UntilGone is Given Unlimited Freedom to Scale with BigCommerce

Discover how customisable, cost-effective and reliable BigCommerce is and why we built it that way.

case-study-device-laptop-merchant

32.7%

increase in revenue

9.16%

increase in orders

21.6%

increase in average order value

Performance metrics compare data from Q1 2020 to Q1 2021.

Building a hub for bargain hunters.

In 2018, Richard Bell, President and Owner of UntilGone, entered the world of daily deals and hasn’t looked back since. After acquiring a struggling online marketplace that offers limited-time discounts on name-brand products, Bell and his wife took on transforming the site into the go-to spot for anyone in search of a good bargain.

After switching ecommerce platforms, building a custom back-end to manage products, orders, and vendors, and rebranding to what’s now known as UntilGone — the site has taken off and become a hub for deal seekers.

However, Bell quickly realised that its ecommerce platform presented challenges that were limiting UntilGone’s growth. He knew that to continue scaling the business, he needed to find a different ecommerce solution.

CHALLENGE

Hosting on a restrictive platform.

UntilGone’s initial ecommerce platform was Ruby on Rails. However, Bell found continuing to host the site on this open-source software would not be cost-effective, which led him to migrate to Shopify Plus.

Soon after the migration, he noticed Shopify was not entirely compatible with his back-end solution, which consisted of a custom ERP and PIM. This caused significant challenges when managing orders, vendors, and the site’s inventory, which were difficult to solve due to the platform’s rate limited APIs.

“Shopify architects their platform so you use only their products. Because of this, Shopify became more and more limiting for us, specifically with their API rate limits. This made it impossible to keep things up to date, and we eventually had to start making compromises about keeping our inventory current,” explained Richard Bell, President and Owner of UntilGone.

Unlike more traditional ecommerce stores, UntilGone offers a dynamic set of products that are changing weekly or even daily. To keep up with the frequency of its product rotation, having a platform with robust APIs was essential. 

Bell knew Shopify would not give him the flexibility to incorporate outside technology, which caused him to worry about UntilGone’s scalability on the platform. This, in addition to feeling dissatisfied with Shopify’s level of security, led Bell to decide enough was enough and that it was time to re-platform to a more reliable solution that would give the business limitless freedom to grow.

It eventually came down between BigCommerce and Adobe Commerce Cloud. However, after learning about BigCommerce’s comprehensive APIs, ability to handle a large volume of customers, and robust support team, Bell knew this platform would enable UntilGone to scale limitlessly.

“The fact that BigCommerce had a mature Enterprise plan support team and the API behaviours we needed was pretty significant. BigCommerce just stood out, and it made sense,” remarked Bell.

To migrate UntilGone from Shopify, Bell teamed up with BigCommerce agency partner Arctic Leaf.

“We went looking for a partner and came across Arctic Leaf. They stood out because they had a lot of experience building themes for BigCommerce. We knew they would be a great team to help with the migration,” explained Bell.

“The fact that BigCommerce had a mature Enterprise plan support team and the API behaviours we needed was pretty significant. BigCommerce just stood out, and it made sense.”

Richard Bell, President and Owner, UntilGone

SOLUTION

Limitless freedom to build custom solutions.

One key reason Bell knew BigCommerce was the right platform for UntilGone was its robust API capabilities. With the help of his BigCommerce Implementation Project Manager, Bell seamlessly incorporated his custom back-end solution through an API connection.

Now, UntilGone’s back-end data is always up-to-date and the team no longer has to cut corners.

“We had to integrate our back-end with BigCommerce and replace the Shopify integration. Our Implementation Project Manager really helped get this accomplished. Our back-end is fully compatible with BigCommerce, and my business works the way it should because BigCommerce does what it needs to do,” remarked Bell.

Since switching platforms, Bell has launched three new daily deal marketplaces: Daily Steals, Pick Your Plum, and ShopHempDeals. BigCommerce has enabled Bell to easily connect his custom back-end to each different store that he runs on BigCommerce.

However, Bell doesn’t only use APIs to connect his back-end solution. With BigCommerce, he has the freedom to build and connect any integration he can think of to effectively run his different marketplaces.

“If we want to do something outside of BigCommerce, we can just build an API. We recently built a dynamic collection tool, which is a collection of products based on rules. The fact that BigCommerce lets us do that means they’re focused on being a true partner,” remarked Bell.

Front-end customizability.

While Bell and his team are well-versed in creating custom back-end solutions, they partnered with Arctic Leaf to help redesign the store and improve it for the customer experience. Part of this included rebuilding the store’s front-end with the same feel and familiarity customers were accustomed to while finding ways to optimise it.

“We work with APIs a lot, but none of us are front-end people, and there's a lot of expertise that goes into doing a good front-end experience. That’s one of the reasons we partnered with Arctic Leaf,” explained Bell.

BigCommerce’s freedom and flexibility allowed Arctic Leaf to replicate the look and feel of the original UntilGone store, providing shoppers with the same experience they’re used to. At the same time, the agency improved it to meet ADA compliance standards and more strategically merchandise products.

After seeing how well Arctic Leaf redesigned UntilGone’s site, Bell asked the agency to do the same for Pick Your Plum.

“Arctic Leaf is a company that does a great job of bringing those front-end experiences to life. I definitely would endorse them as an agency to work with,” said Bell.

Flexibility to incorporate best-in-breed technology.

Bell is always looking to incorporate the latest technology into his ecommerce sites. With the rise of artificial intelligence (AI), it’s no surprise he’s found innovative ways to use this new and exciting tool to his advantage.

After piloting it to write product descriptions, Bell saw the endless ways AI could benefit his marketplaces. Now, he integrates Google Cloud for Retail into UntilGone and Pick Your Plum.

With Google Cloud for Retail, shoppers receive personalised daily deal emails based on their engagement and purchase history. Beforehand, Bell and his team would manually select products to include in the emails, and customers would not receive tailored recommendations.

“We use Google Cloud for Retail to recommend products in emails that are personalised for an individual. The tool will start targeting you very specifically based on factors like what you're engaging with and what products you buy,” explained Bell.

Bell also recently rolled out Google Cloud for Retail’s search functionality into UntilGone to create a more tailored search experience for shoppers based on browsing history.

“When you have a large demographic of customers, having an AI tool that automates the recommendations based on what a person is looking for is very valuable. We looked at building our own AI tools, so being able to do this with Google was a really big advantage,” explained Bell.

Agency Partner: Arctic Leaf

Tech Stack:

BigCommerce Professional Services:

  • Implementation Project Manager

  • Customer Success Manager

“Our back-end is fully compatible with BigCommerce, and my business works the way it should because BigCommerce does what it needs to do.”

Richard Bell, President and Owner, UntilGone

“If we want to do something outside of BigCommerce, we can just build an API. We recently built a dynamic collection tool, which is a collection of products based on rules. The fact that BigCommerce lets us do that means they’re focused on being a true partner.”

RICHARD BELL, PRESIDENT AND OWNER, UNTILGONE

case-study-device-tablet-until-gone

RESULTS

Success from all angles. 

BigCommerce’s freedom and flexibility have given Bell the opportunity to grow UntilGone. Since moving to a platform that can integrate with new technologies and is compatible with his custom-built back-end, he’s seen a drastic increase in sales.

In fact, incorporating AI product recommendations into UntilGone’s transactional emails led to a 200% increase in revenue by the end of 2023.

“We used to randomly select bestsellers from the last 90 days for the transactional emails, and since making AI-driven recommendations, we've seen a 200% increase in revenue. The AI recommendations have also allowed us to automate many of our email campaigns, saving the team a great deal of time,” remarked Bell.

Bell’s other marketplaces have also seen significant growth since migrating to BigCommerce. Daily Steals’ sales have skyrocketed since launching in August of 2023, and Pick Your Plum’s revenue has seen 20% year-over-year growth since going live in June of 2022.

“BigCommerce aims to be the best ecommerce platform it can be, without forcing you to make it the centre of your world. I think this is why we’ve been so successful on the platform,” remarked Bell.

“BigCommerce aims to be the best ecommerce platform it can be, without forcing you to make it the centre of your world. I think this is why we’ve been so successful on the platform.”

Richard Bell, President and Owner, UntilGone

LOOKING AHEAD

Finding innovative ways to attract deal seekers.

As Bell works to scale his different marketplaces, he plans to continue tapping into the growing world of AI.

“AI presents a big opportunity to optimise how we operate our business. We've historically picked our daily deals manually, so being able to replace other manual processes with AI can really help us out,” explained Bell.

On top of this, he’s looking to add more stores and develop a mobile app for each one to entice shoppers who prefer to browse from their phones or tablets.

With BigCommerce serving as a reliable and scalable ecommerce platform, Bell knows there’s nothing but opportunity for his businesses.

“BigCommerce has always been there for us. I have no regrets about jumping onto the platform and working with BigCommerce. I can't see us moving anywhere else,” explained Bell.

“BigCommerce has always been there for us. I have no regrets about jumping onto the platform and working with BigCommerce. I can't see us moving anywhere else.”

Richard Bell, President and Owner, UntilGone

Published: June 2024

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