CheckoutWeekly/TaskHusky Curated Newsletter #2222

Feeling Spicy … on Shopify

Yo -

Hello there my fellow Shopifanatics!

So, most of you know that I’ve been known to order a chicken nugget or 2 … or 20. There’s just something about those bite-sized, dippable bundles of chicken-like ectoplasm that makes me happy. Sure … I know that they are more nugget than chicken … I know that they are held together with insoluble binders and made glossy by non-nutritive food varnishes … I know all that. I also know that these crunchy morsels of quick-fried post-industrial by-product … well, sometimes nothing else fills the late-night void.

But … the other day I was going through the drive-through of my favorite McDonalds. It’s my favorite McDonalds because the late-night drive-through window on Tuesdays is usually staffed by Amy. Who’s Amy, you ask? Amy likes my pickup truck and gives me extra Ranch dipping sauce for free, so that makes Amy a high-quality person and makes this particular McDonalds my fav stopping point.

But last week Amy done me wrong.

Mickey-Ds has brought their so-called “

back …. ahem, “for a limited time” … as they are wont to do. Anyway, normally reliable Amy put the spicy nuggets in my to-go order by accident. Now, it’s dark and I’m hungry so I just pop open the lid and slam the first one down.

I’m a traditionalist … a classicist actually … when it comes to my nuggets. More of a connoisseur of fried poultry products, if you will.

And I’m no slouch in the spicy food department. But as my right eye started tearing up uncontrollably, I quickly understood that not only was this NOT a “classic” chicken nugget, it was NOT a normal spicy nugget either. No … this was some kind of otherworldly nugget of flame that — due to some freak fatal manufacturing flaw or nuclear accident had transformed into a mutant hunk of burning love.

But like I said … I’m no slouch. I figure, “Let’s cool off these searing chunks of crispy lava with a refreshing dip in my favorite Ranch dipping sauce and all will be good. So, bite number 2 happens — post dip — and I realized that this is not cool Ranch dipping sauce with a hint of dill. No … it … is … not. This, my good sir, is

.

I heard angels singing and walked toward the light. But as my soul lifted gently out of my being to escape the pain of this cruel world and Amy's treachery to become one with the universe, a voice in my head whispered,

“It’s not your time … the Shopify newsletter readers need you.”

So, here’s my question … “Do taste buds heal?” Do they? Because it’s a week later and everything still tastes like dryer lint.

While I was recovering from Amy’s obvious attempt at

homicide by habanero

, I remembered one of our favorite Shopify websites. They’re in the business of spices and herbs. They’re killing it too … much as Amy was killing me slowly with sriracha.

Is my tongue supposed to be this color? Why am I still sweating?

Anyway, let’s meet today’s Shopify teardown target.

Happy Selling,

Zach

Can You Take the Heat!

Well, not “you” exactly. Who wants to get a newsletter about ”you,” right? But if you have a Shopify site and want that site to be front and center in an upcoming TaskHusky Checkout Weekly newsletter this is kind of cool.

Here’s the deal … we have spent the last few years focused on the larger Shopify stores. That’s great and all, but I thought it would be cool to give a few “normal” sites a load of free advice and such. And I will do just that. But keep in mind that I tell marginally humorous jokes and poke fun at everything. So, well, you get the idea.

Just reply to this email and say

“Tear me down Zach!”

and I’ll put you on the list for an upcoming issue.

This Week’s Shopify Teardown Target: TheSpiceHouse

The Spice House has been in the spice business for 65 years. They were founded in 1957 by Bill and Ruth Penzey. They opened a small chain of local spice shops across Illinois and Wisconsin catering to home cooks and restaurant chefs alike. Eventually the business was passed to their daughter Patty and her husband Tom Erd. It was Patty and Tom that modernized the company and launched TheSpiceHouse.com on Shopify.

Then, in 2018 the business was sold to Dave Grossman and Dan Yates — 2 refugees from the finance and tech industries who are carrying the banner of good taste forward.

The Shopify Theme That They Use

Our super-to-secret website spy tools tell us that this Shopify site theme was made by magic monkeys who rubbed jellyfish sticks together to make glitter.

Which means that this is a custom theme of some sort that they spent too much on. Why? Because everyone we’ve ever met who runs decent volume on Shopify and decides to have a “custom” theme created has spent more than what they had too.

What They Do Well

Like I said, we love this website. In fact, we love everything about their business. Some of us have become regular customers.

The custom packaging is great. Not how they have flat packs of spices and herbs? This is brilliant! They got around the cost of shipping by devising a packaging that can be cheaply mailed. But those who want the fancy jars can still have them … if they pay for shipping. So, The Spice House enjoys the best of both worlds. Customers “choose” free shipping by choosing the product that ships super-cheap. Then they do not complain (too much) about the non-free shipping on the jars.

Navigation is easy and clean. They do not waste a second of your precious time walking you through a process. Find what you want and buy it.

The photography is custom and gorgeous. I wish we all could have those kinds of resources at our disposal. We all can’t (yet). But you can work your way to it. And all of it works well with the brand and theme of the site. Nothing looks out of place.

Speaking of photography, the images are optimized very well. The site scores in the 90s for page speed which is a function of careful coding, expert shooting, and having just a few apps. It really works,

What Needs to Be Improved

When I said, “we lover everything,” that was a bit of an exaggeration. During the checkout process the display of express payment options is rather bare and they miss several great cross-sell / up-sell opportunities. Not “horrible,” but not great either.

Looking at this Shopify site makes me hungry.

The Shopify Apps They Use

We used our top-secret Shopify scanning tools to determine that this site is using the following apps and plugins:

  • Drip — An online ecommerce CRM app.

  • Hotjar — User behavioral heatmaps.

  • Attentive — Mobile messaging.

  • Zoho SalesIQ — Visitor tracking.

  • Algolia – Website search functions.

  • Okendo — Customer reviews.

  • Bugsnag — When there are little bugs, in your code no good. Who ya gonna call?

  • PayPal/ShopPay/etcetera —

Wow … that’s an impressively short list. They do quite a lot with quite a little.

Marketing Stuff They Do

The Spice House is doing just about everything — social media ads, paid search, and a top-notch email marketing campaign. Somebody over there knows what they heck they are doing. But in every marketing interaction nothing “feels” rushed or forced.

They have a

page,

,

,

, and even

(yes, TikTok). But here are 3 social media ads and 3 paid search ads that are running right now for your review and approval.

Sponsored

Let us help you make it Iron Chef worthy. If you need help making Shopify website tweaks or fixing those little nagging things on your Shopify store, let’s get stuff done.