from their lists or previous or ders to their shopping carts.

The targeted banner advertising found throughout the Small Business area of WebCrawler's Buard type tool helps customers find the right accessories for products such as toner cartridges for laser printers. The site also offers secure online transactions and real time credit card and order submissions, ensuring order confirmation and next day delivery. Secure online transactions and customer shopping lists that allow shoppers to develop lists of frequently ordered items.

WebCrawler's Businthe quotes, news, charts and bulletin boards onts retailer. Office Depot currently operates 613 retail stores. In the United States, this includes 566 office supply retail stores in 38 states and the District of Colum day delivery to 95% of the U.S. OfficeDepot.com is based in San Francisco, CA.

About Excite, Inc.

Internet and extensive personalization capabilities, and advertisers the best one-to-one marketing services available online. The Excite Network consists of two of the largest brands on the Web, Excite (www.excite.com) and WebCrawler (www.webcrawler.com), and its subsidiaries; Classifieds2000, MatchLogic, Inc., Excite Japan Co., Ltd. and Excite UK, Ltd. Personalized versions of Excite are available in F About Intuit, Inc.

Intuit Inc., a fina the most popular small business accounting softsites.

CONTACT: Keith Butler Karen Pascual

Office Depot Online Stanton Crenshaw

415/974-1m karen@stanton-crenshaw.com