TOSS recently became one of frooly’s top sellers, and has received the single most customer ‘likes’ of any shop in the marketplace. I went to visit proprietor Emma Hudson this week to present her with her ‘Top Seller Award’ and ended up staying for a great cup of tea and a chat:
R: Tell me a little bit about what you do.E: It’s basically a shop and a gallery to showcase work by local artists, so all the artwork and crafts are handmade locally. I often get artists coming into the shop saying that they’ve heard about us, that they make this and that and would we be interested, but we also have an exhibition every three months, which I curate, so it’s a nice balance.
R: Do you think it’s important to sell online as well as from your shop?
E: I think it’s really important. For the first three years (of TOSS) I didn’t sell online, and that was more a time thing, but I do think it’s really important, especially as it helps you broaden your horizons. Here I am, in Nether Edge, and it’s a great place, the shop is ideally situated here, but I don’t get thousands and thousands of people coming past every week, and that’s why I find selling online so important, because it’s easier to direct people online sometimes than it is to physically get them to the shop.
R: Have you experienced an increase in your sales since you joined frooly?
E: Yes, certainly in the run up to Christmas. You probably know more than me about the figures though!
R: How much time on average do you commit to keeping your site up to date?
E: During December I spent a good amount of time, but that was sort of easy in a way, because December is my busy period anyway, so I’m constantly on the go and it was easy to keep up to date. I’ve probably not updated it as much as I should have recently to be honest, but it’s on the list of things to do...and it doesn’t take long, and I enjoy doing it as well!
R: And how have you found the upload process?
E: Just to get the site set up in the first place was really easy, even if you’re a technophobe. This sort of thing can be really daunting. You think “blimey, I’m setting up a website!” but it’s really simple really, and it was nice to have control over the look and feel of it, which is really important to me, because I want to be able to recreate what I’ve got in the shop on my frooly site.
R: Do you sell anywhere else online?
E: No. I’ve thought about it, but it didn’t make sense to me. Once I became aware of frooly and became a user, I thought it might be a bit confusing for my customers to have shops in different places and frooly was providing everything I needed.
R: Can you sum up frooly in one sentence?
E: I’d say it’s an online marketplace for independent businesses to sell online.
R: Textbook answer! What is your favourite thing about the frooly marketplace?
E: I think my favourite thing is that it feels like I’m part of a community. It’s all independent businesses and everyone’s just trying to do their own thing, so it feels like we’re all in it together. I know quite a few people on there, both personally and other businesses, and it just feels like everybody’s helping each other and supporting each other. I also really believe in the buying local and supporting local business ethos, and that’s what I like about frooly, because you’re doing that.
R: Why do you think you’ve had success on frooly?
E: Well it’s difficult to tell, because the majority of my success came over Christmas, and it’s difficult to draw too many conclusions.
R: Has your customer base changed significantly?
E: It’s been interesting because I’ve had a real mix of customers. I’ve had quite a few customers from Sheffield, and I found that quite interesting, and I’ve been thinking, why are they buying online? Why don’t they just come in to the shop? It’s great that even though people have busy lives, they’re still able to buy from me. I’ve also had several enquiries from people in the netherlands...
R: How would you like to see frooly work for you in the future?
E: Well the shop is already growing as a result of being on frooly, that is already happening. In terms of features and products, frooly is already sort of doing it already with workshops and things, but I’d like to see a bit more networking, getting people to meet face to face, that might be fun. That’s one of the interesting things about the internet these days, that you can meet people that you wouldn’t meet normally, and you feel like you know some of these people. Like, on frooly I recognise certain people and brands, and it’d be nice to meet some of them and put a face to the businesses.
You can view the full interview on frooly’s YouTube channel
You can visit the Old Sweet Shop's frooly site here.
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