MightyMerchant Services & Features > Portfolio > Client Profiles > A self-described “Stickerographer”

Net Sales: Rick Cricow

A self-described “Stickerographer”

When Rick Cricow went looking for a new host for his website, YuJean.com, it didn’t matter to him where the company was located, as long as they offered high quality service. “Having somebody whether by phone or email who will answer,” is what’s important says Rick. He settled on Datahost, as MightyMerchant was known at the time, as the first company to contact because everything looked good, not knowing that MightyMerchant was located in Springfield, just outside of Eugene, Oregon.

He called and spoke with our operations manager Jeanie Dunn. “I’m chatting with her and having a good conversation and she’s understanding my questions and everything’s feeling really good,” said Rick. When Jeanie asked what domain he was using, they had a moment of revelation that they were both located in the same town and enjoyed a good laugh. “We met up with them and enjoyed talking with everyone, but in this business it doesn’t really mater where you are. You don’t need the face-to-face, you need the competence.”

That’s what Rick found with us, and still feels switching to MightyMerchant was the right decision. Rick started his business more than 30 years ago, selling trendy stickers, patches, magnets, key chains, window decals, buttons, and other trend merchandise. He calls himself a “stickerographer” and says that he enjoys the traveling, meeting new people and seeing new art designs much as an anthropologist would.

YuJean.com was created as a catalog company selling only wholesale. Though they frequently had people inquire about buying retail, they were not interested in having a retail store with shelves and displays, and referred those inquiries to the retail store carrying their products which was closest to the customer’s ZIP code.

About 2 years ago he decided to give a retail-priced website a chance. “Our product is a very low end product, but we figured with the website that Datahost created for us we’d take a chance and put retail prices on everything,” says Rick. “I have nothing but admiration for Datahost and MightyMerchant. I’ve been in business a long time and I’ve used other web services. I have nothing but praise. I can’t think of a single complaint.”

Go to Net Sales

The design of YuJean.com presented some unique challenges due to the nature of the products. The average order for the types of products Rick sells would be 50, 75, or 100 items, but the average shopping experience on the web is that shoppers have to pick one item at a time to add to their shopping cart. Then they must go back and pick a different item to add to the shopping cart, but with Rick’s products that would be impractical and too cumbersome. “You don’t want to do that 100 times,” he says. “MightyMerchant did an amazing job. They were able to set us up with a website that would display a full screen of stuff, tons of stuff, and people could go through and pick what they want and then just click once to add it to their cart.”

Rick finds MightyMerchant’s site manager software easy to use, which makes a big difference in how smoothly his business runs. “It’s easy for us to update,” he says. “We’re constantly adding new items, changing prices, changing categories, and the software is very easy to work with. I can’t go in and tweak code and crash the server, but on the other hand there’s no reason why I can’t change copy that’s just text. There’s no reason why I can’t drop a piece of art in.”

For anyone making the decision of where to host their website, Rick understands that it can be a scary prospect. “When we choose something we spend a lot of time and a lot of money setting it up and it’s always very scary when you first jump in, you’re thinking, ‘Is it going to work out?’ You’re committing a lot of resources,” he says. “But it’s very worthwhile and we have no regrets. I work closely with MightyMerchant adding new things and giving the site some tweaks and they’ve been great. It’s been just what I would hope for.”

Thanks so much, Rick!