— ROLE
• CEO & Co-Owner
• Technology, design, finance, & core operations
— HIGHLIGHTS
• Store Revolution — From "shut it down" to 34% YoY growth
• Ecommerce Overhaul — full platform migration; From double digit loss to 10% growth
• Warehouse Relocation & Transformation
• RAG AI workflows for high volume content production informed by internal knowledge
— TECH & TOOLS
Shopify
Ruby on Rails
Hotwire + Stimulus.js
Google Sheets + Code
ChatGPT & Claude
After consulting with World Spice periodically for several years, the prior CEO & owner recruited me to take over and steward a tiny-but-mighty culinary brand into its third generation.
World Spice has a massive catalog of beloved products, a passionate base of retail and commercial clients… and was barely break-even. In fact, it was losing money in its brick & mortar flagship store in Seattle.
Complicating matters, the CEO had moved the warehouse to Montana years prior, and no one would be left to run it. Everything had to change fast: retail, warehouse, ecommerce, packaging, branding. On a dime.
First thing? I knew the digital side, so I quickly spent time in Montana and Seattle to understand how the offline pieces all fit together, every single step of the way.
The Impact
20 months in…
Retail Store — from planned shutdown to 34% YoY revenue growth
• We completed a DIY renovation — which I designed, and we did ourselves from demolition to construction — to modernize the space and streamline operations
- • Replaced labor-intensive custom ordering process with unified, grab-and-go sizes for all 250+ products
- • Introduced “Taste Bar” experience to taste spice blends and teas in-store, spurring foot traffic (for the novel experience) and sales (once you taste fresh spices, you know the difference)
- • Increased employee satisfaction with fewer (messy) tasks to manage and far more time to focus on the customer experience and discuss FOOD!
Below: Video of the store today — plus a slideshow of before/after shots if you swipe. I largely designed the new interior with an understanding of the historical building’s strict construction limits and surprising quirks throughout.
Since 1995, the store involved grinding, filling, & heat-sealing spices in-store
Fun! And a lot of work. And for some: intimidating.
Online — Halt declining online sales & lower net operating costs by migrating a decade-old, custom platform & database to Shopify
• Migrated product catalog, blogs, recipes, and proprietary data from custom ecommerce platform
• Shift marketing content from sales-driven to guidance-driven, increasing CTRs and reducing sale reliance (ongoing)
• Lowered shipping costs substantially
• Greatly increased flexibility for site management
Below: Before & after images of the customer-facing site. I designed & implemented the theme. Drag the <> to see each image.
Warehouse — Relocate & streamline for 40% higher output with 50% less staff
• Scout & negotiate warehouse lease well-suited to operational needs as well as employee recruiting
• Replace and semi-automate existing process to drastically improve and standardize fulfillment
• Attract, train, & retain versatile team with deep & relevant experience
• Full-stack (Rails) warehouse management system for tracking lots, inventory, & pricing for 300 products from 100 vendors. Products are sold individually as well as used as components in products we manufacture, making lot tracking a unique challenge to the business.
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Let's talk. Book a meeting or just send me an email.