Succulent Surprise
Learning by doing: a one-product ecommerce site
Retail is weird. With old-school bricks and mortar, getting footfall was easy — people just wandered into your store — but the logistics were hard. Today, setting up an online store is easy, but building an audience is hard. Shopify, Squarespace, Big Cartel, and a thousand other ecommerce platforms make it so effortless it seems almost rude *not* to have an online shop.
What would we sell, if we wanted to make a micro gift shop? Last year, we bought a little succulent in an enamelware cup, from Nook. (We named her Antoinette, and predictably, she ended up having her head knocked off 😂) Falcon sell their tiny tumblers online, and a little research turned up a bunch of wholesalers who deliver trays of mixed Echeveria through the post. Why not sell lucky dip plants by post?
We’ve seen a bunch of plant subscription and delivery services springing up recently:
These businesses are blooming because millennials (who love succulents, btw) can’t afford homes with gardens, and don’t drive. House plants are an affordable treat for the growing precariat, cheering up a poky rental or bare desk, and much better value than cut flowers. A low maintenance plant in a cute pot could be the perfect product to test out a low volume online store!
Most platforms assume you want to display multiple products, in a grid analogous to the old shop window. It’s surprisingly difficult to find a good one page retail template. You can use a platform’s buy buttons, but they usually limit your ability to customize your form data capture. How hard could it be to build our own one-pager with Stripe? With no monthly subscription fees, the running costs are almost zero.
Branding
Once we had the concept, we needed a name. I’m a sucker for alliteration, so Secret/Super/Special/Spectacular Succulents were all in with a shout. We searched for a name that had an available domain with matching social handles. Eventually we had to compromise on consistency for brevity, so succulentsurprise.com is paired with @succiesurprise on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. We also checked the hashtag volumes, to confirm that #succulentsurprise wasn’t already associated with another brand or movement.
For the logo, we went for a bright yellow, to stand out from the crowd. Green seemed too obvious, and we figured there’d be plenty of foliage on display, so wanted something with good contrast. Sticking with the organic theme, we chose playful Courgette, from Google Fonts, for its cheeky inverted “S” shapes and jaunty angle. Everything was designed directly in the browser — no Photoshop required!
Website
We wanted a super simple one pager: logo, proposition, buy button, product images, social links. We used Django and server side rendering. No complicated stuff or fancy front-end framework. The great thing about Django is that we got an admin site in a blink of an eye. From that admin site we manage and track sales. The web app is based on the fabulous Tachyons CSS library, giving us great results quickly. It’s hosted on a $5 DigitalOcean box, keeping running costs to a minimum. On mobile, the site is streamlined — same content, but images are inline where necessary.
Knowing that social would be our main traffic driver, the site needs to make its point quickly, and inspire confidence that payment will be totally painless on any device. The order form has the fewest fields possible: name, address, optional gift note, email and card details. We’ve timed it: it takes about 90 seconds to fill out. The confirmation page has a “thank you” message and social share buttons. That’s it!
Prototyping
Packaging is half the experience when you send a present by post. We were lucky to find some reasonably priced cardboard boxes that were the perfect size, and natural wood wool to protect our little buddies on their travels. To jazz them up a bit, we taped the flaps with graphic packing tape — MT tape has an incredible range of colours and patterns. For any gift messages, we found Italian handmade paper and envelopes, just small enough to slip inside the box.
Imagery
On the site, we needed to clearly show the whole product: plant and pot. We played with a few different formats: mug shots, portraits, close up, top down… Pro tip — if you don’t have a photo studio, just drape some wrapping paper over the back of your sofa 👌
For Instagram, we’re using a mix of product shots, boxing/unboxing, and succulents spotted around town. We tag Falcon as a supplier, and they’ve been kind enough to feature us 😘 We’ve disappeared down the rabbit hole of obscure hashtags, from #succulentsunday to #plantladyisthenewcatlady.
Pricing
Pricing is not an exact science. The tumbler is the biggest cost, £5 each. The succulents range from £1.50-£3, depending on the supplier. Packaging (cardboard, wood wool, tape, gift card and envelope, postage label) comes to a few pounds per unit, and obviously gets cheaper if you can buy in bulk. First class postage for a small package is £3.35. We also need to cover monthly web hosting, and the Stripe commission per transaction. Just to cover our costs, we need to be charging around £15. Add a tiny profit margin, and our sweet spot is around £17 — still cheaper than most bouquets!
Promotion
Paid social has come a long way in the last couple of years. Campaigns can run simultaneously on Facebook and Instagram, and targeting options are more precise than in the past. Instagram’s “Shop Now” call to action works well with simple video ads to drive traffic.
Your chance of getting any of those clicks to convert is still pretty slim, but at £4 per day as a suggested starter budget, at least the barrier to entry is now low enough for young brands to dabble. Slow and steady community building is still the best way to grow sales, but paid social helps to reach people outside your own network. Nothing beats getting tagged by a happy customer 😍
Summary
What have we learned?
- It’s totally possible to set up a one product online shop on a shoestring
- After materials, packaging, postage and promotion, margins are wafer thin
- Always put a “this way up” sticker on packages 😂
Promotion is harder than coding! Design, marketing and pricing are crucial for finding product/market fit. Growing a business from friends, to friends-of-friends, to orders from strangers is a labour of love. It’s incredibly inspiring to see people making viable businesses out of the tiniest niches. Huge respect for small business owners — it’s tough out there 💕
Startuple is François Hoehl and Sinead Doyle. Find out more at startuple.works
