Hanna Sillitoe

As seen by many on Dragons’ Den, entrepreneur Hanna Sillitoe launched a blog in 2015 which led to her publishing her first book ‘Radiant’ in 2017. It became a best seller and is on sale around the world. From there, she launched Radiant retreats, meal box deliveries, and her own skin care range.

As someone who struggled with the pain of irritated skin, Hanna’s mission was to formulate botanical skin care products that addressed the needs of those searching for a naturally soothing solution.

When she began her kitchen table range, things looked different from how they are now. She’d pack everything herself, load it into bags and turn up at the post office holding the queue up for half an hour. Living in a remote cottage location, she couldn’t arrange a courier collection either.

It was then she realised she needed to outsource the responsibility of fulfilment, but the first provider she chose couldn’t keep up with sudden spikes in orders and she’d have daily issues with customers receiving incorrect items. The straw that broke the camel’s back was when she discovered they were stealing from her.

What we created

Our teams were up to the challenge.

Hannah said, “The headache of moving fulfilment centres was something I really did not need. It was in the middle of Covid, with enough on my plate. The website was busy with online orders constantly coming in and I didn’t want any disruption of service to customers. Shannon at James and James and I worked hard on setting everything up in the background, to make the final move as smooth and seamless as possible.

“I don’t have web developers so the point of me choosing Shopify was the ability to build and run the store myself. Shannon’s backend integration knowledge was great, and absolutely key to ensuring the system was reading the orders properly. She talked me through exactly what I needed to input and it all worked – first time.

“The onboarding team were amazing and it meant that when we finally hit the button to make it happen there was absolutely no disruption for my customers. Everyone is super kind and helpful at James and James. The day-to-day stuff runs really smoothly so I’m not having to waste time emailing or calling anybody. Most of the information I need is right there on the dashboard. I was emailing my previous fulfilment centre daily, and it’s lovely not having to chase, check and replace orders.”

What we delivered

According to Hanna, a self-proclaimed ‘analytics geek’, here’s what we delivered on:

Accuracy – I don’t have customers complaining that they’ve received the wrong items! It might sound like something you’d take for granted, but the number of incorrect orders that went out with my previous fulfilment centre was ridiculous. I would say that I had at least 5% of orders with issues previously. It’s lovely to not have that additional stress, which just allows me to get on with running my business. In my first month with James and James I hadn’t a single incorrect item sent out.

Shipping costs – The courier costs, especially on international orders, are significantly less than I was paying before. Plus it’s wonderful to be able to offer the customer the option of next day delivery if they’re happy to pay extra.

Intel – The at-a-glance ControlPort portal gives me a quick and instant update on orders and stock.