To celebrate our ten year anniversary, we’re looking back on the last decade with some of our longest running clients. First up is DIY merchant Bamford Trading.
Bamford Trading & Volo Commerce
Based in Herefordshire, Bamford Trading was set up over 10 years ago with a small investment of only £2,000. Now one of the top sellers on eBay, with a turnover of close to £2 million, Bamford Trading sells a wide range of tools, hardware and consumables for tradesmen and keen DIYers.
“When we launched Bamford Trading, we knew that ecommerce would grow rapidly as technology was evolving at the speed of light. We also realised that if we found it challenging to manage 100 SKUs, 20,000 items that needed listing and managing would have made our life a lot more difficult. As we couldn’t afford to hire more people we started to look for an alternative solution. Volo Commerce was the best option for our needs. It provided a strong platform that could automatically manage our listings and stock, and we could invest the saved time and money in finding and developing new growth opportunities,” explains John Hewitt, co- founder of Bamford Trading.
For Bamford Trading some of the major milestones that shaped the company’s future were trading on Amazon and developing its website, supported by Volo.
“Amazon changed the eCommerce world and increased both the competition and customers’ expectations. Volo helped us to stay in tune with these trends and be as competitive as the larger traders,” adds John.
The ecommerce industry
In the past decade, John believes that customers’ behaviour and habits have significantly changed and people now have higher expectations and demands.
“10 years ago people were busy during the day and did most of their shopping in the evening. Now it doesn’t really matter; they can get anything they want, whenever they want it, with just a flick of their finger and then expect it delivered on the same day,” says John.
A look into the future
As for the future of the ecommerce industry, John believes the mobile ecommerce sector will see exponential growth.
“The ecommerce world is a speed industry where people expect it, and we need to deliver almost instantly. This, of course, puts more pressure on small merchants like Bamford but with Volo by our side we trust we will overcome any challenge and continue to take our company forward,” concludes John.
