Supplying a Hobby: How Wild Birds Unlimited Has Upped its E-Commerce Game in 2020

Across all social media platforms, Americans are sharing stories and pictures of hobbies they’ve taken up while stuck at home, from knitting to home fitness to cooking. Dubbed “pandemic hobbies,” activities that can either be performed in the comfort of your own home or socially distanced outdoors are growing in value and keeping many folks entertained.

Wild Birds Unlimited, the leading franchise dedicated to connecting people with nature, is one of the many hobby-driven businesses that has done well in spite of stay at home orders. As more states established lockdowns, more people began to observe the wildlife that lived in their own backyards. With a growing interest in the birds that exist in their personal ecosystems, more and more people began to engage with their local Wild Birds Unlimited locations to learn more.

Patrick Eckhardt, e-commerce manager at Wild Birds Unlimited, said that its updated e-commerce abilities have provided customers with easy access to the brand’s products, enhancing that growing interest. The brand’s platform, MyWBU, has exceeded expectations in the past three months. Over the course of COVID-19, MyWBU has been instrumental in keeping franchisees going strong, allowing the brand to keep its sales up despite being closed to in-person guests. The digital platform, which connects local stores to regional customers through ecommerce, has even helped multiple locations see a spike in revenue.

“I think [our digital platform] has been essential to keep our customers tied into our system and shopping with our stores,” said Eckhardt. “We have a store that shut down completely and they went up year over year in total sales, surpassing their sales volume from when they had their physical location open. We’re finding that every single one of those [existing] customers either maintained or increased engagement.”

The proof is in the pudding, as they say. Franchisees are finding their customers truly appreciate the accessibility the e-commerce platform provides to the products they love. Manuel Pena, a customer-turned-franchisee in Dripping Springs, Texas, said that curbside service has made up for 95% of his sales throughout the pandemic. According to Pena, the ability to take orders online and over the phone has been instrumental in their success in the past few months: “We’re fortunate that we had our MyWBU website set up already. We wouldn’t have been as successful as we have been if we weren’t prepared to handle online orders.”

Eckhardt says the e-commerce initiative began long before the advent of COVID-19 with a goal to increase sales in a big way in three to five years. Last year, sales were just over 2% online. Online sales under the pandemic, however, have skyrocketed with MyWBU. In the initial months of COVID-19, the e-commerce platform produced about 20% of total sales in March, April, and May. Thanks to the franchise support center’s efforts to incorporate more store locations onto the MyWBU platform, more franchisees were able to take advantage of the platform and go almost completely digital when they needed to most.

“Whether they legally can’t or don’t want to reopen, we’ve been suggesting franchisees push sales online,” said Eckhardt. “Right now we have about 250 of our 350 stores online. We’re still onboarding, but will have all of them online by the end of 2021.”

Customers’ access to Wild Bird Unlimited’s products has been critical to sales growth. While there’s a certain level of comfort that comes with physically going into the stores, customers have the opportunity to buy the same bird feed while browsing new products from the comfort of their homes. Eckhardt says MyWBU will continue to be valuable beyond the pandemic, giving customers the chance to plan their shopping trip online before heading into the store. For customers who are older or suffer from health complications that make it difficult for them to leave their homes, the platform will continue to help.

“We know we can leverage the platform to keep [customers] engaged with our services and increase lifetime value,” said Eckhardt. “No matter their personal situations, they continue to learn more about a hobby they love and engage with a store they love.”