Texas entrepreneur takes leather company to the next level with Fast
In 1999, Dave Munson was a volunteer English teacher in Mexico looking for a bag to carry his students’ books. His top requirement: it had to look cool.
Munson asked a local leather bag maker to make him a bag based on a drawing he sketched. It was an immediate hit. Everywhere Munson went, people would ask about his nice bag. The following year, he returned to Mexico to live and have more bags made. Over the course of 20 years, Munson went from selling bags out of the back of his truck to listing them on eBay to establishing a full-blown business, Saddleback Leather, an online retailer of leather goods and corporate gifts.
“Dave found that he was able to sell those bags, but also the ability to create a community was easy for him and continues to be the main thing with Saddleback.”
It was on the road that Munson realized he had started something special, said Shawn Wyatt, chief operating officer of Arvada Creative, Saddleback’s e-commerce agency partner.
“Dave found that he was able to sell those bags, but the ability to create a community of Saddleback fans has been the driving force of building the brand,” said Wyatt, also a former Saddleback employee. “There's a huge Facebook group of people who love Saddleback and that's been what's driven the success of the company till this point and really helped with COVID.”
Striving to build upon its success, Saddleback Leather set a goal of increasing conversions in 2020. Munson engaged Wyatt, a former Saddleback Leather employee who now runs his own agency Arvada Creative, to explore conversion uplift solutions. Wyatt recommended Fast, a payment solutions company that consolidates the checkout process into one click for the entire internet.
Saddleback installed Fast just before Thanksgiving, and it didn’t disappoint. They've since seen a whopping 65% increase in conversion.
On average, customers check out in five steps and have to fill out at least 14 form fields, which can be arduous if they can’t remember every detail or have to search for their payment card just to complete every single purchase. This outdated process contributes to 70% of transactions being abandoned entirely (checkout abandonment). Fast Checkout eliminates that entire process by securely allowing customers to check out and pay for their items in one click and go on with the rest of their day. The Fast Checkout button is a tested and proven way to increase conversions, boost sales, and improve customer experience.
Wyatt learned about Fast through social media.
“Fast has a really strong Twitter game,” he said. "I saw Fast and did a little research, checked it out on a few other sites Fast was already on, and decided to implement it for Saddleback and some of my other customers, as well. Knowing the main goal for Saddleback this year was boosting the conversion rate, Fast was the perfect option to help with that, and they saw a boost for the holiday season.”Saddleback installed Fast just before Thanksgiving, and it didn’t disappoint. After just a few weeks, they've seen conversion increase 65%.
“And it’s been a steady checkout option since then,” Wyatt said.
It’s been exciting to watch the wide range of businesses installing Fast Checkout over the last couple months –– everything from solopreneurs to larger enterprises with $100M+ in annual sales. Stay tuned for more case studies at fast.co/stories.
