Thicc Cookie’s Journey To Ecommerce
Founder Christopher Scheldrick, and his sister’s afternoon craving for New York-style cookies transformed into all that THICC Cookies is today. Dreaming about the cookies from their favorite New York bakery, Levain, the brother and sister duo recognized an opportunity to bring this unique style of cookies down under. Christopher was part of his family’s wholesale bakery shop where he had been working for almost seven years. One day he asked himself, “Why is no one selling cookies here? We work at a bakery. If we’re not doing it, how can we expect someone else to?”
From there, Christopher and his sister began to develop the perfect cookie recipe. Baked for the purpose of personal satisfaction, the family duo began to quickly recognize the opportunity to sell their craft. Naming the business was inspired by exactly what they were selling: thick cookies. With the recipe and name in place, THICC Cookies came to life.
Located in the heart of Sydney, Australia, THICC Cookies crafts their cookies with the best, freshest ingredients. “Our greatest goal is to be considered Australia’s best cookie,” Christopher said.
The cookie gurus launched its presence in June 2019 by setting up booths at local farmers’ markets and participating in the Sydney Tea Festival. When they noticed a rise in popularity and began selling out quickly at festivals, they knew it was time to make the transition to ecommerce.
Finding Success Through COVID-19
In January 2020, THICC Cookies launched their online store. Starting off only selling a couple of boxes of cookies a week, Christopher was able to manually tackle baking and shipping out his orders alone.
When COVID-19 hit, sending Australia in shutdown mid-March, THICC cookies’ ecommerce presence rapidly began to gain traction. Making the sudden transition from in-person booths to solely an online presence, Christopher knew he had to perfect his brand’s digital landscape.
Building out a website that would connect seamlessly to his POS, and generating a viral social media presence were the first steps in THICC Cookie’s ecommerce journey. Quickly, the brand began to take charge. Customers’ social proof ignited on social media as customers began to share the “instagrammable” splitting of the cookie moment.
“Cookies are familiar to everybody. When people would claim on an Instagram post that this is the best cookie they’ve ever had, it made others want to be their own judge. When someone says that this is the “best” of anything, it makes you want to see for yourself.”
The ShipStation Solution
In the midst of THICC cookies taking off online, Christopher discovered ShipStation through a podcast advertisement and signed up immediately. Seamlessly integrating his Shopify and Squarespace store into ShipStation, Christopher was able to onboarded his business within a day.
Within the first week of the COVID-19 shutdown, the business went from 50 orders a month to 177 box orders in a day.
The sudden influx of orders had Christopher spending hours out of his day on shipping. Without an order and delivery management platform, his time was consumed with the inefficient and manual process of copy, pasting, and confirming addresses in Sendle. In order to fulfill one order, it would take Christopher over 6,000 clicks per order.
He quickly realized that he no longer had time to help his team out in the bakery. But, now thanks to ShipStation’s automation tools, they have reduced their clicks per order to less than 20.
“What once took me three to four hours now takes me fifteen minutes at most with ShipStation. The best part is I can work from anywhere. I use the ShipStation mobile app to print the postage labels at the office. No matter where I am —at home or on holiday — I can wake up, send and print labels to the bakery, then go back to bed.”
Utilizing the picking list function as a product log within ShipStation, the THICC cookies team is able to maximize efficiency by quickly exporting lists of which types of cookies need to be baked on any given day. This has significantly cut down on delivery errors and slowed fulfillment.
“Our orders are different than most. Others in apparel, for example, can package up a t-shirt in a box and send it off. Whereas us, we receive 10 orders with 10 different flavors of cookies, and we have to bake all of that. It’s complicated, which is why we knew we needed ShipStation.”
An Order & Delivery Management Platform That Supports Global Growth
With ShipStation allowing the team to focus more time on perfecting their product, their next goal is to move THICC Cookies towards global expansion. Desiring to deliver quality tasting cookies around the world, the team is in the process of creative developments for the future of their international reach.
“Shipping and fulfillment used to be the pain point for us. We’re not a logistics company, we’re a bakery. Since using ShipStation, we simply forget that there’s an issue with shipping. We just focus on customer service and product. We don’t spend time on shipping at all. It allows us to be more creative and have fun with our brand.”
Within the next two years, THICC Cookies hopes to expand its international reach by opening a shop in another country. Thanks to ShipStation, Christopher has full confidence he will be able to accomplish his goal.
Features Designed for the Australian Merchant
ShipStation’s features and integrations are designed and tailored to specifically serve ecommerce merchants. We asked Christopher to share his concluding words of encouragement to any merchant considering ShipStation for their business. He emphasized the integrations with local carriers as the primary benefit
“I would tell any Australian merchant that ShipStation is built to integrate specifically with Australian shipping providers, like Aus Post and Sendle. There is so much customization within ShipStation. It’s apparent that these features are specifically for us Australians.”
“The features within ShipStation show that Australia was not an afterthought market. Some people just add other international markets onto their product, but it’s apparent that ShipStation was Australia specific. The integrations are tailored to optimize the Australian merchant to be the most efficient.”
Follow along with THICC Cookies by checking out their Instagram or supporting them at biggandthicc.com.au.
