When Kristi Cistaro became a first time parent 15 years ago, she recognized a gap in the retail landscape of her Sault Ste. Marie community. “There was really nowhere to shop [for children’s clothing and accessories] other than some of the larger retailers,” says Cistaro. Spurred on by this gap, she launched her own children’s retail store, Stork + Bundle. Thirteen years later, the boutique remains a staple for Sault Ste-Marie families, but Cistaro was eager to see if an e-commerce store could take her business beyond her local community.
Cistaro is no stranger to entrepreneurship. Her family has owned and operated businesses since the 30s, instilling in her the importance of innovation in order to stay ahead of the curve, which is why she launched an e-commerce website for Stork + Bundle in 2016. Despite this transformative change, Cistaro was underwhelmed with the end result. “It was really cumbersome. It wasn’t a great customer experience [and] we were having all sorts of issues with integrating our internal point-of-sale (POS) and inventory management systems with this online platform,” she says. While on the hunt for solutions to improve Stork + Bundle’s online presence, Cistaro came across Digital Main Street’s Digital Transformation Grant (DTG) program, which provides small businesses with a digital assessment, online training, and a $2,500 grant to implement their Digital Transformation Plan. “The program really appealed to me,” remarks Cistaro, “because there was a rather robust catalog of information training sessions, to help me not just get a website going, [but] make it work for my business as a whole.”
After successfully applying for the DTG, Cistaro was able to do exactly that. She invested her grant funds with a website development agency that helped her transition her store from WooCommerce to Shopify. To improve the integration between her brick-and-mortar and online shop, Cistaro also set up a Shopify POS to allow inventory to be seamlessly tracked and updated without any additional work for the store staff. The remaining funds were allocated to advertising on social platforms to drive traffic to the website.
Cistaro says the impact on Stork + Bundle has been significant; “the major pain points that we had in our previous solution have all been eliminated and we’ve seen a significant increase in our online sales.” In fact, Cistaro exceeded her six-month online sales target just sixty days after launching her new website. Additionally, the total percentage of website sales has grown from 10 to 20% since the launch. Internally, the Stork + Bundle team has noticed a significant improvement in workflow. “It’s really exposed my staff, certainly, and myself as well, to some new learnings and made our operations as a business more efficient; we’re able to do more with our current staffing complement.”
Coupled with revenue growth and streamlined operations, Cistaro also noticed an improvement in the customer experience for existing clients. She was pleasantly surprised to receive so many positive reviews from local customers using the website. “That was a behaviour that I hadn’t […] built into my plan, but it’s been a happy bonus. My clients love the convenience of doing a quick order through our website while they’re dropping their kids off in line at school.” Another benefit was receiving orders from across North America. “These are customers that can shop anywhere. These are customers that are in New York City or Chicago, and they have access to every retailer, independent or otherwise, that you can think of and they found my store and wanted to buy from us.”
Cistaro says seeing her business grow and expand has been a great experience. “I would recommend [the DTG] program [to any business owner struggling with digital transformation]. The resources that are available, both online through [the] training modules, and certainly with the Digital Service Squad members, can really help you isolate and identify where you need to invest your time and your resources. I strongly recommend taking advantage of it!”