Stop waiting for your website to be perfect and get on with it!

Stop waiting for your website to be perfect and get on with it!

This is the story of how Vintage Tub and Bath, a $25 million dollar a year online and offline business started from under two brother’s parent’s deck! That was 15 years ago … and now it’s cleaning up (excuse the bath jokes, they’re unavoidable!) and is ranked in the top 500 online businesses in America.

The really interesting part of this story is this online store hasn’t had a decent make-over in well over seven years – yet it’s still raking in twenty five big ones a year in revenue. Now that’s exciting – as I far too often hear small business owners hide behind the excuse of “I’m just waiting for my website to be updated before I get on with the rest of my marketing.”

As my guest’s bio reads – Allan Dick started his eCommerce career began innocently enough in 1998 when he began helping his brother build an ecommerce presence for his fledgling tub-refinishing business. Since then, Vintage Tub and Bath (www.vintagetub.com) has grown from a two person operation into a $25M/year Internet Retailer Top 500 company and the largest family-owned retailer of reproduction bathroom fixtures in the United States.

In this fireside chat with Allan explains exactly how they did it and you’ll discover how to market an online store. I ask him:

To tell us about that business and what you did to turn it into a $25M / year Internet Retailer Top 500 company and the largest family-owned retailer of reproduction bathroom fixtures in the United States.

To take us inside the business … How many staff, located where, do you hold stock, despatched from? Showroom or 100% online?

What’s your view on bricks and mortar businesses that refuse to embrace the online world?

What are the key boxes every online store must tick?

What are primary ways you marketing Vintage Tub?

How do you approach customer service?

What role does their eBay presence play?

PLUS I share some marketing insights from my recent family holiday in Sydney, and cover off some marketing topics currently being discussed in the Small Business Big Marketing Forum (which you really should be a Member of at only $49 / month!

 

Allan Dick’s Interview Transcription

 

Tim
Okay, this week’s interview is with Allan Dick of vintagetub.com. Now, vintagetub.com is a seriously successful website that sells baths. Yup, baths. Let me just share a little bit about Allan’s bio. Allan’s e-commerce career began innocently enough in 1998 when he began helping his brother build an e-commerce present for his fledgling tub refinishing business. He did it under the deck of his parents’ home as you will shortly find out. It’s now a $25 million a year operation, small business, if you like, and it is in the top 500 Internet retailing companies in the United States of America and it’s the largest family-owned retailer of reproduction bathroom fixtures in the United States. Allan started that business. He’s now stepped outside of that business. His brother runs it. Allan advices and consults to it, and he’s in Australia at the moment because he is speaking at a conference that my wonderful sponsor Net Registry is actually sponsoring. It’s called the Melbourne E-Commerce Online Retail Conference and it is in Melbourne at the convention centre, April 16 and 17, 2013. Allan is speaking there and he was also kind enough to come on the show and just share some absolute gold. We had a wonderful discussion about online versus offline. They’ve got a showroom, a fully-fledged bricks and mortar showroom, all that type of stuff as well as this incredibly successful online business selling refurbished bathtubs. So wonderful interview. Pen and paper at the ready, guys. There is marketing gold dripping from your earphones in about five seconds time. Here is Allan Dick from vintagetub.com. Allan Dick from Vintage Tub, welcome to Small Business Big Marketing.

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Links & Resources Mentioned In This Episode.

Netregistry – Check out these three exclusive packages for SBBM Listeners. Each one designed by myself and Netregistry to help get your online marketing sorted.

Vintage Tub & Bath website.

Ecommerce Conference & Expo in Melbourne – You can see Allan Dick speak  there (It’s also sponsored by Netregistry).

The Small Business Big Marketing Forum – Chat with me daily about your marketing conundrums!

Put your business under the Small Business Big Marketing Spotlight and watch your marketing boom.

The marketing keynote I gave was similar to this one, although it went for an extra hour!

Here’s my new website promoting Tim Reid as a marketing speaker.

Here’s where to join the Small Business Big Marketing Meetup group.

 

Join the marketing discussion beyond my podcast …

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Leave a review for Small Business Big Marketing in iTunes. It’s a rankings thing ;0)

 

I’ve personally created these marketing training products in response to listener feedback …

Site Boost – Discover the characteristics of a successful website.

Spotlight – I create an exclusive podcast episode solving the marketing challenges of your business.

 

10 thoughts on “Stop waiting for your website to be perfect and get on with it!”

  1. Arn Betteridge

    Ouch, I haven’t even listened to this yet & I’m feeling guilty already!
    Bullet straight between the eyeballs.

  2. Arn Betteridge

    Now I’ve listened to it I really feel guilty!
    Another great show Tim, so many learnings in there.

  3. a great show tim with lots of marketing gold, ive allready changed the header on my website http://www.vacshop.com.au/ to highlight the idea of free shipping and visable contact number, cheers mate keep up the good work, Andrew the vacuum guy.

  4. Thanks Arn … yeah this one hurts. I’m guilty of it as much as anyone. It’s weird that we do it – I know websites are an integral part of our marketing, but they shouldn’t hold up doing business!!!

  5. We Shoot Buildings

    Hey Timbo
    What do you think for me as a photographer of using the Canon Logo on my website as a credible brand?

    i.e that i use their equipment for my photography.

    the talk around vitage tub using the brands on their site sparked this idea.

    What are your thoughts on this?

  6. I think it’s a great idea, Grant. We buy brands – some may not admit it, but a strong brand name is a major selection criteria for purchase decisions. Go for it, I reckon.

  7. Siniverisyys

    My website is downright embarrassing at the moment. However, I was recently contacted by an interested person. Working with this person may have been huge. It may have allowed me to go ‘part-time’ at my job, or perhaps quit altogether. It fell into my lap out of nowhere. Unfortunately, we didn’t reach an agreement, but I do know that: 1) This was the first opportunity of many, 2) If I had no website up, that opportunity would have never come to me.

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