Kamakura Beniya, founded in 1954, is a long-established confectionery manufacturer known for its baked goods made with walnuts. Their signature product, “Kurumikko”, is so popular that it sells out early every day in stores, and sells out quickly at online shops as well.
Until now, Kamakura Beniya has expanded its business mainly through stores, but in recent years it has also grown into an online store. After recently switching to Shopify Plus from Makeshop, Kamakura Beniya achieved the following results:
- Online shop sales grew by 120% compared to the previous year
- The number of visitors to their online shop increased by 190% compared to previous year
- The number of customer complaints related to payments decreased by over 90%
How did a 70-year-old company with a well-established brick-and-mortar presence succeed in the face of a "digital reform"? We asked Koichi Nagano, Director of Direct Marketing and Kamakura Beniya’s leader of ecommerce growth, to find out more about the company's success.
Kamakura Beniya worked on strengthening online activities
Kamakura Beniya concentrated on sales at directly managed stores until around 2018. After the coronavirus outbreak, there was no choice but to temporarily close all stores. Even after businesses reopened, various restrictions continued to be imposed on brick-and-mortar stores. Under such circumstances, the number of customers using online shops has increased. The company started making plans to further strengthen sales through an online shop.
First, the department that handled online shop-related work, which belonged to the sales department, was made independent and placed directly under the president's office. We hired a dedicated ecommerce developer and focused on it as one of the pillars of our business.
After the coronavirus pandemic, while customers flocked to using online shops, more people started enjoying sweets at home or using them as personalized gifts. The product was so popular that it sold out on the same day at all physical stores, and the supply of products became difficult to keep up with.
Mr. Nagano said, “At times when access is concentrated, such as when popular or limited-edition items are added to stock or when there is media exposure, we often hear from customers saying, ‘I can't access the site’, or ‘I thought I was connected to the site, but it's already sold out.’ We received a lot of criticism”, adding “Not only was it a huge loss of business, but the negative first impression with new customers was a big issue in terms of branding.”
In addition, because some products are so popular, they are resold at a premium on resale sites, so it was necessary to take measures to prevent fraudulent orders. Therefore, we wanted to implement a "lottery sale" to ensure equality of purchase, but there were also issues.
"In addition to the lottery function, we wanted to add a My Page function as part of our CRM efforts and strengthen gift-related services.” However, it was difficult to introduce new functions with the cart service on the previous platform. Even if it was possible, “the development costs would have been high, so we had no choice but to give up,'' he says, feeling a dilemma.
Why we chose Shopify as the replacement
With the decision to build a new factory to expand product production, we decided to review our ecommerce service as part of the infrastructure developed to support it.
After considering several services, we decided that Shopify Plus was the best fit based on the following points, with the priority being "server strength" so that the server would not go down even during periods of high traffic:
- Overwhelming server strength: It is robust even during peak sales and server response times remain fast, while still being lower cost compared to other companies.
- Global standard security: Highly reliable and can be used with peace of mind.
- Extensible services: Provides a wide range of functions and applications, making it easy to implement.
- Enhanced design: It has an excellent design and is easy to use.
- Utilize the latest technology: Always utilize the latest services and technology.
- Business improvement: Automatic linkage with the warehouse management system is possible, and improvements in business efficiency can be expected.
In fact, Mr. Nagano had also experienced replacing his previous company with Shopify.
“When I worked with Shopify at my previous company, I realized how rich its functions and apps were, and how highly expandable it was. We considered other companies' services, but given our future challenges, we decided to use Shopify again this time. It was clear that Shopify was the best choice."
In January 2023, we officially decided to implement Shopify Plus, and the transition went smoothly. We were also able to successfully overcome data migration, which is a barrier for many companies.
It was necessary to migrate membership and order data. Moreover, we had to cleanse and move the site while it was running, so it took more time than expected. However, the reason we were able to complete the project without any major problems is that even though we do not know the latest technology, we were able to use our own experience and knowledge to clearly explain to our development partners what we wanted to achieve. Perhaps what was conveyed was important.
Sales grew 120% compared to the previous year within 6 months of the migration
Within 10 months, Kamakura Beniya finalized the migration to Shopify Plus. After the site replatform, we achieved the following results thanks to Shopify Plus:
- Online shop sales grew by 120% compared to the previous year
- The number of visitors to their online shop increased by 190% compared to previous year
- The number of customer complaints related to payments decreased by over 90%
The biggest contributor to these results was the server's high availability and response time. The reduction in downtime led to a direct increase in not only the number of visitors but also the number of repeat visitors. Additionally, the "e-gift" function introduced to enhance gift giving is also producing results.
Our products have the characteristic that a large number of customers say, `I didn't know about the product, but it tastes delicious so I want to buy it. I also want to give it as a gift to someone.` It has become easier for customers to receive the product, enjoy it, buy it for themselves, and then gift it to someone else.
Furthermore, the reason for the significant decrease in customer inquiries before and after the renewal is that “a big part of it was that we were able to eliminate the areas that customers were dissatisfied with.”
When access was concentrated, the problem of not being able to connect to the online shop was resolved, and even when there was a rush of orders, the site was easier to operate, and the speed at which orders were completed was improved. Also, there were people who were in a hurry to buy before they sold out!" In addition to reducing the number of order errors that would otherwise occur, we added a post-order cancellation function, allowing customers to immediately reorder, and the number of inquiries has been significantly reduced.
In addition, regarding the "lottery purchase" introduced to ensure equality of purchase, Arii Kotaro, President of Kamakura Beniya, also highly rates this feature, as it has long been a frequently requested feature in his social media posts. When we actually conducted a lottery purchase, we received more than 10 times as many applications for the limited edition product, of which only 2,500 were sold.
Mr. Nagano said, “Up until now, we had been collecting data on sales and sales numbers, but since products were sold out every day, we had no way of grasping how much demand there was for our products. By introducing Shopify Plus and creating an environment for operating our online shop, we have been able to accumulate high-quality marketing data, which has made it possible to plan effective measures.”
Aiming to strengthen the use of marketing data and link store data
At Kamakura Beniya, we are currently installing Shopify and infrastructure and reviewing our organizational structure in order to ensure more stable operations in preparation for the start of the new factory in 2025. "From now on, I would like to focus on marketing activities that analyze and utilize Shopify data," said Nagano. In particular, we are focusing on data linkage with stores, and aim to achieve unified customer management by linking various services.
When asked about his future plans, Mr. Nagano expressed his enthusiasm for efforts to further expand the use of Shopify. Our first priority is to meet domestic demand, but Shopify has many functions for building cross-border e-commerce, and we plan to expand overseas in the future. Furthermore, he says that he would like to work on improving usability using AI.
"At Kamakura Beniya, we have stopped taking orders over the phone and have switched to directing customers to our online site. However, many of our customers who have loved our products for a long time are in their 70s and 80s, so it can be difficult to operate online. "I hope we can use AI to provide an experience that is easy for everyone to use," he said, expressing his hopes for using Shopify.