If most ecommerce brands are playing Tetris with their inventory, Personalised Favours is playing 4D chess. 74,000 SKUs, five production methods, and real-time job routing to a fleet of laser engravers. Sounds like a nightmare, but it’s their competitive edge.
In today’s episode, we caught up with Melissa Wilkinson and Matthew Mosse-Robinson, the co-founders of Personalised Favours, to unpack how they’ve scaled a business that combines on-demand manufacturing with emotional ecommerce. Spoiler: it’s not easy. But what they’ve built is incredibly smart, and there’s a lot in here for operators who are deep in the trenches of complexity, growth, and customer expectations.
Let’s break it down.
Complexity is the Moat
Most brands would choose to run away from customisation. Ask them. But these two have run towards it, building a multimillion-dollar custom gifting brand that’s quietly outsmarting half the industry.
Personalised Favours offers over 2,000 products and more than 74,000 SKUs, with options for laser engraving, embroidery, UV printing, DTF, and even sublimation. It’s the kind of operational spaghetti that makes most ecommerce folks break into hives. But Mel and Matt aren’t just managing it, they’re thriving on it. All while keeping the family dynamic intact. Yep, they’re brother and sister-in-law. Bet you didn’t see that one coming.
Why? Because complexity is their moat. It’s hard to copy. It’s built on custom software, real-time production scheduling, and a deeply integrated tech stack that pushes orders from website to machine, sometimes even in the same day. When others zig towards simplicity, M&M double down on operational depth. And, surprise, it’s working.
Custom Tech Beats Cookie Cutter
You won’t find many out-of-the-box tools powering Personalised Favours. Sure, they’re on Shopify Plus now (after finally escaping the trauma of Magento, RIP), but almost everything else is mainly custom-built. From the dynamic imaging that lets customers preview their engraved glassware before purchase, to the production dashboards that optimise machine utilisation in real-time.
They’ve even built a customer comms tool that delivers personalised proofs by SMS and email, ten years ago.
This isn’t tech for tech’s sake. It’s about speed, accuracy, and delivering the kind of experience customers don’t usually expect from a custom order. In the words of Anna Samkova, co-founder of Albany Advisory, that’s the difference between ‘customer loyalty’ and real customer experience. And let’s be honest, those are the moments that keep people coming back.
Good Ops = Freedom (Eventually)
Get this: after 15 years, Matt and Mel finally took a 30-day holiday together. With their families. On a cruise. And the business kept humming along.That doesn’t happen by accident. It’s the result of years spent building systems, hiring leaders, and resisting the urge to duct tape every problem themselves. And it’s a reminder to all of us in ecommerce: if you want your business to grow beyond you, you have to let go of the reins (and sometimes your phone). As Mel puts it:
“Sometimes you just need that break to fall back in love with your business.”
Amen.
Final Thoughts
Personalised Favours isn’t just selling gifts. They’re building infrastructure for a type of ecommerce that’s deeply emotional, maddeningly complex, and massively rewarding when done right. Mel and Matt prove that with the right mix of systems, smarts and a whole lot of grit, even the most custom businesses can scale and let you cruise off into the sunset, knowing it won’t all burn down without you.Just maybe keep a fire extinguisher nearby. They’ve had one of those too.
Keen to hear more of Mel and Matt’s story? Hit play on the latest Add To Cart episode at the link below. And if you’re curious about how other brands are nailing personalisation at scale, don’t miss our chat with Rosie Collins, founder and CEO of Deja Marc.
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