Jane Garner shares her view as partner with Adam Davies in Deadgoodundies.com, online only retailer of men’s underwear and swimwear brands from all over the world since 2007.
How has the COVID-19 crisis affected online sales? Have you noticed spikes or dips in particular product groups
Not as much as we feared but sales yoyo by the day. We are fortunate that men’s underwear, unlike lingerie, sells consistently throughout the year without seasonal peaks like Christmas – and men, in particular DGU customers, are extremely loyal to the brands they like, and to us. Customers are being careful with their money, buying lower priced products, often a single pair, and of course swimwear is pretty much a no-no at the moment.
How are you retaining your customer loyalty during the COVID-19 crisis?
The Deadgoodundies.com partners are providing the same service as usual, with no staff, by handling all deliveries and outgoing parcels ourselves. Social distancing is no problem with just the two of us in separate rooms, and minimal contact with only one or two posties or delivery drivers each day via our remote control front door. The only significant changes are that the weekday cut-off for orders to ship same day was 4pm and that’s now 11am and parcels are taking longer to arrive, but customers understand why.
Have you had problems in deliveries from your own suppliers?
Not too many – one cannot deliver because their European distribution centre has shut down and another has had to cancel two small collections of men’s underwear due this autumn, which is a shame but not a crisis.
Have you had problems getting your orders out to your customers?
Our main service is Royal Mail who came up with new timings quickly and, with understandable delays, continue to work well for us.
With deliveries slower than normal have you extended the customers’ return period for unwanted/incorrect purchases?
Yes, of course.
Do you use social media to keep in touch with customers – how big a part does this play in promoting your online business? Are you considering adding any new media such as Skype, Zoom to keep in touch
We do use social media which is great for awareness and keeping in contact with customers. We deliver to more than 80 countries and our regulars prefer the direct contact of our newsletter and the blog on Deadgoodundies which keeps them up to date on new arrivals and news from DGU. They particularly liked our post about Nigel the statue when Shrewsbury was hit by massive flooding from the River Severn – twice – just before Covid-19 came along.
Have you been using other online platforms such as E-bay?
Yes, we are multichannel and purely online. But the vast majority of our sales every day are through our main site.
Realistically how do you think this will affect your online business for the rest of this year and perhaps even further down the line?
We hold and ship all our own stock which is a definite advantage because we have good levels of NOS men’s underwear and swimwear and early deliveries of SS20 collections in hand. There might be some knock-on effect with gaps in the weeks and months to come but as we stock each brand in depth and offer more than a dozen brands, we have alternatives and our customers trust us to make suggestions. Financially as a small business we are used to working on a tight budget so we expect things to be tricky but not impossible. The government funding for furloughed staff is great, but we’re hoping they will be back long before three months is up.
Do you think you are being well enough informed by national government?
Yes, though you have to be patient between the broad brush stroke announcements and the detail coming through. I’ve been following the government websites and UKFT whose advice and updates have been really useful – very clear and relevant.
Have you had difficulties accessing or getting information on the Business Interruption Loan?
We’re lucky enough not to need one now and hope we won’t.
Can you take advantage for yourself and/or any full or part time staff of the Job Retention Scheme?
We’re partners not company directors so we can’t be furloughed and it’s unlikely we will qualify for freelance support either. But our staff are furloughed on full pay for three months.
Have you had any difficulty with your landlord/s?
Nope – still paying as normal. Keeps him happy.
Where can online retailers put their energy to future-proof their business e.g. digital assets, niche products and your ‘public’ image to customers?
We are already planning a new website this year and continue with the original schedule of work on that. We always work very hard on SEO and if you keep at it steadily, that pays off in the long run. My feeling is that the internet is becoming a different marketplace because of Covid-19, in some ways for the better. I hope all those algorithms that decide who gets to the top of the searches list start to acknowledge the genuine experts in their field, be that dedicated male underwear or women’s lingerie websites, rather than just the big boys who only have underwear as part of their offer.
Would you consider doing an online poll with your customers, running stories to keep them occupied and asking them what they would like to see on your site?
Sorry, no time, parcels to pack!
Have you been using your ‘face’ as the face of the business online?
Nope, we’re very happy to let the underpants do the talking.
Has this crisis given you food for thought and inspired new creativity now you actually have more time to analyse?
More time will come later when the staff are back in. But yes, there are several new ideas brewing, especially as we are doing the hands-on jobs rather than ‘managing’ and finding easier and better ways to do some things. It’s all good experience.
