Name of your website?The Big Big Pet Shop
Your name?
Bernard Mc Closkey
Your Location (city, etc)
Donegal
Please give us a short summary of your website?
The Big Big Pet Shop has all your pet needs in one place. A huge range of top Brands with excellent prices and service. Products for Dogs, Cats, Fish, Reptiles Small animals & more. Come along and see our selection
What inspired you to launch your own website?
I had a part time job in a pet shop when I was in college and that's where I developed my love of animals. I come for a very rural part of Ireland and it was difficult to find the things I needed for my pets.
When did you launch your first website, and what was it?
I launched my first website in 2004. It's called europilot.ie and sells as the name would suggest pilot equipment and accessories.
How did you decide on a name for your website?
Definitely the hardest part of the process. Much checking of the whois database and trial and error. In the end I was quite happy with the name. The most important thing when naming a website is for it to be easy to say to someone, no hyphens underscores or using numbers as words etc. It's great if its short as well but difficult to get one that's not in use
What makes your website different from other, similar offerings?
I hope the service I provide set's us apart. I always want to sell the person the right product or no product at all if it's not right for that customer. Alot of sites are driven by the quick fix of an instant sale but I think if your honest with your customers and sell them what they need and not what you've got a storeroom full of and are trying to shift it will pay dividends in the long run.
What is your eventual goal? (To sell it, keep it for income, secure a book or other mainstream media deal?)
It's my retirement plan (I plan to retire at 35). I've a few sites but the pet site is the one that's closest to my heart and I love interacting with customers, seeing their pets grow and thrive. The others I may sell if the opportunity arises but I can't see myself ever not involved with pets.
How does your investment of time and money balance against your success?
Money wise we've done quite well, we kept a very tight control of expenses to start with and grew it gradually as we generated the means to do so. Time is another story. I couldn't have invested as much time in it as I did unless I really loved what I was doing. The first year it was 24/7 and although the time spent on it now is reasonable it was a long slog to get to this point
If you had an unlimited development budget for development, how would you change your site?
A webcam with every tank/vivarium/dog bed sold and live streaming on the site :) . Seriously tho I would redevolpe it from scratch and build a system that was completely customized for every customer based on their preferences/pets/sales.
If your site got really big, really quickly, would you be able to keep up with the demand?
Yes, I was completely obsessive compulsive about building systems for everything at the start and streamlining the processes as much as possible. In hind sight I overdid it in places and probably wasted time automating things that weren't worth the effort but it's a pretty smooth setup now
What unexpected costs and headaches have you had to deal with?
Aside from going a little crazy on adwords at the start there was no major headaches. In the early days stock control was a bit of a nightmare but we learnt our lessons
What has been your biggest challenge?
Finding reliable suppliers with the right products and it's an ongoing struggle. In Ireland most suppliers aren't really geared towards speed of delivery which is a big priority for us so we ended up having to source a lot of products direct from the manufacturer which was hard to judge right in the early days. I think we've just about got the balance right but they could be famous last words.
What method has been most successful for promoting your website?
Adwords by far, especially to get up and running. As I said above we did go a little crazy with them at the start just to get the turnover up but when we sat down and spent some time optimizing them they worked great
How has running your website differed from your expectations?
I completely underestimated the amount of time and range of products involved in the pet site. Most sites I'd worked on up to that point went live with 200-300 products and were built on over time. The pet site needed 2500 before it was launchable and the suppliers were incredibly IT illiterate
How long have you run the site already, and how long will you continue to keep it up if you don't enjoy big gains in traffic, income or popularity?
It's been live for just over a year but it was in the works for almost 2 before that. As I said above, this is a labour of love and will be passed on to the grand kids
What advice would you give to someone starting their own online shop.
Take your time getting right before you go live and don't promote it much until you've done your first few orders. Make sure your site is fully functional and have some friends/family look over it, especially those who don't spend much time on the Internet. If they can navigate it easily without your prompting you've done something right.
What is your website address?
The Big Big Pet Shop
