by Tom Shackleton
By combining targeted social ads with CRO and a great Shopify store, one of our clients Floor Candy has found a niche in an otherwise saturated and highly competitive market. They’ve also seen some great initial success on their mission to make bland, poor quality rugs a thing of the past.
We caught up with Floor Candy’s founder, Tom Selby, to find out why they chose rugs to start their eCommerce adventure and what strategies they’d employed to find their early success.
Why did you start Floor Candy?
Floor Candy make the highest quality rugs, with materials sourced from as far away as New Zealand. So, first, we wanted to find out how and why Tom got started in such a niche, highly skilled area.
- “I previously worked at a communications agency who specialised in home products and home retail. A large part of my role was mapping out potential new markets for us to move into. I found that the home furnishings sector was quite saturated when it comes to broad home product retailers like Barker and Stonehouse or Home Sense, but there are few pure play online retailers _(_Made.com, for example, have had massive success).”
It’s really interesting to see how Floor Candy found a gap in such a saturated market, and Tom had another great point to make on how they stand out from established brands.
- “Many of them have large expensive store footprints, complicated supply chains and an inability to be flexible or agile. It can take them a long time to adjust to customer needs. _I began to look into product specialist stores and felt that specifically rugs, floor coverings and soft furnishings were under serviced. Many of the specialist websites were old, poorly designed or chock-full of the same products. I started Floor Candy to change that.”
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What's been the biggest challenge so far?
Every new eCommerce business faces challenges, and we wanted to find out what the most difficult part of getting started and bringing in some initial sales has been for Tom and Floor Candy.
- “It’s been learning what sells and why, then optimising that. Driving traffic is all well and good but you will live and die by your conversion rate!”
What are your ambitions and plans for the future?
After such a great start, we wanted to find out where Tom sees Floor Candy going in the future, and it looks like the answer is expansion and growth…
- “I'd like the brand to evolve into wider home accessories and really begin to broaden our exclusive own design products.”
How are you using marketing to grow?
With ambitions plans for growth and expansion, using marketing will be an important part of achieving Floor Candy’s goals into the future. We asked Tom how they’ve been using marketing to take the business forward.
- “We've been focusing on paid social and PPC advertising to drive traffic, we now also have a big focus on conversion rate optimisation, working with Statement to maximise our sales. It’s fantastic to see Tom and Floor Candy putting a strong focus on CRO and paid advertising. This is something that we believe is so key for a startup eCommerce business, and should build a great foundation for long-term success."
Any top tips for future start-ups?
Having been through the process of starting and beginning to build an eCommerce business, we wanted to find out what Tom’s advice would be for any future start-up embarking on the same adventure.
According to Tom;
- “First of all, the best thing you can do is actually… do it. Most people want to, but don't take the plunge. If you do, then also don't expect overnight success. It takes time and perseverance in order to see results.”
Finally - how did you hear about Statement?
- “My little black book…”
A bright future for Floor Candy
Floor Candy’s early success is undoubtably down to the fact that they’ve invested plenty of time, money and passion into their new business. Opening an online store is often the easy part, but Floor Candy have the dedication and attention to detail to make the startup a great success.
So many new eCommerce businesses don’t invest the money required to get a fledgling brand off the ground, and Floor Candy is a good example of how investing early on can build a foundation for the future, and drive initial results.
With a strong passion for home furnishings, and a clear route forward, the future looks bright for Floor Candy. We can’t wait to see them shake up the established names in homewares and bring us all rugs with personality.
Interested in finding out how Statement can help your eCommerce business with a Shopify or Shopify Plus store and marketing? Feel free to get in touch with our team and we’d be happy to help.
