ProStores Helps an Olympian Keep her Eye on the Road
We wanted another source of revenue and the ability to create something of our own that had more of our personality.
Dotsie Bausch,
Hibiscus Sunglasses
Riding in Style
Former fashion model, professional cyclist, soon-to-be Olympian – Dotsie Bausch has held several impressive titles in her career. And for the last three years, she’s added ProStores merchant to that long list. During her many years as a cyclist, she realized that she “wanted her sunglasses functional yet fashionable,” so in between winning national titles and gold medals, she founded web store Hibiscus Sunglasses with her sister Meg Dietzel. Together, they “only sell brands that have style and comfort as their marquis statement.”
The business first started as a love affair. Dotsie met her husband in 2003, who had been in the action sports industry his entire life. “When I met him he had at least 200 pairs of sunglasses just sitting in boxes in the garage,” says Dotsie. “I had some experience selling on eBay with my bicycles, so I thought of starting a small store to sell all of these beautiful sunglasses.” She and Meg eventually found a loyal following that enjoyed buying name brand sunglasses at discounted prices.
By early 2008, their eBay Store had grown to such a point that she and Meg decided it was time to open an online store. “We wanted another source of revenue and the ability to create something of our own that had more of our personality.”
Fashion and Function
They wanted a small business eCommerce solution that was both stylish and practical, so they chose ProStores. Certified designer Intuit Solutions helped them infuse their web store with personality by creating a custom eCommerce design that Dotsie says “made the store look sleek” and helped them land vendors of high profile brands like Oakley and Dior. “Vendors had an awesome response to our aesthetics,” Dotsie recalls. “If they’re going to connect their brand to an online business, the look of the storefront is really important to them. They loved our design so they agreed to let us carry their product.”
In terms of functionality, “ProStores’ store administration is great and allows our web store to communicate directly with our eBay store,” explains Dotsie. “When something in our inventory sells on one platform, it is automatically taken off the other.”
Because much of that inventory is discounted, Meg and Dotsie need an eCommerce solution that helps them manage their promotions. They especially like to use ProStores’ Promotions feature to run sales and create custom codes for local events so they can track how much business a particular display has generated.
Their favorite add-on tool is Neoverve’s Price Percentage Discount plug-in, which takes a store’s promotions and automatically calculates a price. “The feature is awesome,” says Meg. “It’s seamless—I put a discount on eBay, and ProStores recognizes it. Now customers can see that an item is on sale. That’s important for our vendors who don’t like seeing their products marked down online with no recognition that there’s been a discount.”
They happened to discover the plug-in at a recent “eBay: On Location,” one of many events that eBay and ProStores organize to support merchants. “The classes are invaluable,” says Meg. “To hear advice from other entrepreneurs – you can’t put a dollar amount on it.”
Olympic Dreams
Even though their eBay store still accounts for 80 percent of their business, Dotsie and Meg’s web store sales are steadily growing, with about $1500 in monthly sales. “With our growth having doubled in the last six months, our goal is to get the ProStores web store up to the level of sales that we have on eBay,” says Dotsie.
Until then, ProStores’ ease of use has allowed Dotsie to hand over most of the day-to-day operations to Meg. That way, she can worry less about her store and concentrate on what could be the biggest event in her life – the 2012 Olympics.
Other featured success stories
