No Click with the Brick is no bueno

by Julie Burgmeier on OCTOBER 20, 2009

I opened a brick & click (children’s boutique storefront & e-commerce site) in the fall of 2005.  My intent was to have the brick open first and then the click.  However, as life sometimes doesn’t goes orderly, neither did this.  The remodeling of the retail space was taking longer than expected, but all of the inventory had arrived by September.  Hence, we cranked up the work on the e-commerce site and launched in October of 2005 with the storefront opening the day after Thanksgiving in November.

Our first full month of being opened online produced $958.61 of sales revenue…mostly from friends and families.  Our first day of being open, granted the day after Thanksgiving, our sales were $1,951.61.  The very last customer of the day dropped $1,000.  My business partner and I were on the floor giggling and hollering after they left.

The websales started out slow, but have exponentially grown over the past 4 years.   In these so wonderful economic times (HAH), the websales are crucial to our survival and success.  2006, 2007, and 2008 websales and storefront sales increased each year.  Storefront sales are much higher in overall sales but the websales have been increasing  at a larger percentage rate.  Where storefront sales increased by small increments annually, our websales nearly doubled each year.

Besides the obvious benefits of having an online store to compliment your storefront , an online gift registry, built-in customer relationship management, and an inexpensive channel for communicating new products and events through social media, you can also storm out the… well storms.  Our storefront is in a pacific northwest tiny town which is a shopping destination for many from 15 miles away to 75 miles away in Seattle and Vancouver BC.  Last December we had some of the worst weather ever including snow which is highly unusual.  There were many days when the entire town was closed.  Not us!  I arrived in my pajamas to ship out those web orders.  Having a customer base across the country and Canada helps even out our seasonal highs and lows.

With the advent and improvements to wordpress and blogger, there is no excuse for any retail business not to have web presence.   And if you would like to broaden your customer base, communicate better with your current customers, and grow your business then pony up to an e-commerce site.  Here are some steps to get you started.

• If you don’t have point of sale system, invest in it now.  Your cash register will now be your computer with internet access. *If you buy one of the newer credit card machines or go directly through your point of sale system, there will be no need to pay for a second phone line. *Quickbooks point of sale is relatively inexpensive including the hardware.
• If you are hiring new employees make sure keyboarding, working with a digital camera, and possibly ebaying experience is in their bag of tricks.
• Next buying trip  think about your current vendors in a new light.  Do they allow you to sell their products online?  Do they have a professional website with product images you can use?  Do they drop-ship large heavy items?
• Check in with your local post office.  You should be able to set up free pick-up at your business and you can order free shipping supplies if Priority Mail works for you at USPS.com.
• Budget about $1500-$3000 for your site.  Cost will depend on how many features you set up and how much administration you are requesting.
• Plan on uploading and managing your inventory right in your storefront to start out with if you don’t want to rent extra space.  You will need to have an inventory management system in place – see bullet point #1.

Brick & Click – Muy Bueno!