Inside Ghanda’s Ecommerce Engine: How They Scaled Fast and Stayed Lean with Convert Digital | #572

In today’s exclusive episode, Ghanda Clothing’s CIO Silvan Baard joins Convert Digital’s Andrew Waite to share the real story behind their retail transformation. From ditching waiting-room checkouts to pioneering one of Shopify’s first custom Checkout Extensibility builds, this conversation is packed with lessons for every ecommerce leader looking to grow smarter.

Today, we’re discussing: 

• Why Ghanda made the switch from Magento to Shopify (and how Convert made it painless)
• How the team built a headless Shopify experience before it was cool
• The automations that keep Ghanda’s lean team moving at scale
• Why checkout isn’t the end of the shopping journey, it’s the beginning
• The future of unified commerce: CDPs, POS, and camera-based in-store analytics

Connect with Silvan
Connect with Andrew
Explore Convert Digital

Chapters

• 5:39 The Magento Crisis And The Call
• 8:04 Choosing Shopify And Going Headless
• 10:27 Balancing Technology and Design
• 15:06 Future Growth and Scalability Strategies
• 19:00 Automation To Run A Lean Team
• 25:05 Peak Trade Insights and Customer Experience
• 27:43 Navigating Multi-Brand Strategies
• 30:48 Checkout Customisation and Its Impact
• 34:12 Harnessing Customer Data for Personalisation
• 40:50 The Future of Retail: Omnichannel Experiences

Transcript

SPEAKER_03: 0:01

Since we went live with Shopify, I have not had to touch our website once. So if our business increased by 10 times what it is now, will we still run with this same amount of lean resources that we've got at the moment? So it's always about it's always looking that way. And so we're kind of willing to walk that extra mile at the start to ensure that we get that efficiency down the track.

SPEAKER_01: 0:26

It's like your experience with the brand might start with checkout. I'm going through finding a product, purchasing it straight through the Agenti experience, and I'm hit with okay, now I'm with Brad. Now I'm talking to you.

SPEAKER_02: 0:39

Hey, it's Nathan Bush or Bushy, joining you from the land of the terrible people here in Brisbane, Australia. Hello and welcome back for a very special midweek episode of Add to Cart. Today we have something very special lined up because it's from a retailer who has had the most amazing growth since COVID. And they don't actually speak a lot around how they did it. So I'm stoked to be able to bring it to you today, thanks to our good friends at Convert Digital. Today we are shining the spotlight on the long-term partnership between Convert Digital and Gander Clothing, who you no doubt know you've probably been in one of their 110 stores around Australia and since COVID have just kind of bucked the trend when it comes to surfwear in Australia. They're really going from strength to strength. And we are lucky enough to be joined by their CIO today to talk us through it. Gander Clothing was born out of Torquay, which is in Victoria, and they've exploded from a handful of coastal stores to over 110 locations nationwide. And as you'll hear today, their online store has scaled alongside them and even driven that growth. They've done it all while keeping production local, running their own print and manufacturing operations, and staying true to that surf meet street Ganda vibe. Now leading the charge from a technology and IT perspective is Sylvan Bard, Ganda's chief information officer. Or as he jokes, the guy who was manually letting customers through a Magento checkout during COVID, but he's now running one of the most automated and scalable e-commerce setups in Australia. Sitting across the table today from Sylvan is Andrew Waite, who is the CEO and founder of Convert Digital, the agency behind some of Australia's most successful Shopify Plus builds, including Shopify, Brand Collective, L Age, and Coco Black. They're all about turning complexity into competitive advantage. In this chat, we cover a lot, but we talk about the decisions and the lessons behind Gander's transformation. From the moment they ditch Magento in a COVID meltdown to going headless on Shopify. We also ask if they'd actually go headless again. We talk about building automation into everything that they do and how they combine online and in-store experiences so that it's just one Gander wherever a customer chooses to shop. So without further ado, let's get into this special episode with Andrew Waite, CEO and founder of Convert Digital, and Sylvan Bard, Chief Information Officer at Gander Clothing. Sylvan and Andrew, welcome to Ad Descartes. Bushy, how are you? Thanks for having us. Pleasure. Sylvan, first time, welcome back. Wadey, you've been here before. You know the drill. Thank you again for joining us. And obviously, thank you to Convert Digital for all the support over a couple of years now. This conversation has come about because we were at a Byron Bay event. Was it early this year? Late late last year, early this year. And Sylvan, you're on a panel talking about Gander's transformation and all the work that you've done there, leading the team as CIO. And I just thought it was fascinating at retail at scale and the absolute tear that you've been on with Gander. So I'm really keen to get nerdy and to dive into this from a tech side. But tell us first if people don't know you. Let's do a little bit of an introduction. Sylvan, I'll throw to you first. Tell us who you are and what your role is at Gander.

SPEAKER_03: 4:09

Yeah, sure. Thanks again for having me. And yeah, I guess, you know, had a very interesting background, judging by my accent, you can probably tell that I'm South African originally. Uh, don't hold it against me. But um, you know, worked in software implementations, ERP WMS POS implementations as a consultant for about 15 or so years, then started going into, you know, working for end user organizations.

SPEAKER_02: 4:32

Because I was doing a little LinkedIn stalk of you. And this is your first retail gig, isn't it?

SPEAKER_03: 4:37

Yeah, first where I'm actually working for the retailer themselves. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 4:40

Incredible. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 4:42

So I actually used to be I used to be a consultant and implemented Ganda systems for them about 15 years ago originally. So that's how we kind of our paths crossed. And back then, you know, the brand was just really starting. They've just put up eight stores, and it was all kind of based around the Geelong Torkey lawn area because it originated out of Torquay. And so kind of implemented their systems for them, went away on a different path, worked for a few other companies, and then touched base with the guys from Ganda a few years later. They had 35 stores, that's about eight and a half, nine years ago, and they just said, Hey, you know, do you want to come in full-time with us as our IT person? And that's that's kind of how I ended up here. And uh, you know, it was a very, very small team at that point in time, and businesses boomed mostly actually thanks to COVID. And uh, you know, here we are, 110 locations and a growing strong.

SPEAKER_02: 5:39

Incredible. All right, I want to dive into that journey because I know there's a lot to talk about from COVID onwards, even though the brand is older than that. But from a technology perspective, that's fascinating. Andrew, I know Convert Digital and Gann have been working together for some time now. How did the this beautiful relationship form at the start?

SPEAKER_01: 5:57

Yeah, good question. I met Sylvan through a, I think it was a crisis call, wasn't it, Sylvan? You were running on a Magento environment, and at that point in time, Convert Digital wasn't uh just a Shopify Platinum partner. We're also servicing some Adobe and Magento customers at the same time. So Sylvan reached out to say, come fix my Magento site. I think at that point in time.

SPEAKER_02: 6:19

Don't you love those calls? It's like, have you got something exciting for me? No, no, no, you can come and fix my Magento site.

SPEAKER_01: 6:24

It was um and like we said yes, right? Like 100%. I think that the traffic at that point in time was uh hitting 500 concurrents and checkout would struggle to to process that that kind of volume, which um of a scaling brand like Ganner, that's clearly pretty problematic. So Sylvan said, yeah, can we can we have a chat? And we decided to go and catch up in the Torque E office. And at that point in time in Ghana's journey, the Talke office wasn't what it was today. Sylvan, it was a small mezzanine overlooking the full production line. We didn't have a screen to present on, it was just a chat with with Sylvan and Dom. We bonded, you know, pretty quickly and sort of said, Well, hey, we can go fix this Magento site, or there's this other thing out of here called Shopify. And that you know, that started that process. And, you know, Sylvan and and Dom and the team were pretty open to exploring that option at that point.

SPEAKER_02: 7:15

Awesome. Sylvan, was there a break point during COVID that made you pick up the phone?

SPEAKER_03: 7:19

Yes, very much, as uh Andrew kind of alluded to is the checkout, and we just couldn't ever get our Magento site to scale and run, you know, across multiple servers and just handle the traffic. And I remember we implemented like a waiting room type of app on the Magento site, and I would sit in the evenings because our peak traffic is probably you know 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. And I would sit in the evenings and I would just literally click on that waiting room thing and let people in and kind of manage how many people are on the website and how many is offered. It was just so you know intensive from a resource perspective trying to manage it. And I mean, I knew this is not how things should be. So yeah, got to my wit's end and then just called up Convert. And you know, we we were fairly sold on Magento at that point in time, to be honest. And we weren't necessarily looking to move. But when Andrew and the team said, look, there's there's probably a couple of different options for you. And I really liked the fact that they were, I guess, technology agnostic at that point in time and could kind of give us the pros and cons from different systems from different perspectives. And yeah, we were open to change because we were gonna change anyway. So whether it's gonna be the website itself or whether it's gonna be to a different platform, you know, we were open to listening to the pros and cons. And I think, you know, we were very convinced that Shopify is probably gonna be the better solution for us as a as more of a B2C kind of business rather than a B2B business. And so I just like the idea of never wanting to, you know, control a waiting room or a waiting list in the future. And, you know, I can honestly say that since we went live with Shopify, I have not had to touch our website once.

SPEAKER_02: 9:08

You mean you don't have to sit there at night while you're watching maths letting people go through the checkout?

SPEAKER_03: 9:13

Not at all. Not at all. And I mean, I guess from a volume perspective, back then our boxing day orders would be about a thousand orders for the day. Obviously a lot more visitors than than the orders, but now, you know, our last boxing day was about six and a half thousand orders for the day. And, you know, I've not had to touch the Shopify platform from a performance perspective at all. And that's been extremely freeing.

SPEAKER_02: 9:35

I could imagine coming from Magento, there would have been a fair bit of custom build there. And, you know, there's a pattern around CIOs and CTOs of building out the beautiful architecture because it is kind of design your own and you get to keep and you get to build a team, and we see this pattern playing out all the time. So I'm really intrigued to understand more around you giving up not only just moving a platform from Magento to Shopify, but I could imagine that it changes your whole org model and the roles and the responsibilities that you'll need in the team to grow and maintain this platform because it's a totally different structure, right, to where you've been before. What was the biggest pros and the biggest cons that you had in mind? And I'd love you to answer this as well, Andrew, as you're making that decision to go from Magento, but if we even if we put it as a custom-owned platform, even though Magento's not custom, so to speak, but over that many years of building it up, there would be a lot of customization in it. Going from that model to a Shopify model where you're following a roadmap, essentially. Where are the biggest pros and cons for retail like you?

SPEAKER_01: 10:34

I mean, Sylvan, I might jump in and take the one a little bit. We made a decision at that point in time that was probably going against the grain slightly when we decided to move the Shopify. We went down a headless implementation. So as far as any of those sacrifices were concerned, I'd say Silver, numb. Like it was all elevation and there was certainly no regression as far as you know the feature richness of the decisions that we were making. Yeah, at that point in time, and you know, we're talking five plus years ago, some of the considerations, uh, you know, why did we go down that path? You know, storefront 2.0 hadn't even been released from Shopify's perspective. So, you know, sections didn't exist. So being able to manage the content at scale that that Gander had, you know, the that catalogue of video imagery is ridiculous. Like, you know, we're serving 10 to 20 videos on PLPs and home pages and and whatnot, and managing that through Shopify at that point in time would have been, you know, just complicated, challenging. So that was one of the decisions we decided to go down the path of headless. Shopify had a hundred, you know, product variant limitation at that point in time. So to be able to go, I've got 20 different hoodies across 10 different sizes.

SPEAKER_02: 11:42

Some of the colour swatches I was looking at through the product list, some of the you've got up to like 50 colour swatches on some of those products. So that'll get pretty complicated pretty quickly.

SPEAKER_01: 11:51

And navigating through that without headless five years ago, it would have been really slow. Like so just click clicking around and the Gander team really wanted that mobile app like experience. So yeah, I would say we yeah, Sylvan, correct me if I'm wrong, but certainly no no regression in features all uh all uplift. Would you do headless again today? That's a good question. Look, in in 99% of cases, no. Like from Gander's perspective, though, yeah, we're going through that process in 17th. I think your team want to catch up, Sylvan, to to go through that that redesign and rescoping process. I think if you look at you know the customer today and and the needs of the customer and even the direction you know that Shopify is going with the chat GPT integration, like the priority is focusing on that checkout experience and meeting the customer where they are. If you know, and also there's some other decisions that you know that the Ghana business have made around leaning into Shopify for things like port of sale that you know might mean that we decide to to go down a liquid implementation, but at the same time, if we want to go down the path of some more bespoke app-like experiences from a customer perspective, it might lean it to endless. We just don't know yet.

SPEAKER_02: 12:59

Yeah. What's on your mind, Sylvan, for that meeting on the 17th? What's changed since you've launched on Shopify to where Shopify is today and where the business is today that you're really top of mind that you're like, this is a problem we've got to solve?

SPEAKER_03: 13:11

Yeah, look, I think firstly from a business perspective is just volume. You know, we've grown significantly, our range has grown significantly. We've got, you know, a couple of other brands that we're bringing on. And so kind of we're looking to expand, not just from a Gander perspective, but potentially in other brands and things like that. So we're we're needing to fulfill a situation where we can scale quickly across multiple brands, not just within one entity or one brand as such. So that's probably the biggest one for us right now. You know, I guess adding on to what Andrew said before is the biggest thing that I was looking at, and the biggest thing that I constantly look at for our business when we put new technology in is having efficiency and not having to have significant resources that can run something. So for us, you know, everything comes down to automation and ensuring that it takes us from a staff resource perspective, it takes just as long to, you know, for instance, upload a product list of a thousand items as it does to take a product list of 10,000 items. There should be no difference. And so we're constantly, you know, we try and run as lean as possible. And everything that we do is always with the outlook of how can we scale. So if our business increased by 10 times what it is now, will we still run with this same amount of lean resources that we've got at the moment? So it's always about it's always looking that way. And so we're kind of willing to walk that extra mile at the start to ensure that we get that efficiency down the track. That long-term payoff. Yeah, and that was probably one of the major key decision makers or key decision points when we did go the headless way back then. We felt like it was going to give us those kind of things, uh, those options, and then the ability to, you know, potentially pull some technology out and replace it with other pieces of technology yet down the track. And yeah, as Andrew said, we're going through the business in a is in a very different place now. And, you know, in the past, we used to we called it reskinning the website, right? So basically building a brand new website pretty much every two years prior to going onto Shopify. And we're now going to our you know, second iteration of Shopify, but that re effectively by the time it goes live, it'll be six years later. So, you know, the amount of longevity that we've gotten from it is good. And people may ask, well, why do you have to do it again? But you know, there's a lot of new technology that Shopify has released that, you know, our bills just don't have in, and so just hasn't incorporated that. And so we just feel like this is a really good time from a business perspective in terms of our growth and where we want to go to and scale to, you know, this is a good opportunity for us to kind of revisit that and see which pieces of the puzzle we'll keep the same and then which other pieces we're going to replace with, you know, hopefully something better.

SPEAKER_02: 15:57

Yeah. Andrew, we've spoken about this before in that the lines are blurring between a redesign and a re-platform and a new platform. You know what I mean? Like before it was like we're switching from one platform to the next, or we're going from Magento 1 to Magento 2. But to Sylvan's points, there is like sometimes you just need to reshape core parts of the build, not the whole thing, or you know what I mean? It's not as straightforward as a re-platform versus rebuild anymore. Are you still finding that?

SPEAKER_01: 16:23

Totally. I think with a solid foundation and design system, you know, certainly that uplift becomes a lot more seamless than it used to be. Uh, and we're not going through this like constant refactoring or or re-engineering process or or rebuilding process. I think the expectation of the customer or the retailer is to you know get that longevity and like you know, you might call it sweat the asset or like whatever terminology you you put around it. But it's uh you just hit the bingo card there. Well done. Yeah, exactly. But you know, it is a testament to the effort that you know Sylvan and the team and you know our our team went into building this thing five years ago that it still looks and performs unbelievably. Yeah, that's that's definitely um you know the expectation, I think, moving forward, is that you know you can you know have that longevity.

SPEAKER_02: 17:10

It's a beautiful site and it doesn't strike you as a Shopify build straight away. And I don't say that in a negative way, it's a lot of people take the templates or or what's out there and go, well, that's good enough from a design perspective. You can tell that there's been a lot of design and UX put in over the top that's relevant for the Gander offering and the Gander customer. Sylvan, how do you approach this as CIO to make sure that there's a good balance of tech and design in what you're putting out there?

SPEAKER_03: 17:37

I guess to be honest, I just stay out of the way of the designers and let them do what they do, right? I'm not necessarily a very design-oriented person. I'm kind of more about, you know, the the workings behind the scene type of thing. So I think a lot of that is to do with allowing the right people to do the right things and not not necessarily wanting to micromanage everything. But at the same time, I guess, you know, we've got a strong design team who really wants to convey our brand. And when people, as you say, you know, kind of click on our website, they can go, wow, I'm with Gander. And it it should be almost to the point that even if you don't see the Gander logo, you should just feel that it's Gander. And so having Convert in this process is hugely important for us because they are the guys that kind of can say, okay, well, this is what your design team wants, but this is also what you want from a process flow behind the scenes. And here's the piece of technology that's going to allow us to make that happen. So, you know, we've been very, very happy with our relationship with Convert. They truly have been, you know, not just kind of business partners, but business advisors for us in terms of where we want to go. And I think um, you know, when you have that trust in those advisory roles, that goes a long way because, you know, we do fashion on a daily basis. We don't necessarily do web sites on a daily basis. And so we're dependent on Convert to say, hey, you know, well, maybe have you thought about this or have you thought about that? So, you know, and especially right at the start. I mean, if you want the everybody's input into it and want to build the perfect site or, you know, the perfect system from the start, it's never gonna happen. You have to at some stage sacrifice a little bit of, I guess, kind of some user experience, maybe or some performance just to get like a minimum viable product out there. And then you can start.

SPEAKER_02: 19:22

Knowing that it's not the end.

SPEAKER_03: 19:24

Correct. And it's uh, but you've got to start somewhere. Yeah. And so I would say, you know, as great as our website does look at the moment, that was not what it was on day one. You know, that's a culmination of the last six years worth of work. And I guess that was, again, one of the main reasons why we did go down that Shopify headless solution back then, is so that we can constantly evolve rather than having to build something brand new every couple of years.

SPEAKER_02: 19:49

And you mentioned before that you you do run very lean. Most people looking at the site wouldn't go, oh, this is a lean team. Like it doesn't, it doesn't scream lean. But is that more from a process perspective in terms of making sure what teams are looking after what? So allowing your design team and your front-end team the liberty to have all the data available to them in a safe way that, you know, can't be messed up, separating the front end and the back end so that the front-end team can do exactly what they need to deliver that customer experience.

SPEAKER_03: 20:17

Absolutely. I mean, it's as simple as basically, you know, your design team creating imagery that they were going to use for the product and you know, banners and all those kind of things. And instead of them having to log into the website and have to go to every area where they want to upload it and click upload, we've just got a system where they just drop it in a folder and it automatically gets uploaded. Right. What system is that?

SPEAKER_02: 20:38

Is that custom built?

SPEAKER_03: 20:40

It's all custom built. Yeah. So things like that just allows the designer to not necessarily have knowledge of the technology. They do what they are good at. They design the imagery and they drop it in a section and the rest gets taken care of. And to me, you know, that's automation from that perspective.

SPEAKER_01: 20:57

But to get there is like from a you know, engineering and design perspective, I think it's about like getting the right people in the room for those discussions. So like when we're showing up with the Ganda team on the 17th, you've got Blake, head of engineering, Kylie solutions, Matt, head of design. Like everyone's having these discussions to not only think about, okay, what's the customer experience, but like what is that staff experience? So, you know, the fact that Gander's dropping those files into a folder, we're picking that up through cloud and area. It doesn't matter the size of the imagery either, right? Like we're just doing all that automation in the back end to you know make sure that staff experience is we want to get this product in market as quickly as possible, both the actual product, but you know, also the engineering component of the product.

SPEAKER_02: 21:37

Is that a common setup that you've seen, Andrew, with other clients around having the design team stay out of the Shopify backend? Or because I mean if we look at the Shopify backend, it's pretty simple, especially for us who've been in e-commerce compared to the old Magento ones or the WordPress ones, like where it's a bit more complicated or even custom. Most of us look at Shopify backend to go, it's pretty simple. But again, from a design perspective, if it's just wasting their time logging in and not actually doing the designing, it's it's a really great idea.

SPEAKER_01: 22:03

Is it common? I'd probably say no, but like depending on the product and uh retailer or customer that we're dealing with, like you're talking about you know, Gander's product lifecycle management. It's fast. Like it's it's super fast. I think Sylvan, you know, you guys have told stories about you know testing and trialing a product in to the point where you're printing limited runs in Torque and then going, okay, that really worked. Let's just let's push this into mass production and those decisions happening within days. So like to be able to do that at scale and have people do a lot of manual work just doesn't make any sense.

SPEAKER_02: 22:35

Yeah, that makes sense. Sylvan, um you've now got me curious. The automations that you speak about, that's a great example, that one for the design team, being able to drop into a folder and have them publish on the website. What are some of the other key automations that you've got in place that you think separate Gander and allow you to run so lean?

SPEAKER_03: 22:51

Well, I think, you know, probably the one that we're really pushing towards right now is uh Shopify pause. You know, an example of that is instead of having an ERP that integrates with a point of sale system and Shopify to get master data up and down is just, you know, the moment the products are available online, they're available through our Shopify Pause platform, you know. And so we're starting to roll out Shopify Pause. We've got it in four outlets at the moment. We're just I was just speaking to Andrew before, and we're rolling out what we call QBusters, which is the, you know, just basically handhelds that people use that we'll use in our stores. So we're we're actually currently running a Sage point of sale, which we're converting slowly to Shopify point of sale, but that process takes time because there's hardware, you know, brand new tills and printers and all those kind of things that needs to go into the stores. But we actually can now run a hybrid of their Sage point of sale and then bring these Shopify POS QBusters in at the same time.

SPEAKER_02: 23:51

So you're running it alongside your existing point of sale?

SPEAKER_03: 23:54

Correct. And then we're just pulling it into our ERP combined so that you know our staff can see all the data in one platform and basically do their end-of-day cash-ups and and make sure that they you know balance across both systems. But the fact that we've already got the integration of the website and the ERP sorted just meant that the POS integration is already there, you know. And so it's I guess one, it's it's about building, I guess, what what I would classify as smarter integrations and solutions, but sometimes just going for the lower low-hanging fruit as well. Like the option is already there. So why would I want to do something else? You know, so we're yeah, we're moving to that space where you know, in the new year, probably by April, May next year, we'll be 100% on a Shopify platform from a sales perspective. So that'll be both from e-commerce and from a point of sale perspective. And you know, it's gonna enhance our customer experience significantly because customers will be able to see their transactions both from in-store as well as online in one platform and allow us to serve them better and you know, give them better, I guess, access through things like loyalty and things like that. So yeah, we're very excited about it. And but yeah, that's just a great example, I think, of simplifying you know, automations and integrations.

SPEAKER_02: 25:11

I can imagine you'll have an eagle eye on those four stores over peak trade to see what impact it has on customer experience, even sales if you've got store associates wandering around stores being able to get people out pretty quickly.

SPEAKER_03: 25:22

Well, we actually so we we implemented that in December last year, and we actually specifically did it to see how it went over peak period. And, you know, I guess to give you an indication, we've got a uh a Torquey outlet that, you know, torquey ghosts just gangbusters over summer, you know, and they would do about a hundred transactions a day, and then on New Year's Day, they did about 980 transactions. You know, so the question is how do you scale to serve that amount of customers in a quick amount of time, right? And so we actually ran Shopify Pause with two Q Busters, and we, although there was lines and and waiting, as you can imagine, for that a number of transactions, we didn't expect that many people. So we'll we'll top them up with an extra couple of Q Busters this season. But you know, they were able to get through it, and and we've had through no fault of our own, but there's been power outages and things like that, and Shopify Pause has has performed in an offline capability, and so you know, that's we've we really have used our outlets like a proof of concept to prove itself before we can roll it out to our full price stores.

SPEAKER_01: 26:28

What I found really interesting with that, and um my business partner Aaron from Make Retail was involved with with Sylvan and and that project over December last year. The change management side of things, Sylvan, you said like staff just didn't even need to be showed how to use the the system and just jumped into it straight away. And then, you know, you and Aaron were sort of standing there and said, Hey, look, someone just played with their watch in the middle of it, queue. That was interesting, and like the staff just um adopted it so quickly.

SPEAKER_02: 26:54

Yeah, I know Aaron and the team at Make Retail just rolled out, they were the first to hit over a hundred stores with Nutrition Warehouse, rolling out Shopify Pods, which is pretty incredible. Are you finding that most retailers who are going on a transformation at this scale are taking Sylvan's approach of putting Shopify Pods alongside existing to test, learn, not overly disrupt, or are they doing the the rip and shift model?

SPEAKER_01: 27:18

Uh I'd say a combination of of both. I think you know, once that decision has been made and and the lean-in is happening, it's a you know that rapid progression, as Sylvan said, like the team are rapidly trying to adopt it. I think there's some other projects going on in the background that have been a priority, Sylvan, this year. But I think the proof of concept approach works for some, but people that are, you know, have been highly involved in in Shopify are pretty comfortable with making that move logically quickly. Yeah, that makes sense.

SPEAKER_02: 27:44

Sylvan, I'm really interested. You mentioned multi-brand before, and I've just worked on a project with another client around setting up multi-brand on plus. It's a lot more complicated than people think about. You know, it looks like really simple. Well, the good ones look simple because there's just different brand tabs at the top of a page, but we know there's a lot of complexity under that. For anyone who is maybe considering a multi-brand presence on the one site, what advice or lessons do you have from that experience?

SPEAKER_03: 28:11

Well, we're definitely not there yet. You know, I think what has counted in our favor. So we've got another brand, for instance, at the moment called Karma. And with Karma, what we've done is we've just set up its own complete Shopify environment. And they use Shopify pause. You know, they only had a couple of stores at the start. So we were kind of like, we can make some mistakes here. And I think that's the other thing is, you know, you've got to be willing to make mistakes, be willing to test the waters and say, you know, if the mistake happens, that's fine, we'll take it on the chin. But we've got a fallback option, you know, if and when that happens. And so I guess from an internal perspective, we've got different designers working on the Karma brand than the Gander brand. And so it's got, it really has its own identity. And when we meet up with Convert, you know, in in a couple of weeks, that will be something that we, I guess, try to push on in terms of with our new platform that we want to go to. How can we have multi-brands but keep them fairly, you know, potentially quite distinct in terms of you know what the page layouts look like and all those kind of things, right? Because we want them to have their own identity. We don't want them to just be another gander with a different logo. Yes. And I think that's important because that's how you build a brand rather than just, you know, trying to copy another one.

SPEAKER_02: 29:29

That's right. Andrew, what are the benefits that you see in brands that take a multi-brand approach within the one experience versus separating them out as separate sites?

SPEAKER_01: 29:39

It's like the most simplistic answer to that question is checkout.

SPEAKER_00: 29:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 29:43

But having said that, like Shopify's got some functionality that's like kind of like watch this space as far as checkout is concerned, and you know, amalgamating multiple brands into a single checkout experience through across like domain strategy is something that's like not impossible moving forward. But I think, yeah, certainly the the benefit. Is in the checkout, the benefit is in you know leveraging an existing brand's presence and and you know leveraging that asset to be able to push across. I think the you know the challenge comes in trying to define and create that experience that it doesn't make you feel like you're getting you know pushed and shoved left, right, and center between your brand X and brand Y. And also like where you've navigated from too, right? Like if you've come from a social experience that looks like a kid's product into a Gander environment, I don't want to be pushed into an adult world where I'm seeing that kind of different kind of content that's you know not necessarily relevant to the advertisement or experience that I've seen. So I think we've done that as good as we can in the existing sort of technology stack that we've got with the Gander experience. But yeah, I'm really keen to see what our team come up with when we uh we move to the next site.

SPEAKER_02: 30:48

Speaking of checkout, I know that checkout is a sensitive area, especially this time of year. We don't want to mess around with it too much. But we also know that Shopify have lifted the lid on what we can do to it. For a long time, Shopify was like, don't touch the checkout. We know what we're doing. We've got best in class practice, but I know Gander has a few little customizations in the checkout. Based on what you're seeing so far, where do you think you get the most value in customizing the checkout? Sylvan, I might start with you there.

SPEAKER_03: 31:17

I think Andrew is better, better place to answer that question, to be honest. For me, um, you know, uh I guess where we're sitting right now is that our checkout works really well and conversion rates are good. I mean, we're we're constantly trying to see how we can get that better, but you know, the functionality is good. And so for me, it's not as much as what we can do right now as it is, you know, what's our next step with the next platform that we want to go to. So once we, you know, re-platform this or or decide on what our next version is of the Shopify platform, you know, then we'll kind of reassess that in a little bit more detail.

SPEAKER_01: 31:52

But yeah, I'll let Andrew give you more detail on that. I mean, Ganner are in a really fortunate position with us when we went through this process. We were open to some beta access to checkout extensibility. So we were, you know, one of the first in uh well globally actually to be working on Shopify checkout customizations. That started with some like really simplistic use cases around product cross-sell, product upsell in checkout. That then led into okay, well, how do we automate this? Yeah, going back to Sylvan's point around the importance of automation, you know, they use Search Spring for search and and merch or athos. So we said, okay, well, we'll kill you for calling it search string. Yeah, well, yeah, maybe we'll just cut that bit. And like we've got all these automatables sitting over here, right? It's like, well, let's just leverage those and pull those into checkout. So search spring is Athos is now driving all that automation with product upsell and like the the I think you know, you know, I'll have to ask Blake and and Sil in particular around the the success of that, but it's a you know ridiculous uptake as far as conversion is concerned. That then, yeah, that just that one project that we did with with Silvan and the team actually led into us productising you know that in what's now called checkout components. So Blackout Head of Engineering runs that that business and that that project, which is used on over 500 merchants globally and uh allows customers to you know not only do things like upsell and cost-sell and checkout, but you know, messaging, localization, a bunch of different stuff.

SPEAKER_02: 33:16

Yeah, I loved it. I've obviously gone deep in checkout components recently and just seeing the ability to add one click additional items into checkout, but even do things like add a donation or promote loyalty or promote new ranges within the checkout is really clever because I think we're seeing that shift now, aren't we? That the shopping journey doesn't stop once we get to checkout, which is kind of like, well, we've done what we can here, we're done. We're also seeing checkout as a sales opportunity and also post-checkout with you know, upsells, cross sells, add to your order, all that sort of stuff. So the journey is getting longer.

SPEAKER_01: 33:51

Well, not only that, like you think about the agentic stuff, it's like your experience with the brand might start with checkout. Like I'm going through finding a product, purchasing it straight through the agentic experience, and I'm hit with okay, now I'm with the brand. Now I'm talking to you. So yeah, I think that you know we are trying to surface a lot more in that experience than traditionally just trying to capture a bunch of information.

SPEAKER_02: 34:12

Speaking of information, Sylvan, you've got an incredibly complex setup there, 110 stores, multi-brand, online, offline. What's your approach to customer data? I know that's a shit question, it's a very broad question, but how are you making sure that with first party customer data is such a strong asset? I've got a feeling that you've got some really great automations in place to make sure that the right data is collected, organized, put in a central source of truth to make sure the right teams can get it. What's your philosophy on making sure that that's available?

SPEAKER_03: 34:44

Well, I think about 18 months ago or so, we we kicked off a project with Convert of implementing a CDP and basically starting to store some data in that. We've been doing and storing that data for about the last 12 months. So we're probably just at a point where we can start to get to a point where we can actually use their data in a significant way. And, you know, that's all about what people browse, what they're looking for. Obviously, user, you know, or uh personal identification is all, you know, hidden and anonymous and all those kind of things. So that was fairly important for us. You know, I guess things like having to be PCI compliant with payments and all that type of stuff. We've taken that complexity out of the way by handling all payments through Shopify. So we've just gone, you know what, we're not even going to touch that because I think that could be a big black hole that you can get down to into, and especially when it comes to cybersecurity and things like that. So I guess we've gone and taken the easy approach. But you know, we've been gathering that data to really kind of want to start, and that'll be part of the new platform as well, really focus on personalization so that when you know you as a customer are coming onto our site and we can recognize you and you know, you look at men's clothing, that we don't serve you with, you know, the next woman's genes that's coming out and things like that, which is just useless. And then other things like you know, localization so that you're actually seeing the type of product that is is running well for your area based on geographical locations because you know, Gandal runs both, you know, we we've got quite a bit of a following in the US, and so and obviously their seasons are you know opposite to ours. And then, you know, just even in Australia, we've got stores down to Hobart, and then we've got one in Broome, and their climate is very, very different.

SPEAKER_02: 36:27

Um, you know, surfware is selling in Hobart.

SPEAKER_03: 36:30

It's surprising actually that there's quite a bit, but obviously they, you know, so we we kind of classify stores a little bit between the geographical locations, and so from physically what we put in stores to versus what they, you know, what we want to show users when they come onto our website will be kind of quite specific to that. So we've been on a process to go, how do we get there? But it's not a flick of a switch, right? You've got to invest in the infrastructure and get the information because information is is key, and you've got to kind of you know capture that information over a period of time before you can start using that. And so we're just about at that point where we can start using that, and then that'll be part of the the new platform that we're gonna roll out. Alongside with that, we're actually working with Make Retail on a project that we're looking at, you know, at camera systems within our in our stores, really giving us an opportunity to view where people are browsing within the stores themselves. Because from a website perspective, it's easy, right? Because you can have people click and they they can browse and you can kind of capture the the interaction. Like from a store perspective, how do we know which areas of our stores are really hot spot areas? And then is it to do with the location in the store? Is it to do with the product in that location? And just kind of being able to really analyze that data and then, you know, serve the customers better ultimately in terms of that. Because if we see that customers keep hanging or clogging in a in the corner at the back of the store, well, maybe it's better for us to bring that a little bit more to the front of the store where there's a bit more space or things like that.

SPEAKER_02: 37:58

So and is all that camera data, is the intent there to have that AI analyzed? Because I can imagine it's not like the uh the old camera systems where you're trying to work out patterns manually.

SPEAKER_03: 38:07

Yeah, very AI analyzed and you know, just even looking at things like conversion rates. So for instance, you know, how many people have gone to the change room who then actually go to checkout? You know, and so is our staff serving our customers really well in store, or do we need to give more training to our staff in terms of you know, how do they work with the customers to get those conversion rates up and things like that? So it's it's all about you know serving the staff and our customers better and you know what opportunities do we have that we're potentially just missing out on just because we just don't know what we don't know.

SPEAKER_02: 38:40

Yeah, Andrew, we had David from Lexa on a few weeks ago, obviously co-founded the Lexa CDP. What's your view then on how retailers are using customer data? Because you're working with a lot of retailers who do have physical and online stores, huge amounts of data, can get really complex. I love the approach that you talked about, Sylvan, is like let's take 12 months to collect the right data and to have a really strong database before actually trying to implement it and frustrate customers or frustrate our team with incomplete data. What is your approach to a central source of data? Do you generally have it in Shopify most of the time, or do most of your customers move towards a CDP model?

SPEAKER_01: 39:18

I think it depends on like where you're at in your journey, right? It's a data maturity discussion and like how we're handling data. Certainly, depending on where you're at in that scale will depend on what system we're talking to when it comes to data. As far as like serving the customer, though, like we do really need to structure that information where the customer lives. So, you know, the front end being Shopify, having a really in-depth conversation during the discovery process around data, you know, everything from content through to customer order product, and making sure we architect that right so that depending on where you're at on that journey, when we are ready, we can do something useful with that information. Like if we don't get the product schema stuff right at the start or the content architecture or whatever it might be, it becomes useless and like really hard to manage down the track to the point where it's like we have to blow this thing up and start again.

SPEAKER_02: 40:08

What's the biggest mistake there that you see with the product schema?

SPEAKER_01: 40:11

Like just replicating what we have from an old system and trying to shoehorn it into a new system. So, like, you know, when we talk about data migration from a Salesforce or Magento, it's like, let's just dump this thing and put it across. So it's just not going through the process of you know, that proper solution design up front.

SPEAKER_02: 40:26

Okay. Gents, you're giving us so much both on the incredible growth of Gander and how you've set your team up to be lean, but also set up to scale. Incredible journey so far. And I'm excited just listening to, I want to be like a float on the wall in that meeting that's coming up to hear where you're going because it sounds like you've got some big ideas and plans for the next five to ten years as well that you're thinking ahead for now. If I was to ask both of you what you're most excited about, around what's innovative or what's going to be the future of retail, where do your minds go? Sylvan, I'm gonna ask you. If we go beyond, we've talked a lot around the basics, the getting the customer data right, the product data right, making sure customers have good experience, good design, good brand. What excites you the most? Where do you think we can blow the lid off?

SPEAKER_03: 41:13

I think the part that's the most exciting for me is being able to bring in-store data and merge that with online data, especially with our customer base. We have a lot of people who will buy in-store, but also will buy online at the same time. You know, I guess giving them that true kind of omnichannel experience and that they, I guess for our customers, feel like Gandha's Ganda, whether I'm on the website, get served by, you know, getting a parcel in the in the mail or whether I'm in the store itself. But I think that browsing experience type of thing, so that whole CDP framework of getting the online data, but also then the analytics from the vision in store, getting that together, to me, I think that just kind of completes the picture and really will go a massive way towards us serving our customers better. And so it's just more about analyzing that data. And the data is really king in the whole process because ultimately, you know, if the customers are not happy, then they're not gonna buy. So I think if you're in this journey not to enhance the customer experience, then you know, you're probably just barking up the wrong tree a little bit. Or you're gonna spend time and effort on things that's not necessarily gonna equate to a return on investment at the end of the day.

SPEAKER_02: 42:29

Yeah. And that makes a lot of sense, that that direction, given that the scale of your business, I can imagine the pipelines of data that you're getting getting bigger and bigger every day. And that's leading with automations in mind that you're going, well, how can I use this data in a more effective way? We're not having to manually make changes or recommendations or whatever, whatever way it is to keep your team lean and then leaning into that to deliver a great customer experience. It comes together really nicely. Andrew, what about you? What's exciting you? What's getting you pumped up at the moment?

SPEAKER_01: 42:57

Oh, I mean, if you look at the evolution of convert as an agency, like we've been around for 12 years now, you know, when we first started, like highly focused on web development, e-commerce, and you know, those conversations evolved into omni-channel, into you know, what's now called, you know, we consider unified commerce. And, you know, we're no longer an e-commerce delivery agency, we're commerce delivery agency, it's you know, commerce anywhere, retail everywhere. You know, we started the retail practice in Make Retail last year. You know, those conversations are evolving rapidly and the growth of that piece of our business is evolving rapidly. This next gen analytics stuff that Sylvan's been referencing is like super exciting. And I think, you know, being able to meet the customer where they are and service that customer is Silvan I'm sort of referring to, is what's really exciting. You know, being able to have deeper conversations and this digital asset that exists over here, it's like what is that customer experience everywhere? And how are we supporting that journey?

SPEAKER_02: 43:50

Yeah, and I love following your journey, not only because we've known each other for a long time and you're a great supporter of the show, but just seeing how you've evolved when there's so many development agencies, and I'm not putting in that category, but traditional development agencies who are shitting themselves with AI and what's coming, right? Because anyone can build a website now. So then what becomes your point of difference? And I think you've done a great job at expanding out your point of difference. We heard how Sylvan was talking about having you there as consultants to help guide the strategy, to help guide the direction, not just build stuff is a fantastic testament to what you and the team are doing. So congratulations. Thank you. Appreciate it. Gents, thank you so much for joining us today. That was a great case study, and I've loved, you know, going over those last five years. You've given us lots to think about in terms of how we set up e-commerce for the future to scale, to stay lean, and to automate to deliver a really great customer experience. So thank you so much. Thank you. There we go. How lucky are we to get that undercover view of what's really going on at Gander? They're someone that I've admired for a long time. And based on the parcels that come through my front door for my wife and my children constantly from Gander, I've always wondered how they keep up with the demand and what's behind those systems that make those parcels turn up so regularly and always on time. Here are three ideas that I took out of that conversation with Andrew and Stillvan, which caught my attention. Number one, the no-touch e-commerce model. It's come up a few times in conversations for the idea of running lean. Now you wouldn't think an organization like Gander, who does a lot of production in-house, has over 110 stores, and a huge footprint would be associated with lean. But the way that Stillwin described it was that they're making decisions, especially around technology, that they know will scale with them, that they don't need to keep adding resources, team, or money to keep growing them. Once that decision's made, they're made as scalable decisions to handle whatever growth may throw at them. Now, of course, that doesn't mean that they might not have to revisit some of those decisions in further down the track. As we heard, they're coming up to one right now. But when they make the decisions, they're thinking what will scale with us for the next three, four, five years, and knowing that they'll get their return over that time, not in the next 12 months. I love that idea of making decisions around a no-touch scalable e-commerce model. Secondly, pods as a secondary system. We don't often hear this. We have heard a lot lately around Shopify pods and how retailers are adopting this as a simplified way to take pods in store, to have one view of the customer, and to give store associates the ability to be with the customer on the shop floor with transactions with them everywhere they go. However, it's usually talked about as a replacement for the existing pod system, which is often a legacy and tied to other systems. The way that Gander has approached it, at least in this early model of it, is to have it as a secondary system alongside their existing POS so they can trial it and not disrupt too much. I really like that approach. And if all it's doing at the start is allowing your store associates and team to have all the customers' information with them wherever they are on the shop front to allow you to check out customers anywhere in the store and to kind of give those CubeBuster capabilities when times get really, really busy, I think that's a nice add-on. Number three, and the last one I've got for you, and I'm not just saying this because they've brought you this episode, is the art of agency partnership. You can hear it in this dynamic that this is definitely a partnership, not a retailer-ventor relationship. As you've heard, they've built this solution over five years together and they spoke like colleagues, not necessarily internal, external parties. And that's what true relationships look like. Agencies need to bring strategic and commercial thinking to the forefront to be of value and to get that relationship. And retailers need to embrace that they've gone to external subject matter experts to get that strategic input and advice, not just be order takers. When you can find a relationship that brings both of those parties together, you get something that magnifies the output and magnifies the results like you saw today with Gander and Convert Digital. That's everything from this very special episode with Gander Clothing and Convert Digital. If you want to know more about Convert Digital and get in touch with Andrew, you can see the brands that they're helping. There's lots of case studies on their website. Everyone from Age to Cocoa Black to ShowPo to Brand Collective, go on there and see the work that they're doing. They're doing some great work across development design strategic consultation. Go check them out, convertdigital.com.au. We thank them again for their support. Until next time, we hope this is giving you a little bump in the middle of the week. We'll see you again on Friday.