Retail stores
Ecommerce and click and collect for independent shops
Most independent shops carry far more than they can display, and most of their customers assume the window is the whole range. That gap is usually the easiest money in the business.
Today
9 online orders · 6 for collection
An illustration of the kind of screen this builds towards - yours is built around how your retail shop actually runs.
The reality
Where the time and money goes in a retail shop
Customers only know what is in the window
The specialist stock at the back - often the best margin - never gets seen, because nobody knows to ask for it.
"Have you got this in?" phone calls
A steady stream of calls asking about stock, each one taking somebody off the shop floor to go and look.
Trading hours limit trading
People decide to buy things at ten at night. A shop that closes at half five is shut for a big share of the time customers are actually thinking about spending.
Competing with the internet on the internet's terms
Trying to out-price or out-deliver a national retailer is a losing game. Being able to have it today, locally, is not.
Stock accuracy across shelf and site
Selling something online that walked out of the shop an hour ago starts the customer relationship with an apology.
The approach
How we'd fix it
The point of an independent shop's website is usually not to become a national ecommerce business. It is to show the full range, answer the stock question without a phone call, and make it easy to reserve or buy something for collection today. Click and collect is the lever that matters most, because it plays to the one advantage you have over a warehouse - the customer can have it in their hands this afternoon.
It also tends to drive footfall rather than replace it. People come in to collect, and a good proportion buy something else while they are there. That is a very different economic model from posting parcels, and for most independents it is a considerably better one - no packing, no postage, no returns to process, and a customer standing in your shop.
What we build
Built for retail shops
Your full range online
Everything you stock, not just what fits in the window, with photographs and enough description to sell it.
Click and collect, and reserve in store
Buy online and collect today, or reserve without paying - whichever suits how your customers shop.
Live stock levels
Customers can see what is in, which answers most of the phone calls before they are made.
Local delivery
A local delivery option with its own postcodes and fee, which for a lot of shops beats posting nationally.
Simple product management
Add a product in a couple of minutes from a phone, because a shop with stale stock online stops selling.
Local search groundwork
Set up to be found by people searching for what you sell in your town, which is the traffic worth having.
What changes
The difference it makes
- The stock people did not know you had starts selling
- Stock-check phone calls largely stop
- You take orders outside opening hours
- Collections bring people into the shop, where they buy more
In practice
A worked example: footfall, not parcels
An independent shop expected its website to generate postal orders. What it actually generated was collections - a majority of online orders were picked up in person, usually within a day, by people who lived nearby and wanted the thing now rather than on Thursday.
That turned out to be far better business than posting. No packing, no postage costs, no returns to handle, and a customer standing at the counter where they can be sold something else. The website ended up working as a shop window that happens to take payment, rather than as a parcel operation, which suited both the margins and the way the business already ran.
The systems behind it
What this is built from
Everything on this page is put together from the same handful of systems, shaped around how retail shops actually work.
Questions
Retail Stores - the questions I get asked
Do I need to sell online, or is a website enough?
It depends what your customers do. If they regularly ring to ask whether something is in, showing live stock and letting them reserve it will earn its keep quickly. If your range is small and everything is on display, a good site with strong local search may be all you need. I would rather tell you that than sell you a shop you will not use.
Is click and collect worth setting up?
For most independents it is the best part of the whole thing. It plays to the advantage you have - the customer can have it today - and it costs you nothing in postage or packing. It also brings people into the shop, where a decent proportion buy something else while they are at the counter.
How do we keep online stock matching the shelf?
If your EPOS has an API, the two can be kept in step automatically. If not, stock is managed in one place and staff work from that. There is also a middle option a lot of shops prefer - reserve rather than buy, so a member of staff confirms the item is physically there before taking any money.
Can I add products myself without it being a chore?
That is the main thing that decides whether a shop site succeeds or quietly dies. Adding a product should take a couple of minutes from a phone - photograph, name, price, category, done. If it takes twenty minutes at a computer, it will not happen, and a site with three-month-old stock stops selling anything.
Will it help people find us locally?
That is where most of the value is for an independent. Product pages built to be found, a properly set up Google Business Profile, and pages that make it clear what you sell and where you are. The traffic worth having is somebody two miles away searching for what is sitting on your shelf.
Similar businesses I work with
All industries →Computer Shops
A catalogue people can filter by spec, repair jobs customers can track themselves, and click and collect that brings them into the shop.
Cafes
Pre-orders that beat the morning queue, loyalty without the cardboard card, and catering enquiries that stop being a phone call.
Car Dealerships
Stock that goes live in minutes, test drives booked online, and part-exchange and finance enquiries that arrive already qualified.
Run a retail shop? Let's have a look at it
Tell me how things work at the moment and I'll come back with a clear, fixed quote - and an honest view on whether it's worth the money. No pressure and no jargon.