Oliver Hagen: It was exciting, but it was also very daunting because you didn't know what was going to happen at that point. We didn't know the supply was going to continue or like if we were going to be shut down or if it was only going to be for a week.
Ruby Hagen: We'd gone from taking 50 orders a week to 150 orders a day. Is people are thinking about what's important and it's taken people back to the thinking about food and the importance of food. Not only food security, which is something that's really important, but also sharing meals with people. If you don't have a connection to something, then you consume without thought. And if you consume without thought, you'll waste without thought.
[Voiceover]: Welcome to Add to Cart, the podcast that express delivers all you need to know in the fast moving world of E commerce. Every month, Nathan Bush from 12 High and an E commerce industry expert will share the news, research and insights that you need to know to keep you at the top of your game and of course, keep your customers Adding to Cart.
Nathan Bush: Hello and welcome to Add to Cart. My name is Nathan Bush, host of add to cart and ecommerce commerce strategist at 12 high. A special shout out and welcome to our Melburnian listeners who are slowly emerging out of lockdown. We have a special treat for you today. We have one of your local legends joining us on Add to Cart, brother
Nathan Bush: and sister duo Oliver and Ruby Hagen.
Nathan Bush: From you guess it Hagen's Organics will join us to share how they've converted the traditional butcher shop model into an online institution. In today's conversation, we're going to cover everything from how livestream video can really connect with your audience, even if you're
Nathan Bush: not really live streaming, the impact of
Nathan Bush: picking up the phone and calling customers, and how they had to quickly triple their staff to 75 when Covid hit.
Nathan Bush: I thoroughly enjoy this chat.
Nathan Bush: Just make sure you've eaten beforehand because you'll probably get very hungry throughout. So let's get into it. Thanks to our partners Shopify plus and Signet. Here's our conversation with Oliver and Ruby Hagan for From Hagan's Organics.
Nathan Bush: Oliver and Ruby Hagan, welcome to Add to Cart.
Oliver Hagen: Hello. How you going?
Ruby Hagen: Thank you so much for having us. Good, good.
Nathan Bush: Thank you for joining. I'm super pumped about this. As a, as a non Melbournian, I've heard a little bit about the Hagens Organics cult that's starting up, especially Lockdown. So I'm really keen to dive into it. We might start right at the start, where I understand you guys are a family business with your dad starting it over 20 years ago.
Nathan Bush: Can you give us a little bit
Nathan Bush: of a background on Hagan's organics and how you guys got into the business and how you've transitioned it into online?
Oliver Hagen: So yeah, my, our dad started it in 1999, so he started off actually by opening an organic fruit and veg shop and then he went into meat in 1999.
Nathan Bush: So you went vegetarian to meat, not the other way around?
Oliver Hagen: I know, I know. It's weird, isn't it? So all of these customers kind of were like, you guys should do meat. So dad just was like, sure, why the hell not? Let's give it a go. So he jumped into organic meat in the pride market and then soon closed the fruit veg shop and opened up another shop in the Queen Victoria market. And then. Yes, where's the rest is history.
Nathan Bush: That's awesome.
Nathan Bush: So guys, now that you are online,
Nathan Bush: were you both the generation that influenced that transition from the markets into online?
Ruby Hagen: I think I'll take this one. You know, for me, I started working the business when I was, I think at about 13. I came in and always worked in the shops. Then I. A bit of a love hate relationship with it and then I went, you know, worked there and I didn't want to work there. And I started, I did a biomedical, started a biomedical science degree and then I left and then hey, worked in the shop for a year because the buy me wasn't working for me and I was like, what do I want to do? And it's like, look, I love what I do. I love working in the markets. I've spent my whole life there. I want to stay doing this, but I want to take a new spin on it. So I went and did a entrepreneurship degree at business degree at Swinburne University. And from there I sort of, I think I was exposed to a lot of like those ideas of startups and online. And so I was just kind of like, look, I really love to bring that into the business. I was sort of working part. Sorry, studying part time and working full time. And I was like, look, you know, I feel like we need an online presence. If you're not online, you're not anything. This is back in like 2010, 2011, 2012. I was like, we gotta do this.
Nathan Bush: And there'd be no other butchers online at that point.
Nathan Bush: Nah.
Ruby Hagen: And so we started it and it was like, I kept, I started it and it was just like, it's been A slow burn. I had a really lovely guy who worked with me and he sort of helped me sort of drive it at that stage. And we just kept going and kept trying, kept trying and, you know, dribs and drabs of orders and it was just like, oh, this isn't really working. And. And then when Bruce came on board sort of more full time after my dad passed away, I think sort of like 2015, was it, Rubes?
Oliver Hagen: Right, about 2015, yeah, yeah.
Ruby Hagen: And then I sort of said, oh, Rubes, can you, like, help me out with this? And sort of Rube's help out quite a lot with it as well. And then got on board with the website and still just didn't really. Didn't really kick off until, you know, sort of COVID hit. And I think there was a. I was actually chatting about some with this someone this morning, and I think there was lot of factors at play at that. You know, we're really lucky because we set ourselves up. Like, we had a system to order online. We knew people could do it. I think there's a couple of triggers that needed to happen for people to sort of get over purchasing food or consumables online and trusting that somebody can supply you something for what you order. You know, the people are okay with that, with clothes and stuff that they felt they could send back. But having food, I think there was a lot of. Especially in this, like, you know, obviously America and the UK had kind of done it, and normally we're sort of like 10 years behind America in terms of uptake. And I feel like that was. This helped speed that along. It was like, all right, well, we have to do it now. And then once they did it, we're like, oh, hang on a second. Like, these guys do a good job. Then it was like, we can do this every week. And so I feel like that sort of. That's where this sort of evolved for us.
Oliver Hagen: Everyone, I think, was just really scared of the unknown. They were scared about how it happened, where, you know, if they were to leave it, like, how it transported. They were just. It was just a very big unknown bubble. I think that people were.
Ruby Hagen: Especially in Australia.
Oliver Hagen: Yeah, exactly, yeah.
Nathan Bush: Was there anything in particular that helped. That you find helped people get over that weirdness of ordering from a butcher online?
Oliver Hagen: I think just communication and just being, like, really open to customers about, you know, the transport, how it does get transported, you know, making sure that there's, like, it's packaged correctly. I think that was a huge thing and also communicating that. But Yeah, I think communication was just a huge one.
Nathan Bush: And from your point of view, setting this up as an E commerce store, was there anything that surprised you operationally that you really had to overcome to get a butcher online?
Ruby Hagen: I think the biggest thing with operational side of things, one thing is actually getting butchers to embrace it, you know, I mean, like, oh, this isn't going to work. You're spending all this time on this online stuff. This is silly. This is. Luckily you've got some, some good young butchers who work in my factory who actually understand the digital age. But you know, there is some like older guys who found it a bit challenging to understand at first. So operationally getting people to accept it. And then I think the biggest part was, the biggest turning point for us was working out we didn't have to provide everybody with everything, you know, I mean, to say, okay, we need, you know, mints at 250 grams, 500 grams a kilo. So people could select just going to go, okay, well really having a look at the data and going, okay, well what do people buying mostly by multiple the 500 grams, right, everything's 500 grams. You know, I mean, doing things like that, they were the challenges trying to work out those little bits and pieces, which helped us sort of streamline things and make things a bit more efficient.
Oliver Hagen: Yeah. And luckily we kind of made all those decisions like before COVID as well, which I think if we were still doing the 250, 500 kilo, all that, it would just be mayhem. So it was good that we set ourselves up, I think, in that way.
Nathan Bush: So start simple and then go from there. Now I'm probably well underplaying you and you may be cringing there when I call you a butcher shop. You are much, much more than that. When you look at the website, it's phenomenal. Some of the, the things that you guys offer tell us what sets you apart from your standard butcher.
Ruby Hagen: I think the thing that really sets us apart is one, it's our sort of transparency with our customers. It's really important. We found it really important to be really honest and open about what we do and where we get our product from and who we get our product from. And then also like we brought in like because of, we have had this massive background in food. I think, you know, our ability to then now bring in, lean on some of our old connections, connections that we've had for 20, 30 years, our family, and be able to bring in, you know, a fruit and veg element to what we're doing, you know, we've been in the market, so we know people at seafood. So to bring seafood into what we're doing and to do it in a way that we sort of bypass that whole like, oh, we don't know what we're doing. We've kind of half. Do we know this is the right person to buy off? Da da da da. Because we've been doing it for so long, we can go, okay, if we don't know about it, we know someone who knows enough about it to be like, all right, who's the best person to buy off? And that's really sort of helped push us good product online, I suppose. Do you agree? Ribs?
Oliver Hagen: Yeah, definitely, definitely 100%. I think that definitely the main one is just being really transparent with our customers. A lot of other butcher shops and other places I think do kind of leave that bit out a little bit. And I think that our main goal is just to really show people where their produce comes from and really tell the stories of farmers and producers.
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Nathan Bush: This includes a drag and drop meal
Nathan Bush: plan, HubSpot CRM integration and time based delivery options for all that cold stuff. They've already achieved a 2.5% conversion rate without any marketing and are now looking to stack on the pounds, I mean, dollars. To read more of Jenny Craig's story and see other case studies, visit the customer section on shopify.com.
Nathan Bush: It feels like the online presence is core to your business. It doesn't feel like it's just an add on or an afterthought where someone's gone. I will try this and we'll give it a go and it can sit over there and we'll do our main business through the markets or through our shop fronts. It really feels core to what you are as a brand and an offering.
Oliver Hagen: Yeah, definitely. And I think it was like that before COVID but I think that Covid has really kind of pivoted our business in that way where it really made the online store its own, its own self, basically. Like, rather than being just like a side thing that we're trying to do.
Nathan Bush: Yeah. So you guys are based in Melbourne. You're in the middle of a lockdown at the moment. Tell us about the impact that Covid has had on your business and what kind of growth that you're seeing because of that.
Ruby Hagen: It's. For us, it's, you know, we're pretty lucky. We've been, you know, we've got the good end of the deal on this one, I think. And not to say, like, you know, not to downplay the amount of effort we put in prior to this and having these sort of systems in place, but, you know, this is sort of allowed us to grow sort of exponentially at the moment. It feels like, you know, we're in a business that's been 20 years old, but like the meep side of our business anyway. But it feels like we're in a startup. You know, it's just kind of like things are happening so fast and we're learning so fast. And, you know, we went from 25 employees to 75 employees in the last. In less than, you know, since March. Really?
Oliver Hagen: Yeah.
Nathan Bush: Wow. So is that across the whole business, not just the online side?
Oliver Hagen: I mean, it is, yeah. Like, it is across the whole business, but mainly online. Like, you know, we've hired new packing staff and new marketing staff and.
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, so, yeah, there's mainly that is online, like packers, drivers, you know, all that kind of stuff. So it kind of like, our business grew really, really quickly, and then it was just like trying to put things in place. And I think, you know, Covid, as I said, it forced people online, but it also forced people to really think about, you know, one of the benefits of it, I suppose, is people are thinking about what's important, and it's taken people back to the thinking about food and the importance of food. There's not only food security, which is something that's really important, but also, like sharing meals with people.
Oliver Hagen: Yeah.
Ruby Hagen: You know, and. And the brilliance of cooking food and sharing with people. And I think that's really impacted how we operate because people are like, look, I want to go to the butcher one. Like, you know, people kind of like, even when they leave this, it's not like, you know, when I was not gonna be a lot of money floating around Australia for a bit, you know, to go out and spend 100 bucks per person on dinner was. People used to would do that. No dramas, you know, now they can think, okay, well, look, I can spend 200 bucks, I can feed five people, and I can also have grog and
Nathan Bush: we can have a great comment.
Ruby Hagen: I could curate experience and a fun experience at home. And I think bringing that has really helped us grow as well. So, yeah, it's. It's pretty special at the moment. Yeah.
Nathan Bush: Because kind of Ethical and quality was a huge trend pre Covid. Right. Is that there was a certain segment of the audience where they were willing to pay more for that ethical, high quality produce where they knew where it was coming from. And I'm assuming, Covid, to your point there, Oliver, that. That's just amplified it. What was the first thing you did when. When Melbourne went into lockdown that first time and you went, wow, this is going to totally change up, isn't it? You've mentioned tripling your stuff, but where was the first point that you went, we've got to change this straight away?
Ruby Hagen: I think it was. I think it was like, it happened. I remember it happened on a Sunday and then sales kicked up at the stores. We're like, oh, God, what's going on here? And then we started seeing sales coming online and I'm like, oh, yeah, I'm, you know, in our working relationship between me and Rubes, I'm the accelerator and Rubes tends to be a bit more of the brake trying to pull me back, what I want to do. So I'm kind of like, let's go, let's do more, let's do this, let's do that, let's have take a. It's, you know, we've gone from, you know, taking 50 orders a week to 150 orders a day, 200 orders a day. So having. I'm like, oh, let's, let's do more, let's do more, let's do more. So, like, the biggest thing in that sense was just us. Like, it happened so quickly. It was that we'd already sort of planned for this. We just didn't explain it for it to happen so quickly. So it was just sort of acting and trying to, like, scramble and put everything that we thought we would have to do over a number of years into a number of weeks.
Oliver Hagen: Yeah.
Nathan Bush: And in that moment, was that exciting? What was the feeling there? Was it exciting or was it daunting? Was it stressful?
Oliver Hagen: It was a bit of both, really. It was exciting, but it was also very daunting. Very daunting because you didn't know what was going to happen. And we, like, you know, at that point, we didn't know really if the supply was going to continue or like we were going to be shut down or if it was only going to be for a week and then it was going to die or.
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, I think on the supply front, it was just. And that's the benefit about what we do is we have relationships with suppliers, so we have relationships with farmers directly. So we pay more. So normally we pay more for stuff and we build this relationship. And our sort of thing is like, you know, everybody's going to make money. I got to make money, they got to make money. We work with families. It's really important for everybody in the supply chain to make money. And then I think because of that, it then flipped and all these people that were dealing with large companies who then got said, oh, we can't sell you as much stock. We can't sell you with as much of this. Do this. Our suppliers are like, yeah, we can give you what you want. I'm like, all right, sweet, thanks. And then just allowed us to supply people. It was just like, you know, dealing with a farmer in Kilmore and be like, all right, dude, like, double your pig order. Yeah, no problems. Easy.
Nathan Bush: Yeah, because you have that channel set up ready to go.
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, exactly.
Nathan Bush: And. And what I love is on your website is that you've got these partners, but you actually feature them. Right. So there's not many retailers who would feature their suppliers on their own website and, and actually give them a profile and build them up. But you've done that across so much on your website. Like, the transparency, like you said, is just coming through. So clearly. You even teach your own customers in a class how to butcher their own meat. You're a butcher, but you're teaching other people how to butcher their own meat. And there was one quote on the website that really caught my eye, and it was about that you should only be eating meat three to four times a week. It's better for our health, better for the animals, better for the environment. That's a quote from you, Oliver, on your website, telling people to limit their meat consumption coming from butcher. So to me, that's fantastic. Was that. Was that. That kind of transparency around your suppliers, around your ethics, Was that all deliberate from the start or is that growing over time?
Ruby Hagen: I think instead of being deliberate from the start, it was sort of like, we've always had that, like, organic food and organic aspect in what we do.
Oliver Hagen: I think it's naturally evolved as well.
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, it's evolved. And I think, like, the biggest thing for us, you know, especially in that comment about meat. It's like one of my firm beliefs. It's. It's our issue, you know, not getting too big into this, but issue within the environment and all this stuff is not what we consume, but how we consume. So it's, you know, it's about, you know, consuming fast and wasting fast and not having connection to where your things from. Because if you don't have a connection to something, then you consume without thought. And if you consume without thought, you waste without thought. Oh, this steak is off a shelf. You don't realize that it's from an animal. You don't realize that a farmer worked really hard for it. You don't realize any of that stuff. And therefore for it to go to its use by date and be thrown in the bin is. It's nothing. I can get it off the shelf. Again. Understanding where it's from gives it more weight. And developing that connection, it's a connection we've completely lost, especially in cities. I think for us it's just so important to be like, hey, look, this is like, this has got weight and we don't want you. Yes, our prices are higher. We don't want you to eat meat all the time because one, it's not the right thing to do. This is the true cost of what to produce it. So eat good, eat less. But equality. And I think that's like one of the biggest things that we've wanted to sort of push towards people and get people understanding.
Nathan Bush: What tips would you give people in their everyday lives if they want to be sure of the source of their food or produce? What kind of tips would you give people when they're at the butcher, when they're at the supermarket to look for?
Oliver Hagen: Just asking the, ask the questions. I mean, at the supermarket, I suppose it is quite hard because they don't provide you with a lot of information. Like you look at the packet and it says like $9.99. It doesn't tell you where it's from, whether in the butcher. I feel like it's just about asking the questions and like really testing them to find out sort of where it is from, what it's fed, how long kind of the. Their lifespan has been, all of that kind of stuff.
Nathan Bush: Yep. And how do you train your team to make sure that they're on message as well? Because you said, you know, you're up to 75 staff there. Obviously a lot of the ethos that's coming through is from yourselves and your family's backgrounds. How do you train your team to fall in line? Well, not fall in line as well, so that it comes across to your customers in the right way.
Oliver Hagen: Something that we're working on.
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, we're working on that a lot now. Like we really had to go back and sort of build, you know, build a really strong business structure which we're Trying to flush out in the last couple of weeks because it's sort of like, you know, a week or two ago and I was like we're just kind of looking and like shit, you know, if we don't do something to do to put something in place now, we're not going to be really be able to take a stronger action and do something and move forward. So in that there was that whole training and that buy in for people. So that's what we really want to sort of work on. I think. You know, when we were smaller it was just sort of just talking to them, just talking, being there, taking, customer taking, offering to take people out to farms, meeting the producers, meeting the farmers,
Oliver Hagen: you know, we had time to do that as well. Where now it's quite hard because we want to go out to the stores and talk to everyone but you know, we just physically don't have the time to do it right now.
Ruby Hagen: Yeah.
Nathan Bush: Is there a special way you qualify new people coming into the business to make sure that they meet that.
Ruby Hagen: I think it's just like we want people to have a curiosity and a willing to let willingness to learn, you know what I mean? Like the biggest thing and you know it can't be understated is make sure people match. They sort of fit in with what we do. Sort of match your culture. You know, everyone talks about culture and as long as I sort of do that, it doesn't really bother me if you don't know much about me. It's like if you're interested in food and you're interested in, you kind of give a shit and we'll teach you and it's easy to learn. Like it's, it's. If you care about what you're doing, it's easy to learn about it, you know?
Nathan Bush: Yeah, I love, I love the curiosity side of it. I think people with curiosity is just, just linchpins for your business.
Nathan Bush: Now turning to your customers because I
Nathan Bush: have my local butcher here in Brisbane that I love. He always recognized me when I come in, knows what I order, knows that my little boy just comes with me to the butcher. He won't go with me anywhere else just so I can get a Cheerio. Probably the worst, sorry, least sustainable meat in the world. But there's that local butcher connection. How do you guys manage your connection with your customers in an online setting? Do you really run the data or is it more personalized one to one stuff?
Oliver Hagen: Well, we have, we have started calling customers. That's a big one. Like actually just reaching out to customers and speaking to them on the phone.
Ruby Hagen: And I think we sort of like, we had that, like we had that connection to begin with as like that touch and feel. Like we built out everything on that, you know, and, and then, yeah, recently it's as things have changed, one, it's like our level of connection with like our like customer response and talking and emailing and like, that's what we're doing. We have a couple of little tricks up our sleeve which we want to roll out in the next month or so to try and prove that experience and really try and give people that butcher shop experience at home. But we're looking at the data, we're looking at like obviously feedback from us, from our staff, we're looking at the data from Google, we're looking at the data from Facebook. We're like, who's interacting with us, who's interacting with our brand? We're using all of that. But I don't think anything really beats talking to someone. Sort of like what we really want to plan on doing and, and hopefully roll out soon is really trying to just make sure you have that connection. You have that person to call, you have the person to chat to follow up on your order or even just ask a couple of questions. So I think that's very important. Ruby's sort of been pushing that quite a bit. You used to know all the online customers, didn't you know who was this?
Oliver Hagen: I was on the other end of every email, replying to customers, answering them, creating great relationships. But again, since all of this has blown up and since we have got bigger, I just, again, I don't have the time to do it, but I think that it is really important to kind of call customers and really speak to them and I think that's the best way to create the connection.
Nathan Bush: What kind of reactions have you got from customers who have received kind of a proactive call out of the blue from you?
Oliver Hagen: Well, I haven't actually personally called people yet, so I can't really say I'm going to be honest. We have other people, other people doing that now, but I'm sure that they've been extremely pleased and possibly shocked to hear that their butcher is calling them to see how their sort of order is going. Because I, I mean, I don't even know many businesses that I've ordered online who have called me after I've had my order delivered.
Nathan Bush: No, I think it's such a, such a great thing to be doing is those proactive calls to your most valuable customers. It goes such a long way.
Oliver Hagen: Yeah. And I think it's not even to the sort of most valuable. I think it's just to everyone, you know, and that's how you kind of make them the longtime customers.
Nathan Bush: So
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Nathan Bush: Now. The content through your site is beautiful. You've got recipes, you've got images, you've got video, you're all across the social. Can you tell us a little bit about your content creation process? I'm assuming you don't just load up butchers with a load of iPhones and let them go nuts and upload to your social. Tell us how you bring all that together.
Ruby Hagen: I think it's been a bit of a journey on that one for us. When we started doing it, we really wanted to cement ourselves as a source of knowledge for people. We wanted people to be able to look to us and go, okay, well how do I do this? Obviously ties back to where it's from. And then we sort of had this plan in place and we're sort of stumbling around with it and how we're going to do this. And then again when all this sort of hit, our cousin Pat, Our cousin Pat, he's everywhere. Yeah, he's a bit of a cult hero, Pat. He became available and you know, me and him always cook together. Like we cook together all like cook ups, weekends, family things, whatever. We love to do that. And he was able to come on board with us. He's also like a graphic designer and photographer. He's like, hey look, I'm going to start churning out some. Like we said, can you start checking out, churning out some websites, like recipes, we need them a couple of weeks. And he started with that and then, you know, we were again lucky enough to get a couple of people on board that were just brilliant, you know, these creatives that looking for work and they're like, hey, yeah, we can help out with this or we can do this or we can do that. And it sort of, sort of stemmed from there and, and, and they were
Nathan Bush: attracted to your brand. Like they came to you saying, I've got ideas or I'd love to work with you.
Ruby Hagen: Well, a lot of them are friends. They're just friends. Yeah, we're just like out of work and we're just like, hey, man, we need someone to do our videos. Yeah, I can do this. Yeah, somebody was, you know, Shani, who I think you've spoken to, she was going to do. She was going to move to Barcelona and she had her own business, catering business, and now she's running our social media and she's just like killing it. So just lucky enough to have these people come across our, our path because of this and take them on board. And this has helped us sort of build our strategy out and, and build out what we do.
Nathan Bush: Yeah, brilliant. And is it a test and learn approach in that you kind of give a fair bit of rope to try new things and see what, what hits mark?
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, we just got to give it a go. You just, we're sort of what the opinion is like, you know, just learn from your mistakes and just try something and if it doesn't work, what's a big deal? You know what I mean? It's a flop on, on Instagram, you know, it's. It's so such a consumable thing. It's like, bang, it's gone. It's like, don't worry about it. Just try the next thing out. See if that works. See what gets, you know, see what happens in. As soon as you find something that people like, pick it up and run it for it for a while, you know, don't over burn it, but just go with it and see and just. Yeah, I think it's just giving people the freedom to be creative, I think that creates the best result.
Oliver Hagen: Yeah.
Nathan Bush: Guys, you've experimented a lot with live streaming, especially in lockdown. And I've seen some of the cooking classes and everything you've been doing with people in lockdown. How's live streaming going for you? Because I'm fascinated about it.
Oliver Hagen: Well, we did, we did try and do a live stream with a wine shop down here in Melbourne and that was actually our only official live stream because it just didn't work.
Ruby Hagen: That was a nightmare. That was.
Oliver Hagen: Yeah, yeah. Most. Most of them. The little secret is to have them pre recorded, make them look like it's a live stream, but pre recorded.
Nathan Bush: What went wrong with the live. Live streaming?
Ruby Hagen: We just, it just kept dropping out and it just wouldn't connect. And like me and Reeves are standing there, we're like, just talking like, trying to like, provide, you know, some Kind of instead of looking at the camera and just been like, so we're just like trying to chat away. And they kept trying to connect and it was just kind of like, oh, God, this is. This is, you know, an absolute nightmare. Yeah, it was a bit of a nightmare. So it was. We just sort of said, look, I think just for continuity, we're just gonna still have these interviews. We're gonna record them and we're just gonna post them up here. And you know, we don't really edit them at all. We just do them straight up just so that we can get them. You know, we know it's consistent. You know, there is a couple of dropouts. We can sort of put it in together and it just makes a bit more streamlined, I think.
Nathan Bush: Yeah, so it's more like using your social channels to broadcast.
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, exactly.
Oliver Hagen: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. And I find that's also good as well because I mean, a lot of the time people can miss lives and they can, you know, not see it whether if it's pre recorded, it's just always going to be there. So people can always rely on that. They're going to be able to see it 100%.
Nathan Bush: And we've even seen in China and some other places, some farmers using live streaming to sell some of their products directly. We've seen that as a real trend coming through. Do you think you'll ever integrate shopping with your live streaming?
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, I think we will.
Nathan Bush: Or your live broadcasting?
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, well, look, I think we're gonna like, we will move to live. I think we want to move back to live streaming. We'd love to put some more live things on there, I think that interact, like it's really interactive. But I think we just need to make sure that one, that everybody's got a safe Internet connection, so we don't have dropouts and stuff like that. But I would really love to do some cooking classes or some maybe butchery classes and stuff like that around that live streaming aspect and offer, you know, that sort of purchasing thing coming through into it could be really cool. You know, like we're talking through a recipe. You know, you get Chuck Steak, bang. You can buy Chuck steak. You know, you could be watching me, like, oh, yeah, I want to do this. All right, I'm going to buy these ingredients. Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang. Buy them as we're sort of like, hey, what about this? What about that? You know, not infomercial styles. I don't want to be like, you know, standardly going, look at this Chuck Steak.
Nathan Bush: But like you're the new Tony Robbins.
Nathan Bush: Yeah.
Nathan Bush: On your Facebook page, you've connected shopping in there already and we haven't got the full Facebook shopping rollout here in Australia yet, but can see there that you've got your products listed and pricing and it links through those product pages on your website. How's that going for you? I'm assuming that's kind of still at experimentation stage.
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, still sort of figuring it out. I think, you know, the biggest, like we're getting a few sales through it, not massive sales at all, but we're getting like, you know, drips and drabs. You know, people still want to go to the website and get that full immerse themselves, I suppose, in that experience. So I think, yeah, our biggest thing with Facebook is our advertising at the moment. I think that's like our biggest one. But I think as people get to know the brand and possibly we can sort of tailor that shopping experience a bit more online because it's just like at the moment it's just like sort of photos. But if somehow we can sort of, you know, later on, I'm sure we will be able to integrate more of our, our personal identity onto that. I think people will use it a bit more, you know.
Nathan Bush: Yeah, makes sense. Has there been any breakthroughs in Covid where you've attracted a whole bunch of new customers that you've learned certain channels that are performing much better than others?
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, like our newest customers at the moment, like before COVID our customers, like our demographic was like 35 to 45 year old women was like, that was our demographic biggest, wasn't it? Ribs. That was right, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then, and then now it's shifted to 25 to 35 year olds, like both male and female, skewing more towards women than men, but male and female, I think that's, you know, that channel of both Instagram, like that's those social channels. Facebook has been a huge one for us and, and Instagram. Yeah, that's allowed us sort of tap into that and really reach some of those younger people and really sort of show them our brand. And you know, our sort of hope with this is that whether they continue to shop online or whatever, we've exposed them to what we do. So hopefully we, you know, either they keep coming shopping online or they decide that now when they're free, they can come and buy from us in store.
Nathan Bush: It must be, it must just be a totally different experience for those new customers though, to receive this level of customer service and quality for the first time, I was poking around your Facebook reviews and I found a review on there, and I'm just going to read it so everyone can kind of hear about it, because you can kind of imagine yourself in this customer's shoes. This customer said, Hagen sent me an email apologizing about the Mandarins scent. Apologizing because they weren't organic due to a supplier accidentally sending them to the wrong produce. They sent me a voucher to use next time. I would never have known about those Mandarins. I didn't care anyway. They were sweet and juicy. Bottom line, I'm incredibly impressed with their service quality and their integrity. Like, to get that kind of customer review about Mandarins is phenomenal.
Oliver Hagen: Yeah, I think. I think it just goes back to that kind of thing of us wanting to be really transparent with our customers. And I think that from experience, I've kind of learned the best thing is just to be honest to people. Like, don't make up those little white lies about things that happened or pretend like it's just be up and just be like, look, this happened. We fucked up. I'm really sorry and hope you can forget us.
Nathan Bush: Yeah.
Ruby Hagen: Yeah. And I think the biggest thing like that me and Rubes feel is, like, because I think because we've been in the business, obviously this business means so much to us and we've been in it for so long and it's been part of our family. I think, you know, this might be a bit of a downside, but we kind of like bad customer reviews or customer complaints. We. I take them personally. You know what I mean? I actually, like, they feel something. I'm really, like, I'm upset that if somebody's had a bad experience, I'm like, I'm really disappointed that we've let somebody down. Like, I'll get out on a Saturday, and if I have one customer that didn't get something delivered, so even a Sunday, I'm like, I'll just do it. I'll just go out and pick up some produce and drive out personally to drop it off to them. Purely because I'm just like, I would. I just don't want people to have a bad experience with our brand. And it's a reflection for us. It's a reflection of who we are. So it's just like, we just want to make sure that people really enjoy that experience.
Oliver Hagen: Yeah. And I think on that as well. I think sometimes people forget that there are sometimes people behind the reviews as well. And that. Yeah, as Ollie said, we read each and every Review. And if it is a bad review, you know, sometimes we're on the phone to each other at 10pm on a Saturday night, like, genuinely upset that we had bad review. So it's, you know, it affects us.
Nathan Bush: It's good to take it personally, though, right?
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that's. That's what makes it, you know, it makes us be able to go, okay, well, we want to make sure that, you know, we want to strive for that. That excellence.
Nathan Bush: Now, I can't let you go without asking about the brother sister relationship. We had Nat and Tom on from Mr. Pool Man A couple of weeks ago, and they're obviously brother and sister working a family business together, and they made it sound like the Brady Bunch. How's it go for you guys? You get along okay?
Ruby Hagen: Yeah,
Oliver Hagen: it's like radio silence.
Ruby Hagen: We do, we do. Yeah. We have a. We have a really good relationship. You know, we're really lucky that we've had those ups and those downs and, like, we sort of complement each other quite well. It's definitely a learning experience, like, you know, making sure that you put the right boundaries in place and that you're. You're open and honest. And I think that's sort of the biggest thing we've had to learn recently is just like, we really have to make sure we have boundaries. And, you know, don't call. Try not to call each other on a. When we see each other on a weekend, start talking about work. Just like, all right, let's just not talk about, like, no work. No work. You know, be really like, this is work. This is not work. I think there are a few of those things. But, yeah, we blew. I think we blew. That's just like.
Oliver Hagen: But not the Brady Bunch.
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, we, like, we'll have, you know, you have a go at each other or you piss each other off or you say something and it's like, you know, you're an idiot. And, you know, the good thing about it is most of the time we can walk away and in sort of 10 or 15 minutes, we're pretty sweet. And I think this is about a lot. What it is.
Nathan Bush: Yeah, it is just an extension of childhood, Right?
Oliver Hagen: Exactly, exactly, exactly. And I think it's just about accepting that that stuff does happen rather than sort of. Yeah. Taking it sort of super seriously and that you can't argue and you can't have those brother sister moments. I think you just gotta go. Okay, that's just us.
Nathan Bush: Yeah, that's great. Now, guys, we've got to wrap Up. But what is next for Hagens Organics? I know you guys move fast or Oliver, you move fast and wherever you put on the brakes. What do the next few months look like for you guys?
Ruby Hagen: I think Christmas ahead is. This is our biggest one for us. So getting ready for that. We have some really cool Christmas campaigns coming out and some, some fun things that we want to do for people to interact with and have fun with the brand online. So we've got some, some games and things that we think we want to, we want the community to play with us. So we're gonna, we're gonna, we've got some stuff there and, and you know, our biggest thing at the moment is to sort of bet ourselves down over the next few months, get us through to Christmas and then after that we are looking at where we can go. And we have a couple of cool pop ups coming up as well. So we've got two of those opening out in different locations around Melbourne and Victoria. So, you know, we want people to look out for them and get around it.
Nathan Bush: How do you plan pop ups in
Nathan Bush: Melbourne at this point in time?
Oliver Hagen: That's our first one.
Ruby Hagen: Yeah, it's our first one. Yeah, we, we have some really amazing people that work for us and we've, we're. Yeah, we just kind of staging it out and I think, you know, we're lucky. I think it's just gonna, we're gonna pull it together. It just, it's good. I think it's just about the people that we have with us.
Oliver Hagen: Yeah. Trust. Yeah. Trusting the people that are around us, that they know what we want and you know, we know that they can do a good job.
Nathan Bush: So yeah, great stuff, guys.
Nathan Bush: Now you have very generously given our
Nathan Bush: listeners in Melbourne a Coupon code for 10% off their first order. So we'll put that coupon code into the show notes and into the email that goes out as well. So thank you very much for that. Anyone in Melbourne who wants some quality produce to get them through Covid, we'll have that code for you to give it a go. Guys, thank you so much for sharing your story. It's been so great to hear about and I can definitely recommend, even if you're not in Melbourne, go on to hagensorganics.com have a look at how you are taking the traditional butcher online and everything else that comes with it because I think it's definitely a great case study in how to shake up an industry. Thank you very much.
Ruby Hagen: Thanks. Cheers.
Oliver Hagen: Thanks so much.
Nathan Bush: What stood out for me in this interview was apart from being another brother sister combo who actually still like each other after working together was their focus on transparency in everything that Hagens do. They talked about actually advising their customers to eat less meat. They showcase their suppliers on their website when people could go to them direct and they even teach their customers how to butcher their own meat. A butcher telling customers how to butcher their own meat? Crazy. But while it is transparent, I actually think think there's another name for it. It's confidence. We don't see Ruby and Oliver talk about competitors at all. They don't dwell on the bad times. They talked about what they're good at and what their customers need. They are 100% confident that if they stay focused on what they are good at and what customers want, they will succeed. Everything else is just noise or excuses. I know we can't feel this level of confidence every day and all day. But there will be will be times when we're looking over our shoulders or curled up in a ball crying. But if you can articulate what you are great at and what your customers want, it will certainly help focus you when times get tough. I think Oliver and Ruby do this really well. If you're looking for more e commerce news, case studies and research, sign up to 12High's High5 newsletter. Every week I read all the e commerce news and send you free five things which I've found which will help grow your business. Visit 12high.com auhigh5h I g h5 to
Nathan Bush: sign up for free.
Nathan Bush: Thanks for listening and until next time, keep adding to cartoon.
