December 2010 – auldsodgifts.com

[AnonymousParticipant]

Website: http://www.auldsodgifts.com/

Description: Auld Sod Gifts sells Official Irish Dirt (yes, “dirt”) as well as unique gift sets and growing kits. “We sell online direct to the consumer as well as business to business through a site within the site,” states Randa of Auld Sod Gifts. “We also sell business to business through trade shows and manufacturer reps throughout the US and Canada.

Through our patented process, we exceed all USDA requirements for importation and are the ONLY purveyor of Official Irish Dirt and the official shamrock seed in all of North America. Our company began as a result of the Irish Diaspora wanting to have a piece of the motherland. From small bags of dirt, we grew a gift line of growing kits that are now offered in several high end catalogs such as National Geographic, Orvis and Acorn as well as small ethnic catalogs and independent stores. We have had great success in TJ Maxx, Marshall’s, Home Goods and on QVC.”

Technologies Used: Randa continued, “We use ShopSite as our back end and included several custom templates and our own personalized shopping carts. We have a site within our site for our wholesale customers to log in and purchase at trade pricing using a separate shopping cart. Merchant Corner created our site design templates allowing us to feature multiple images, zoom and multiple product information pages. We use LexiConn as our web host as they are the ShopSite experts, are very quick to respond and convey everything to us in easy to understand terms.”

Advice / Tips: “For us, simple is better. We have a niche product with high graphic packaging. Merchant Corner worked with us to design an effective layout that didn’t compete with the product yet still allowed us to represent our brand integrity without being confusing or too busy. We chose ShopSite because of their endless capabilities. The back office reports are fantastic and give us everything we need to make sound business decisions. We don’t need to be computer programmers to figure out how and when to make basic changes!

Our biggest piece of advice would be to put as much effort into your website as you would in your retail store window. So many of us who sell through multiple channels treat the web channel as an afterthought. Our last website didn’t generate much in sales or traffic, was not user friendly and did not represent our brand well. For us, the upgrade was well worth the investment. Having the experts to “make it happen” is priceless.”

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