How Shoebacca Grew Revenue 15x in Just Three Years

At the turn of the millennium, Marc and Robert Schlachter were selling used athletic shoes at local markets in Texas. The community-minded brothers were also shipping truckloads of shoes to third-world countries. This passion for sneakers and charity work became the inspiration for SHOEBACCA.com, a shoe retailer and community outreach program. Officially formed in 2002, SHOEBACCA extended its reach by becoming a reseller on eBay, then launched a full-scale eCommerce website in the spring of 2007. Through word of mouth, the store quickly became a leader in the online footwear retail market. Today, SHOEBACCA boasts a sprawling headquarters and a 250,000-square-foot warehouse in Irving, Texas, where they stock over 25,000 styles of shoes, accessories, and athletic gear — all at competitive prices.

With its increased popularity, the needs of SHOEBACCA customers changed. The company offered an expanded line of products, and started to look beyond eBay and their website. They focused on growth through innovative technologies, competitive shipping processes, and professional customer service. With over 700,000 SKUs in their system, SHOEBACCA needed to streamline their inventory data by organizing and simplifying their structure. They needed to optimize their merchandising while handling a massive product catalog, and they needed to connect to multiple marketplaces. Their customers love to shop at Amazon, eBay, Rakutan, and the Walmart website, so that’s where they needed to sell. SHOEBACCA decided to create an eCommerce system that could scale their growth, integrate their current systems, and sell customers the perfect sneaker wherever they start their journey.

Selling shoes online to everyone, everywhere

SHOEBACCA had grown their business on the Magento platform since October 2016. In November 2017 they migrated from Magento Open Source to Magento Commerce 2.1. The upgrade allowed them to handle the large data processing required for their massive product catalog, including new fashion seasons and new sneaker designs. It empowered them to capitalize on that huge data to drive eCommerce growth, by connecting the back end with multiple marketplaces and drop-ship service providers. By offering their shoes and accessories for sale on multiple channels, including eBay and Amazon, they can now reach their customers wherever they prefer to shop.

Magento Commerce 2 also provided a wide range of other features, including an improved interface to tightly integrate their back office systems. The new site created a single eCommerce platform on which SHOEBACCA can manage their whole operation, including inventory, pricing, shipping, CRM, and managing sales from those multiple marketplaces. “Magento also gave us a completely responsive design that displays an optimized depiction of our brand on almost any mobile device,” said Thomas Finney, CTO of SHOEBACCA.

“We wanted a fully integrated solution that could handle our eCommerce needs across multiple sales channels, a warehouse management system, and finance — one that could also handle a high degree of customization,” Thomas said. “It also needed to scale and be flexible to meet our needs as we kept growing.” They pulled this off by integrating Magento with Acumatica Cloud ERP, while seamlessly connecting with third-party drop-ship solution providers. Magento not only increased the visibility of their products across all channels, it simplified their massive product catalog data and improved the user experience. “Our partner, Kensium, has been integral in the success of SHOEBACCA.” Thomas said.

Walking on air

As you read this article, more than 250 SHOEBACCA.com orders are being processed. Following their optimization with Amazon, they received 1,800 orders on the first day alone. “Through improved customer relationship management, planning processes, and integration of all its systems, SHOEBACCA put itself in a prime position to succeed,” said Thomas. Magento made the SHOEBACCA experience smoother for customers and for the company, while increasing sales and traffic by 25 percent. They enjoyed smaller customer acquisition costs and a 30 percent increase in sales from the marketplace. This proved how smart marketing put their brand in front of those who are looking for their product, in this case the latest Adidas and Nike styles.

The improved marketplace visibility resulted in a 30 percent increase in sales from those channels, while SHOEBACCA’s new website has shown noticeable improvements in customer browsing and purchasing behavior. In the first week after launch, their average order value increased by an impressive 50 percent, and average visit duration increased by 31 percent. As online sales and traffic rose by 25 percent, SHOEBACCA saw their entire business experience hockey-stick growth — more customers were arriving, staying longer, buying more, and, most importantly, spending more. In the last three years, their total sales have increased a staggering 1,400 percent.