SAFE

SAFE is the largest and safest place to buy and sell sneakers in Canada. They currently operate and sell through their online website and app, as well as 6 retail locations in some of Canada’s marquee malls such as Sherway Gardens and Fairview. 

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The Challenge

SAFE started out as a retail store operating on a consignment (marketplace) model. 

They wanted to create a superior, and end to end shopping experience - for their in store customers, and a new stream of online shoppers.

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The Solution

The first step of this was to launch a website, and an app that supports their marketplace model. There were a few atypical requirements when compared to typical e-commerce shopping experiences:

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1) There needed to be a way for the inventory “onhand” (owned by SAFE) and the inventory (not owned by SAFE, but by trusted vendors) to be available in the app.
2) Customers needed to be able to search and buy every sneaker product that's ever been released (over 10k SKU’s). And when a trusted vendor or SAFE didn’t have the product, a market price for the product, so SAFE can source the product on behalf of the customer.
3) Users needed the ability to purchase via Stripe, and use discount codes generated within Shopify.

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We were able to design, build, QA, and deploy all within 3 months.

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For their in store shoppers, we built a tablet app that is displayed in all of their retail stores.

The app allows customers to select their shoe size, and voila - a list of all products that are available in the size show up (in the store they are in, or across all locations).

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The Success

SAFE's website and app has helped differentiate it from being just a “retail sneaker shop”, to a real brand, says its CEO. 

The sourcing feature has let them ALWAYS have inventory - and never turn away a customer. In this industry, supply is the hard part, and always having stuff available is a massive benefit.. 

The app has also served as a great way to retain and upsell customers that shop in store.

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Their sales have increased 2X.

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