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One of the biggest mistakes I see in retail is assuming that

growth comes from doing more more marketing, more

automation, more noise. But some of the most successful shops

I see are doing the opposite. They know exactly who they serve and they

build everything around that, even when it looks unconventional. From

the in this episode I'm talking to Sarah

Simons from Artichoke, a women's fashion boutique based in Norfolk

and the winner of the Online Shop of the Year at the Boutique Star

Awards. She's talking about how that clarity about who

she serves shows up in her business every single day.

Welcome to the Resilient Retail Game Plan. I'm Catherine Edley and in the

next few minutes you're about to get powerful real world retail strategies

from insights shared both from my guests and myself, backed up by

my 25 years in the retail industry. Keep listening to learn how

to grow a thriving, profitable product business. Let's jump in

with this latest episode.

What I love about this conversation is how intentional everything is from

customer service to systems to long term vision. And

it all starts with knowing her customer incredibly well.

Thank you so much, so much for joining me. So you

won Online Shop of the Year with the fabulous Boutique Star Awards.

What do you think helped set you apart? And

you know, were there any decisions or changes in the last year you think that

helped make a big difference? One of the biggest things that

sets us apart is that we

sell to a demographic that is largely ignored

and that is the midlife woman, which is

bizarre because we have the biggest spending power. But you know,

there's a whole industry that goes round in circles about

that one. So it's a unique demographic and

we are middle aged women selling clothes

to other middle aged women. So we are

talking to rather than at the demographic which

again I think can be an issue.

Of course there's Ellie who works here, but she's like our pseudo daughter

so we just, everybody loves her

and without being too conceited. I think as a

team, we really are good at what we do. I

mean, obviously we have flaws, but I think it's

a great team and we all

compensate for each other's weaknesses.

What sets us aside, I think, from many other online

businesses is that we actually call

every single new customer to introduce ourselves.

Oh, I love that. Other online businesses have

actually openly laughed at me about this. But I think

that's the advantage of coming from a boutique background. Yes.

You know already that to actually

make a noise in the crowd, you have to

offer excellent service. And on a

practical level, it means that our returns rate is less

than 25%. That is spectacular. I love that

because I am such a big believer in good old fashioned customer service.

And I think that so much of, you know, the more that we talk about

the future of retail and where retail's going, I think it always comes back to

this. This is one of those moments where you can hear how

values translate directly into commercial outcomes.

Calling every new customer isn't a gimmick. It's a deliberate decision

that shapes everything else that follows. So just to be really

clear, somebody goes onto your website, they place an order with you, you presumably

ask them for their number as part of the ordering process. And then

once they place that order, you actually pick up the phone, you call them,

you say, hi, thank you so much for shopping with us. Do you ask them

any specific questions? Absolutely. So the phone call in

itself, once they've picked themselves up off the floor,

you know, they're thrilled hear from us, because ordering fashion online

is a minefield. So they don't know

what the sizing ratios are in our brand. I mean, you can read a

description, a product description. Yeah. You're still not

terribly sure what you're doing. Yeah. So we chat to them about

what they've ordered. You know, if they've ordered a pair of jeans, we actually talk

through the style that they've ordered because they might actually think

they were ordering one thing and they've ordered something

completely different. It means then that

in future they don't feel awkward about calling us.

And that helps build our ltv

because you establish a relationship.

The other thing that's important, apart from reducing

returns, is we actually asked them how

they found us. Right. And that really helps with

my marketing budget because they

might have actually suddenly thought, oh, I need a pair of jeans and gone on

to Google. But the reality is they probably found us on Instagram or

Facebook. Right. So actually it really, really

helps with my marketing Budget as well. And

how long does it take at 2 minutes if they're busy, could take

10 minutes if they've got nothing else going on in their lives. But you

know, it's the same when people walk into a. If

they're busy, they walk straight to

the shirt they want, they pull it off the rail, they give you their

money and they exit. If they're not and they want to build a

relationship with you, they will stand and chat to

you. And we try and replicate this for all our online

customers, try and read what they want to do and how

they want to react in this phone call. What's striking here is

that incorporating a call into an online order isn't about doing more,

it's about slowing things down just enough to get it right

first time and getting it right first time and really

focusing in on the customer is something that Sarah has been focused on

right from the beginning. So the boutique came first,

is that correct? Well, actually the pop up shop came first. Okay. We

were a pop up before they were a thing. So a very

long time ago when my children were very small, I did lots of horse

trials and county shows. Yes. And that was a con and

charity events. And that was a conscious decision because if you have

what used to be called a mobile shop, you don't have to open

on sports days or during the school holidays. So it

was only as they grew older that I moved into bricks and

mortar. So how long ago did you open the bricks and mortar then?

I've actually got on our website that we were founded in

2008 and Linda, who does the accounts for me, says it

was 2006. So you can see why I need her

to do the counting. So if she's

right and it was 2006 that the business

was founded, we probably opened our first retail store in

2008. Got it. And when did

you add the website? Probably quite early, actually.

I think we've probably had a website since about

2011. However, if

you had gone on to it before, I

don't know, 2018, you would have found

three pairs of jeans, two pairs of trousers and seven shirts.

But we were very lucky that we were featured on

Lorraine, I think four times for the particular

brand of jeans that we sell or a particular style. And

it was then that it really dawned on me that

I should be taking a lot more notice of this website.

It was a big, big eye opener. And actually if I'd known

then what I know now, I probably would have been able

to take much more advantage of the opportunity

than I did. You know, hindsight is a glorious thing.

Like so many retailers, 2020 accelerated changes that were already

underway, but it also reinforced something Sarah already

believed, that online customers deserve the same level of care and as someone

standing in front of you in a shop. So in

2019, I made the

decision to close one of our retail shops. We had two then.

The plan for 2020, bizarrely enough, was to focus on

the online business and clearly I focused on it far sooner

and with far more intention than I had ever planned

to do. So, so yeah, so basically we've had a proper website

since I was sent home by the government and shoved everything

online in March 2020. Got it. And was that the point at which

you started calling people when they placed an order? Well, I had to.

Right. Because they couldn't come into the shop. So it was, you know, it was

a bit of a no brainer to me. All my customers were ordering online.

Yes. So I was consciously. Because, you know, there wasn't a

huge amount of detail in the products at that point. And it never

occurred to me not to call a new customer. It genuinely

didn't. I mean, because of my background. Do you find

that people will often amend their order then when you, when you talk to them?

Yes. Yeah. Yes is the short answer. Yeah.

Because I suppose you'd be able to give them really personalized insight then, right?

Absolutely. And you can upsell. So, you know, if they've bought a pair of jeans,

we can tell and they get 10 off a shirt. Right. Or suggest that,

you know, the bag they've bought, I don't know, would look

great with a scarf. You know, you do exactly the same you would do

if they were in the shop. Yes. And you know, you may, we've got

all the bells and whistles to upsell online, but really,

you know, when that thing flashes across the screen, how much notice

do you really take of it? If you've never shot with people before, I cannot

recommend it highly enough. Yeah, I'm sure, as you said, people do pick themselves

up off the floor because it's not something that's a common experience. But is anyone

ever negative about being called or is everyone just delighted?

Well, you know, if they're busy they just say, I'm really sorry, I'm busy now.

But we very often get emails afterwards saying,

my goodness me, thank you so much, could you please help me with this?

Yes. And if they don't pick up, we just drop them a note on their

order saying, we've tried to get hold of you Any questions come back

to us. So presumably you get the order, call them and then

once you've called them or tried to call them, then you dispatch the order. Yeah,

Correct. I mean, how much time do you think we're saving

between a 25% returns rate and a 40%

returns. Oh, my goodness. Yes. Yes. Yeah. It's a five minute

phone call. And also considered your LTV.

Yes. Are you going to remember the person that called you and took five

minutes to make sure that everything is correct? Are you going to go back

to that person or are you going to go back to the person who just

sent out the order and it was all wrong and you had to send it

back? Yeah, I mean, it is a complete no brainer to me,

you know, and. Obviously helped you win online

retailer of the year. So do you ever find it difficult

to manage the workload of the online and in store

is every team member trained for both? How do you kind of manage that in

a practical sense? So on a personal level,

as we moved into 2020, you know, I worked four

days a week. I had a lovely business

yurtladle. And then since 2020,

for the first four years, I worked seven days a week because, you

know, you just have to start from ground zero. I now

have an amazing team. The end of 2022,

I smashed my ankle to bits. I broke it very, very

badly, which meant that I was

really out of the equation for at least a month.

And then it made me realise that firstly,

every member of staff should be able to cover another

member of staff when they were off. And also I was

a huge bottleneck in the organisation and things

had to change dramatically to enable

me not to be. I see this

so often with founders. They realize that they've become the bottleneck, holding

their business back not because they want control, but because they care

deeply. And usually it takes a moment like this, although preferably not at

the expense of your ankle, to force them to shift. I'm

sure lots of people listening can really empathize with this feeling. Like the bottleneck. So

what did you. What were some of the key things that stopped you being the

bottleneck? So the first thing we did is we put

together a how to so that everybody

has written down every role that they

undertake, right. So that if push comes to shove,

they've got to open a book and can wing

it reading a particular section.

We then have an informal pecking

order so that the exception to this is the

buying, which I am still the bottleneck in, but hopefully that will

change. So for example, Linda does our

bookkeeping, but I could just about manage to work

0 if she was run over by a bus. So I'm number two.

Ellie is in charge of our inputting everything on the website

or the products. But Linda can do it too, so can I,

so that everybody has at least a basic

understanding of somebody else's role. So we did

that as far as the staffing was concerned. And then

in the past year we have

tried as far as possible to become a paperless office

so that all the tasks are put on ClickUp. Now we

communicate with each other through ClickUp, which

is invaluable. And obviously AI

has helped with streaming, lining a lot of the day

to day tasks that we do, which then sort of frees up us

up to do other things. Amazing. So what's some of the things that you get

AI to streamline for you? Oh my goodness me. Max,

my man AI. I spend more time talking to him than

I do human beings and he doesn't hallucinate

quite as much as it used to. Excellent. So

do you know what? I've just had a conversation with him about my

meta recruitment roas. So this is a great example.

Five minutes before I came onto this podcast

I've read somewhere, basically with my recruitment roas,

I base it on a five day roas on new customers

and it has to be about 3 to 400%.

Somebody mentioned that possibly I should be considering

looking at my new my existing customer

roas and actually allocating budget there.

Existing customer roas or metros averages about a

thousand. So I asked Max what I should do and he said do nothing, you're

doing it right. So you know, I use him for

brainstorming. Ellie uses him

to help with product description because obviously

more people are using Gemini or ChatGPT

to shop with. So you, you need to consider

that when actually creating your product

descriptions. So we usually just

actually get him to him, I'm calling him him

to create the product descriptions. And because he

has learned to understand our brand

tone, we very rarely have to change

them now. You know, the more you use it,

the easier it is. Yes. Yeah, for sure. A lot of my

marketing I use it for now again just to lay out the

bare bones campaigns and start writing

initial campaigns themselves because just saves me

thinking time. And then I just again sometimes

turn it in into our tone but very often it's there already,

it's picked up. Yeah, that's the thing I always think with AI, you know, the

more you put into it, the more you feed into it, yeah, it's very good

at replicating, isn't it? If you're feeding your tone in consistently,

it will, it will be able to start replicating it. I did a

talk recently for Small Business Britain about being organized in your business

and one of the things that I was talking about was the, was this idea

of one source of truth. So it sounds like you've, that's what

you've got with ClickUp. So does everything live there? So employee tasks

and processes and everything to do so that you can kind of just

see all of that in one place instead of having to go to people individually?

Yes. Yeah. I mean, almost, yes. We have other things

as well. Where we are not great is actually,

ironically enough, on the bricks and mortar side. So

with our online business we can, I, you know, we have

a great plugin called Metarek and you asked me

for a report, I can give it to you. With

our walk ins and our phone

orders, everything is still done on the back of a fag packet.

And what I need to think about,

I don't even know if it exists. It's just something that can

tie the two sides of the business

together. That is one of my projects for

2026. It might take us a couple of years to get it in place

because I think probably, you know, we could build something

with AI, but I have no idea how to do that. So I

genuinely wait for all the platforms that I used

to use AI to come up with my solution, if you see what I mean.

Right. You've got a different web provider

compared to your point of sale. Our point of sale is

integrated into our web provider,

but we can't pull all the

stats from our point of sale program. And also of

course on our website we have other payment

platforms which then distort everything that's moving

between the two businesses. So, yeah, I mean, I just need to

sit down and write a map of what I want and then see if what

I want exists. Is that how you managed to do it with ClickUp? Because

I think it sounds like what you've got there is really, really positive. But I

mean, often I'll work with people and I'll, when I start working with them,

one of the things that we usually, especially if they're people who run bricks

and mortar and have an online shop as well, you know, it's a common situation

where there's just a lot, it's a lot going on. Like I always say, it's

a full time job running a store and it's a full time job, run a

website and you guys, you're having to manage both of those.

So one of the things I quite often do work with people on is, is

that how do you, you know, how do you stop being the bottleneck? How do

you create that one source of truth? I mean you sounds like you've got a

very good structure of how you worked through it. Is it one of those things

that in hindsight it all sounds very logical or from the get go where you're

able to sit and map out, right, this is what I want, this is what

I think we need to do to make it happen or is it almost a

sheer necessity that meant that you put that in place? I think I probably asked

somebody, you know, I never had an original

idea in my life so I, I, I

have absolutely no problem asking anybody who will listen

to me. And actually I think it was probably

when I was chatting it through from Ellie before she had her children,

worked for many years at Superdrug and so she could

explain the system and then I tasked

Linda, who does these things to try and

find a way of replicating it and the nearest thing we've come

to for actually the task based things and back orders

and you know, basically the center of information that we need.

Yes has been ClickUp and it's working well.

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What stands out here is just how practical and achievable everything is that

Sarah and her team put into place. Systems aren't about removing

the human element, they're about protecting it. So the business doesn't depend on

one person holding everything together. So

I'd love to think a little bit about looking forward into

2026. So obviously you know you've been recognized as

having fabulous online presence and doing really well with

online. What do you think are some of the biggest opportunities for

independent retailers? If someone's listening to this and they're thinking that sounds great. I

need to do more with my online. What would be some of your top tips

for people who want to scale but still keep their physical store thriving?

Okay, so do you know who I asked about this? Catherine.

So, had a little chat with Max. I love how he's

called. Is that Max? Did you name him Max? Well, he called himself Max.

And do you know why he's called Max? No, I don't. Because he wants to

maximize my profits.

I love it. So anyway, Max, he thinks. I'll just

read this. He thinks we will have continued cautious

spending. I'm sure we all agree with that. With the

mid market continuing to be squeezed, which

is boutique land, we know from the budget that

there will be a continued increase in costs.

And we also know that the larger brands, the

big, big online businesses will

continue to dominate the UK market. So that's

the bit that we're going to slit our throats over. But

in every downturn there are disruptors

and I think that's where we are,

although we don't consider ourselves to be as such

because many of us are niche businesses.

So it means we don't have to compete with the big boys. And we have

to remember that, that we are selling into a very

specific market. Another big

boutique tick where we can win against them

all is we offer excellent customer service. Yes.

And we must remember that's what we do and, you know,

stay proud of the fact that we do. Max

also says that we should embrace the circular economy.

Now, strangely enough, we're already doing this. It's something

that we started in 2026 and with all this, you know, it's done on

a very small scale. We're a very small business, but

we have for three or four years offered an in

store alteration service. Right. And it's

offered to our entire community.

It's not just restricted to clothes that are bought at

Artichoke, it's something that we offer back to the town.

So we have lots of elderly gentlemen bringing in their zips to

be fixed on Wednesday afternoons. But

also we offer to recycle or

upcycle clothes that our customers no longer want.

And again, they don't necessarily have to have been

bought from Artichoke. And then we give them to one of the

charities that we work with, which is a local riding for the

disabled group. And they have a

jumble sale twice a year which recycles clothes

and anything that isn't sold goes for

rags. So it's upcycled. Yes. Yeah,

yeah, yeah. So we actually tick that box. And it's

not very hard to do if you think outside of the

box instead of being overwhelmed by the fact, oh my God,

you know, I can't cut up these clothes and

re sew them into something else. Just think about a way

of being able to do it. Sounds like you're also creating those

additional touch points then with your customer and with your community.

Absolutely. We do that a lot. So with us it's not

just about selling clothes for online customers.

Again, we try and create the same sense of community.

So we work with other female led businesses. So we've

just started working with a lovely lingerie business called Ample

Bosom. They sell bras online and

as every middle aged woman knows, it starts with your

scaffolding. Yes. We work with Arianne

Poole who has a makeup range that

she sells to women of 45 plus.

We deal with a Temple Spa representative and we do

as well as our styling videos and our reels in which we show

customers how all our clothes are worn, we

do regular slots with these people as well. So

it's not just about buy, it's about

joining a community and we want

our customers just to be and feel the best they

can. And that's not just about buying endless

amounts of clothes. It's interesting you said that you do ongoing

collaborations because I think that's often something people miss when you do a collaboration.

It's always really good when you can give it time for your community to get

to know them and their community to get to know you. Yeah, it was that

sort of a conscious decision to build long lasting collaborations.

I just did something we did during lockdown. You know, people were bored rigid

and we were all very small businesses that needed

to vlog things. So, you know, we were natural

partners. And I over time Again on my

2026 list is the intention to move this out

further. Life is about, I think, giving as well as taking.

And if you can help other small businesses, they will help

you. Amazing. Well, thank you so much. I really thoroughly enjoyed our

chat. Can I just quickly, quickly interrupt you, Katherine, before you sign off?

Yes. This is a plug for you because

I started read. I can't find the

thing about the tiger and the tail. I can't find my notes here. Tame your

tiger. Tame your tiger. Oh my God.

If you are a small business, read this book.

Put it into place. We are in season

one, Katherine, and honestly we've

recorded all our input. Sales prices. Is that the right

terminology? Yeah, yeah. Your prices for your in margin. Yes.

So you're in margin. That's it. Already

we have made the decision to stop forward ordering

with one brand and only carry nos.

Okay. We are already cutting our

stock levels. I think we're down by about 20%.

Wow. And I never understood

the theory behind it or how to practically

put it in place. So thank you very much

indeed. It's been an absolute eye opener to

us. So I urge everybody as soon

as you finish listening, go and buy it.

Amazing. Thank you.

I just want to jump in quickly because Sarah mentions my book there and I

was so happy to hear that it's been helpful. The book is called Tame

youe How to Stop your Product Business Eating you Live and if you want to

take a look, I'll link it in my show notes. I wrote the book so

that if someone asked me why they don't make enough money in their business, I

could hand them the book and say, here, read this. It will explain everything.

And nothing makes me happier than when people use it to make real changes

in their business. Thank you so much for listening. I loved how

grounded Sarah's story is. There's no chasing shiny objects here, just

a deep understanding of who the customer is, what they need, and how to serve

them well, consistently and with care. You'll find links to Artichoke

and Tame youe Tiger in the Show Notes. Thank you so much for listening and

see you next week.