Stacks and Stacks shapes up and ships out
After an extensive review of its 2005 shipping costs and processes, Stacks and Stacks Homewares fine-tuned costs to help improve its bottom line this year. The review enabled the company to better gauge actual shipping costs to help lessen the impact of freight on the company’s overall financial status.
Additionally, Stacks and Stacks reviewed its free shipping program.
“We’ve decided to be far more selective on which items we offer free shipping. Free shipping can be an enormous drain on profits, especially when you sell furniture and other large items,” says president Mel Ronick. “Clothing has a relatively low cost for shipping, so it’s a great marketing tool to offer free shipping on such products. With clothing, it’s much easier to ‘give up’ a few margin points.”
On a different front, the company is augmenting its technology infrastructure. It is installing a new web platform, replacing its point-of-sale system to fully integrate accounting and inventory, and upgrading its credit card authorization system.
In 2005 the company stacked up $15.3 million in online sales, a 33.3% increase over 2004’s $11.5 million, according to Internet Retailer estimates. Ronick declines to provide sales figures but reports that 90% of company sales are online with the remaining 10% coming from its catalog and lone retail store. He projects 25% to 35% total sales growth in 2006. According to an estimate from WebTrends Inc., the site had more than 800,000 unique visitors in January.
Stacks and Stacks Homewares maintains nearly 14,000 SKUs, works with more than 1,000 vendors, and has been in business for 21 years.
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