Rob Godwin: This E commerce thing's pretty cool. What should we do? Embroidery or sex toys? Sex toys 1. There was a moment I went, do you know what? The future isn't on distribution, isn't on licensing. It really is B2C. And that's where we basically moved all our eggs into one basket. We have our six core values and one of them is you never know enough about sex.
[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 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 director at E commerce talent agency E Suite. Look, I'm going to level with you. I never thought I would hear the words clitoral stimulation on the Add to Cart E commerce podcast, but lo and behold, here we are. Joining me today is Rob Godwin, director and head of operations at lovehoney. Lovehoney, whether you know them or admit to knowing them, are the sexual wellness people. They're the leading retailer of sex toys, costumes and most things sex related that you can or you can't even imagine. They now operate in nine countries and have 440 staff worldwide. In this episode, Rob takes us behind the scenes at lovehoney to share how the world's attitude changed towards sexual wellness during COVID how the sex industry leads so much of the innovation that we see in other industries, and why inclusion and diversity is critical to his and Lovehoney's mission. Also, stay tuned right until the end of the episode to hear how you can win a $500 Lovehoney prize pack. Plus, there's a special discount for all Add to Cart listeners. See, we really do care about your wellness here. All right, enough foreplay. See? Yes, I got one. In thanks to our partners Shopify plus and Signet, here's our conversation with Rob Godwin from Lovehoney. Rob Godwin, welcome to Add to Cart.
Rob Godwin: Lovely to be here. Thanks for having Lovehoney today.
Nathan Bush: Pleasure. I am very excited. We've been a long, long awaited chat. I actually just listened to your conversation with Ed and Dan over at Trademark, which was a brilliant conversation around sexual health and mental wellbeing and its conversation was well overdue and I loved it.
Rob Godwin: Yeah, the boys at Trademark and Tyaks are superb. They're just legends in their own right and it's a conversation which we had with them which hadn't been had for a long time and just to talk about sex, wellbeing, mental health, starting a conversation. We're supporting them heavily, running the Gold Coast Marathon on their behalf. For my sins. We're decking out our warehouse staff in their workwear gear as well and a number of our suppliers like Main Freight and try to persuade Australia Post to do the same as well.
Nathan Bush: So good.
Nathan Bush: Brilliant partnership. Is Dan and Ed running the marathon with you?
Rob Godwin: No. No, they are. They. They did offer to sponsor me if I ran in their Budgie smugglers, but that's still to be decided. Depends how much money we raise, really.
Nathan Bush: I reckon we should try and raise some money to get them to run in their own Budgie smugglers.
Rob Godwin: I couldn't agree with you more.
Nathan Bush: Brilliant.
Rob Godwin: Absolutely.
Nathan Bush: All right. We are here to talk about Love Honey. So can you give us a little bit of an Overview on who LoveHoney Are and the scale of your operation here in Australia?
Rob Godwin: Yeah. Lovehoney are the sexual happiness people. We are very proud to make a fun, fulfilling sex life available to everyone. We've been here in Australia for just over seven years. It started in our spare bedroom in indoor pilly in Brizzy and with myself and one staff member from the UK and yeah, you fast forward seven years. Market leaders were open seven days a week, 7am till 10pm in the warehouse. 24, 7 customer service, shipping tens of thousands of units per week across Australasia.
Nathan Bush: Brilliant. And it started in the uk, did it?
Rob Godwin: Yeah. So Richard and Neil, the co founders, they started this almost 19 years ago in Bath, beautiful area of the UK and they happen to be friends of ours and we've been involved in industry together for a number of years and yeah, they got together, said, oh, this E commerce thing's pretty cool. What should we do? Embroidery or sex toys? Sex toys 1. When I met them they were 28 staff, about 20 million pound turnover and just their Bath warehouse. Today we've got over 440 staff. We have a Swiss investment company that are now partners with Richard and Neil and we have distribution centers in Bath, uk, Brisbane, Queensland and Atlanta, Georgia in the usa, plus nine global websites.
Nathan Bush: It's a phenomenal business and I hear that even the Queen is a fan of what you're doing.
Rob Godwin: Yes, we are highly honoured and to be in a position where the Queen has endorsed Love Honey. We won the Queen's Award for International Commerce to the Commonwealth for their continuous international trade for the last five years. We were extremely fortunate to win this in 2016 and Richard and Neil went to Buckingham palace to to receive the honor and we've been acknowledged with this award again in April 2021. So flats for continuous international trade which to the Commonwealth is the majority to Australia. So I took great delight with our team in kind of owning that one. But it is just to show you the acceleration and acceptance in society that the Queen has recognized Love Honey twice now.
Nathan Bush: I just have this brilliant image of the Queen in Buckingham palace with her iPad out looking at all the websites of the people who are running for the award, getting to the Love Honey website and going, I like this one.
Rob Godwin: Funny story actually. Funny story. Nathan Rich and I went to Buck in the palace back in 2016 and they were being received by Prince Philip and Princess Anne and they were lined up and prompted how to address the Royal family, et cetera. And Prince Philip walked across and said what does one do? And Richard has got a very dry sense of humour. Co founder one's in the sexual happiness business and he didn't break stride, he carried on, did not pause, did not stop at gay. But Princess Anne did stop and she said, I know of your company. Congratulations, well done.
Nathan Bush: Oh brilliant. Did you look her up on your database to see how good a customer she was?
Rob Godwin: We have a few Windsors in our database, so not too sure really.
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Nathan Bush: Now your tagline is the sexual happiness people. How do you introduce yourself?
Nathan Bush: Say you're at a barbecue and what
Nathan Bush: kind of reactions do you get?
Rob Godwin: Recently the our brand awareness, both prompted and unprompted, has absolute hockey curve. We were so fortunate and during COVID people bought food, alcohol and sex toys and we went from 28 staff to over 60 during the peak season. So taking that on board, I think our exposure to the general public has increased exponentially. So the acceptance of me now when I introduce myself like oh cool, you're that guy or oh yeah, I've seen you guys on TV because we have an always on policy on above the line. It hasn't always been that way. I've worked as a CEO of Sexpo. I've also done the licensing for 50 Shades of Grey and various adult products and films around the country for the last 18 years. And you have three types of people when you meet them that you'll tell them what you do and they'll do 180 degree turn and walk away. You have a second group of people that you tell them what you do and they'll change the subject or ignore what you said. Then the most interesting group is you tell people and they go really well, have you got X? I have this issue or I would like to do and suddenly you become the agony aunt, the sexologist to them and you find out their deep darkest desires, fantasies, requests in the first two minutes. So I would prefer the third group of people. But it is seeing how the industry and how the public perception is changing where now people go. You run a really cool company. Thank you very much. And that's really pleasing, very empowering in hearing that first from people.
Nathan Bush: I reckon you would be the finest person at a party, hands down any day.
Rob Godwin: If we bring the goodie bags. Absolutely.
Nathan Bush: And you mentioned there that brand awareness of Love Honey has increased dramatically. Do you think Australians attitude to sex and sexual wellbeing has changed as well as dramatically during COVID Absolutely.
Rob Godwin: I think we're in a situation where we're forced together and due to lockdowns throughout the country, we saw significant spikes in sales. Unfortunately in those states that were in lockdown, I mean this time last year in April, May was. It was, we were working literally 24 hours a day just to cope with the demand and keep that customer service up. I think that the attitudes have changed prior to Covid, but like the e commerce industry has been brought forward five, six years generally across all sectors. Likewise within the sexual wellness industry, that has accelerated people's acceptance. I think it's accelerated people's awareness as well. But also it is about opening up the conversation that positive relationship to having a positive relationship with your sex life. Really we did just prior to Covid, we did a sexual happiness study and that was 3,000 respondents around the world, a thousand within Australia and just asking general questions. And over half the respondents said having a good sex life is good for your overall health. But really drilling into that data, what was fascinating was 25% said having a good sex life helped mental health. I think during COVID when people were basically locked away from their friends, family, colleagues, et Cetera being able to accept it's okay to have a good sex life, it's okay to have self pleasure. That really did break down those barriers and the walls to acceptance. Really.
Nathan Bush: And did I see in your research that you found that people were having slightly less sex but better quality sex?
Rob Godwin: Yes, yes. So again. And our sales of silent vibrators had a triple figure growth. So you know that the environment you're sharing with so quicker, more productive and just more fun. And so there was again a spike in the acceptance or introduction of bondage as well. So all these smaller spikes within the general growth in our category. And our business was very much encouraged during COVID So. And like things like our pulsating air technology, new products which send oscillating airwaves across clitoris and you can orgasm within a minute. What do you mean?
Nathan Bush: How do you send airwaves for an orgasm?
Rob Godwin: So normal vibrator would vibrate and you rotation or vibration, et cetera. There's a new technological pulsating air and it blows airwaves. So you can actually stimulate the clitoris very fast and effectively with this kind of blowing sensation, sucking sensation. And that reports people orgasm within 30 seconds. So again, fitting into Covid environment where you're somewhat restricted on space and noise, et cetera, that's where these products have really sold very, very well.
Nathan Bush: In between Zoom meetings.
Rob Godwin: Oh, I gave it.
Nathan Bush: Oh, there are so many questions. We could go down that path, but we should talk some E commerce, I think.
Rob Godwin: Okay.
Nathan Bush: So for those who haven't been in the online adult industry, actually before we go down there, what seven years ago, when you started Love Honey here in Australia and you put all your eggs in the E commerce basket, was there a moment that made you do that?
Rob Godwin: I came from Moving to Australia 2001 for the British Lions tour. I only came here for a rugby game. I only meant to be here for three weeks. And that's obviously 19 years later. And we had a very. My ex wife and I had a very equal relation, a very equal weighting of our careers. So I moved to Melbourne and for her to be head of production for Foster's Cub. So she made beer, I sold adult toys and porn. It was a great, great, great start to our marriage. And yeah, just starting off, when I got into the adult toys, you saw the decline or the move. It was huge. DVD and video. And then as the Internet e commerce developed, you could see that's going to die off. That's when I moved into Sexpo and run see a sex Band Club XTools and again seeing that tailing off of the physically the hardware onto the online presence. And it was just through connections through the industry where Richard and Neil were friends and they said, if you're ever going to do anything in Australia, do it with Rob. If you're going to do Anything in the UK with SexPay, do it with these guys. And we just got chatting and said we should do something. And then fifty Shades of Grey came up and, and we pitched for it together. We won it. So I asked them to turn on the website because I knew how poor our competitors were over here in their customer experience and they reluctantly. Australia, you've only got then what, 20 odd million people now 30 million. Seriously guys, you guys, there'll be a real brand affinity towards what you do and how you do it because the customer always comes first. And valet reluctantly turned it on. And the first weekend they got a phone call from the golf course going, we've missed 70 calls this weekend. How quickly can you open up an office? Two weeks later I had a staff member from the UK spare bedroom converted with two phone lines dial up then. And off we went and then moved to West End two offices. But you saw the adoption of online affecting the core sales of adult stores, which was movies. And then you saw the customer experience evolving as these big E commerce companies evolved their customer experience. And so there was a moment I went, do you know what? The future isn't on distribution, isn't on licensing. It really is B2C. And that's where we basically moved all our eggs into one basket. Closed off a few companies and just focusing on developing lovehoney.com and it's been an epic seven year ride, really.
Nathan Bush: Yeah, it's fascinating because it's not only that customers have gone from preferring offline shopping to online shopping, a lot of your product has changed as well to be digitized as well. So you're kind of dealing with customer behavior plus your product, your actual physical product changing so much.
Rob Godwin: Yeah, we have now one of our top selling products are app controls where you can control that interstate between countries, et cetera. So that advancement in products like last month we launched some really cool eco toys. So biodegradable toys, Love Not War, which is recycled aluminium and plastics, the Mindful lingerie range, which is all recycled yarns and elastics and laces, et cetera. So it never stops, never stands still. Really.
Nathan Bush: So much innovation isn't there in the adult industry that drives a lot of the mainstream adoption down the track.
Rob Godwin: Yeah, the adult Industry has always been on the forefront on the front step of when Blu Ray came in, dvd, et cetera. But now the technology side, there is some absolutely fascinating toys. I now have a brilliant team. I mean, I'm very honored to lead a brilliant group of people and it is a Love Honey family here and everyone's welcome to come to Eagle Farm in Brisbane and have a tour around. But I occasionally get in the warehouse, unpack a few containers and even I'm shocked at the new products that come through. I'm like, whoa. We have our six core valleys and one of them is you never know enough about sex. And you been doing this for almost 20 years. You think, ah, you know it, you know what the best sellers. And then suddenly you get a product going, wow, that's cool. Why didn't I think of that? Yeah, it is. It's a continuous evolving new product growth, really.
Nathan Bush: What about your team? Because I could imagine that the way you speak about sex and sexual wellness is very healthy. Do you often find people who come into the team, on the surface they go, yeah, I'm all cool with it, but then they're actually shocked. Or is there a sense of not numbness? Numbness isn't the word, but almost normality, that this is what it is?
Rob Godwin: Yeah. I think the normality comes when you go home and you take your work home with you and on the coffee table you might have some catalogs from a supplier or when I'm in Virgin Lounge and I'm doing, you know, looking at some media decks or presentation from, from suppliers and you forget and someone walks past your shoulder and you can just, you sense him looking at your screen. I think from the staffing element, there's a great chap called Bob Schwartz from Nordstrom. He created Magento and he was on the board of, of Nordstrom. And he described Blake Nordstrom as that kind of reverse triangle where he was at the bottom, then his executives, then his shop staff and then the customers. And he was at the bottom of the triangle, not the top. And that's very much our view here. And how I create the kind of leadership group is that we're here to support our customers. Everything we do is customer orientated. Every process we do is what benefit does a customer get from having this approach or this new tech or this new policy and that if you filter that down into the staffing levels, when people do start with us, they are aware of what we do and how we do it. Our customer service team have a three month induction which is significant. And they don't actually sell. They're the first customer service team I've ever seen where there is absolutely zero sales. KPIs all they are there to do. Not all, but their focus is to take the customer on a positive journey. When this is a very sensitive subject, this is very emotive and we don't want to recommend, you've got to buy X, Y and Z. We take them on the journey through a really good website now in getting to the right decision for them. So they're empowered and they're confident about the purchase and the same goes to our staff. They are empowered. They're all given individual responsibilities to deal with customers at the time. So. So most customers that call up will have an issue generally or an inquiry. So the inquiries, we take them on a positive journey. But if it's an issue then it tends to be where's my order? Or my order's broken. We empower our customer service staff to make the decision immediately. Not I'm going to refer to manager. So they will refund freight, they will give you a full credit, they will send you out a new product straight away. That's the very same day. And that for the staff is such a positive environment because we are the sexual happiness people. If our staff can't be happy, how do we expect our customers to be happy? So I think there's the expectation of a fun environment. We're talking about sex here, we're talking endorphins, but also I think the culture of what we do and how we do it. Procedure. So we have staff barbecues every month. We have three dogs in the office most days. We have a PT that comes in once a week to train the staff. We have a staff box which is fantastic. So any damaged packaging or end of line products is free for the staff. They never have to pay for an adult toy or if they do, they get 50% off brand new. Say they. I think our reputation is already set before the staff. There's anticipation and then there's excitement to start.
Nathan Bush: Absolutely. And in terms of just like going back to those customer service teams because normally customer service is an entry level job into an E commerce business and we, you know, the best E commerce people I've seen go from customer service all the way through. But when you bring customer service team in because you've got a 24 hour customer service around the globe, I can imagine that they're dealing with a lot more than where's my order? Where they can put a tracking a number into an AusPost portal and then give a customer an answer that they could get hit with any type of question at any time. How do you give someone the emotional and product knowledge, I suppose to be able to have those conversations in the right way?
Rob Godwin: You hit on a really interesting point. We have a great internal succession plan here. Our general manager start off in customer service. Eight years ago, our E Commerce manager was our weekend casual at university and has now become deputy manager and then became our E Commerce manager. With a team of three now it really does. We evolve from within. I think the confidence we give them is through the quality of training through that three months and continual learning, having the confidence to deal with the issues. You do hear customers that negative intent and if you can turn that around to a positive reaction, that's an empowerment for the staff and they feel great about it. I mean, we rate. We've got over a quarter of a million customer reviews on our websites.
Nathan Bush: Wow.
Rob Godwin: We have just under 13,000 Trustpilot reviews in Australia of which it's excellent at 4.7. That reflects how credible our customer service is in just dealing with the issues. You empower the staff, you give them the tools. But on the other side it is an emotive subject and so we have to support our staff in their mental health and their wellness in the workplace. So we work with the Central Wellness cdc. Big shout out to Pat and Tina and the guys there. They're amazing. Highly recommend you check out the Central Wellness. They are superb. And we have free counselling for all staff members. We have mental health induction programs for all new starters. All staff do shifts in the warehouse and in customer service and in commercial side to understand all the areas of the business. So it's a very holistic approach to staffing and a real significant investment in time with them.
Nathan Bush: Yeah. And look, obviously that training pays off so much with all those customer reviews and the positive sentiment out there. The question that I wanted to ask you is for people that aren't in the adult online industry, what do you have to do different from an E commerce perspective that other retailers may not have to do?
Rob Godwin: There are elements that you can and can't do. Mr. Zuckerberg doesn't particularly like our category. So Facebook is. There are ways around it, but we can't put up an image of an adult toy on Facebook. Insta a little bit easier. But still there are restrictions. We're not allowed to have the carts, not allowed to have spots, etc. So that's a frustration and there is a bit of a focus on Our above the line as well in terms of timings etc, which is completely understandable and we work with Advertising Standards Bureau with that. I think where Lovehoney tries to create is to be that go to company to be the kind of leaders in this space and that's really illustrating how subtly and effectively we sell. So what do we have to do? So we have to. What do we do differently to what a normal inverted commons E commerce things like the subtlety in imagery. So we have to reshoot everything a lot of the suppliers around the world will give us in a way we're very conservative in how we present the image. We don't want to offend, therefore we get it, it's an adult product, therefore it says what it does on the tin. But there are ways. So our videos online, all of our videos which we shoot for most products are non selling videos. It's just more information what this does, how it does it and what the attributes are not. Again that hard sell. It's all about subtlety and that connection with the customer. Things like we do benchmarking. We've been to Culture Kings of Simon, we've done Adore Beauty, EB Games, Beginning Boutique, St Franc, all brilliant love companies I adore and you see their beautiful curated boxes and branded boxes that they have to send to their customers. We can't do that, you know, we don't want Mr. Postman from Australia. Dear Mrs. Smith, here's your monthly subscription. So there are things where we have to be very discreet in our packaging and discreet in how we promote our products. We can't put on social media the actual product, so we're very much content led. So we do a lot of illustrations, we do a lot of content with our ambassadors and our influencers so that you bridge that gap. You're addressing what they want to hear, but in a very effective and subtle manner.
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Nathan Bush: I can imagine that there'd be a huge difference in how you approach new customer acquisition versus the community that you fostered. And you really do have a really strong community of people who are open and accepting and really celebrating sexual wellness who probably wouldn't be offended by those images because it's just part of life. But new customers, to your point, you might have to nurture them through. So is there a really different strategy for those groups of people we see new customers.
Rob Godwin: Our biggest growth rates in the last or since COVID has been single females under 35. They haven't been updating. They still want to have a positive sex life. Our core demographic is still 25, 45 heterosexual couples. But really how our real connection with them really is through email, through above the line, through that kind of cumulative advertising approach obviously with a good mix of ppc, SEO and affiliate channel marketing. But I think our most effective channel in generating that new customer growth is communicating to them in a way which they can relate to. It might surprise you but a good looking 40 plus Pommy with a beard and no hair single father of two isn't the greatest person to connect with a new potential audience. I can 100% assure you.
Nathan Bush: Don't sell your yourself short.
Nathan Bush: Come on.
Rob Godwin: We have as you say the Love Honey family with our ambassadors and they, they connect and that's, that's our, our key milestone. That's our key triggering connection. We have the fantastic Chantal Otton who's our leading sexologist.
Nathan Bush: Yep.
Rob Godwin: She's been with us almost two years just and when we say about Love Honey family she is like we absolutely do adore her. She, she when you trust your brand to an ambassador you need them to share your brand values but also your overall values and she does. She's an amazing person inside and outside of work. We have Cam Fraser, our male sex coach. Very much more holistic, tantra based can relate to the couple's audience but also with a male focus as well. Dealing with male issues as well as encouraging. I mean men is a massive potential marketplace for us in engaging with them. We have Bryony Cole who's actually back from America, who's Australian. She's the leading sex tech expert in the world. She runs the futuresex.org, brilliant podcast. We have Tamika Wilder, the orgasmic mama that can relate to what a name that's again. And we also have a real depth of in house staff so we have Brit and Tasha run our marketing department page. She's our e commerce manager and some key people in the UK we use over here. So it's getting the right person to connect to that right audience. And we really do have a wide spectrum, plethora of brilliant people that endorse our brand in a really effective way.
Nathan Bush: Oh, it totally normalizes it. I know when I was researching for this, we share an office and it's fairly open plan here. And I started, and I've got a big monitor and I had the Love Honey site up. And the content is amazing. Once you get in and you start reading, the content is just so well written and so relatable. It's all really great stuff, but you almost forget what you're looking at. So I walked out, similar to your experience before in the Virgin Lounge. And I'm just walking around the office and then people are kind of walking past my computer giving me side eyes. But it almost becomes you don't feel awkward on the site at all once you're there and in it, because you've got such great content. And those ambassadors really bring it to life.
Rob Godwin: When. When we did the trademark podcast, they asked, you know, when you get pushback, and we do get occasional pushback, what do you do? So you got to do it even more. You've got to increase the volume, you've got to increase the normalization conversation, you've got to increase the communication about inclusion and diversity. You've got to turn up the volume, turn down the volume with criticism. And that's how you do it. The more people see your screen with Love Honey website on, the more they accept it and they have a choice. They can opt in or opt out, but normalization and acceptance is the key drivers. Really?
Nathan Bush: Absolutely. And we talked there around. You mentioned diversity and inclusion being such a key part of lovehoney's mission, and we talked about some of the partnerships you've got. And you recently have a partnership with Dylan Alcott. Can you tell us about that?
Rob Godwin: Yeah, just another. Another legend. This is where I wouldn't tell the UK head office this, but I would do this job for free at times. And when you spend time with Dillon, he is an Australian hero, full stop, end of story. You know, we are very fortunate that his manager is also manager of Chantal, our key ambassador. And we had. I had a personal incident where my son broke both his knees playing football and he was in the wheelchair for three months. And we were discussing about looking at disability and where we have our strap line about making a fun and fulfilling sex life for everyone. That means everyone. And it was that. When you said, did you have that moment about E commerce. I had that moment about we have to champion disability and sexual wellness, because not referring to my son, but in the barriers just to live a normal life in a wheelchair and just getting around like he was immobilized for three months and it was just, this is so hard. And then I was chatting to the co founder of Handy, Heather Morrison, and just hearing their stories and they've written a book about love, lust and disability and 50 stories of people with disabilities and how they've conquered love, the frustrations and really some savage stories. So we got chatting and they wanted develop an adult toy and so for the disability community, designed by disability users. So we're like, you know what, let's do this. So we sell their book on our three global websites in America, UK and Australia, and 100% of revenue goes back to them, not profit, all the cash goes back to them to help with our MPD team in developing the first, what's going to be called Joystick bespoke toy for the disability community. And off the back of that, we were then chatting about, well, we're championing this, we're promoting this, what else can we do? And then discussions with Dylan and his manager was like, why don't we encourage people to get into the sexual wellness education piece? And that's where the sexual, the Dylan Alcott Foundation Sexual Happiness and Wellness Grants came about, where we're given the first $10,000 to encourage disability customers to get to do their sexology degrees, to do sex coaching, to be sexual health ambassadors, supporting their university degrees or their hardware, they need computers, etc. And the foundation, they're going to decide who gets his first grant. And I hope that is just a start, that is just a tipping point. But in combination with that, we'll do ambassadorship or mentoring, so they'll spend time with Chantal from a sexology perspective, they'll come into our office and do some work placement so they can see how we do E commerce, how we do marketing, how we do the operations. And that's us taking the lead, not just saying, oh, here's a donation, but making an absolute difference. And it's one of the things I'm most proud of, what we've achieved at Love, Finding that we are championing this and opening up the conversation on disability and sex.
Nathan Bush: Oh, it's incredible. There's so many different layers to it and so many different executions of it that it's. To your point, it's not just a money donation. Is there any particular story around the work that you're doing in any of those places has actually made to a disabled person's life like how it actually has changed their day to day life and their well being.
Rob Godwin: We have about 12% of our staff that would identify as having a disability. I won't mention his name for privacy's sake, but we have a chap who works for us and we gave him a chance and he has a condition and we gave him a chance and seeing him develop as a person, as a team member, as part of the Love Honey family has been absolutely amazing. Not just from my perspective to back that person, give him an opportunity, but to see him thrive, to see him shine. And I don't think I've ever seen him as happy and he's doing a pretty routine job, but that job, he comes in with a smile. He's one of the most positive people in our team. He's the people now that other able bodied staff members look up to for that positive influence, for that our community here is really cool.
Nathan Bush: So great.
Rob Godwin: That's awesome. That's worth another couple double digits on the bottom line. That's worth more than the award sometimes just to see those, those are moments in your career.
Nathan Bush: Brilliant. You should be so proud of what you're doing in that space. The other thing that you do, we mentioned before around sustainability. So my question for you is around when you've got sustainable products, right, when people are searching for sex toys, how important is sustainability?
Rob Godwin: It's critical. Now it's hard. We make mostly silicon and plastic products. 70% of what we make is own brand. So whether that's Love Honey collections, whether it's our second, shall we say tier products like Happy Rabbit Desire or licensed products like 50 Shades of Grey. Lovehoney is very much the sexual wellness mission is to bring sexual happiness to people. But along the way I think we're very delighted to be on that journey of being environmentally friendly with a really solid eco focus. And basically we're aiming for 2023 to have all of our own brand products to be free of single use plastics. We will be in the next two to three months announcing a major alignment with a recycling company for Australasia. And that's going to be an industry first and where the industry can join in. So not just doing it for ourselves, but we're setting the standard again as an industry for other retailers to join us in doing this. We're actually a little bit ahead of the time, the consumers. It's not a question of should we do it, we have to do it now and we want to do it. And that's the biggest, I think, change in the retail e commerce environment where we see with thread, together with the fashion industry, we have to do this stuff now. Not a question of maybe even going back eight, nine years. We're a little bit ahead of the curve. In the uk we had a thing called Rabbit Amnesty where you could send back your rabbits and your vibrators and they recycled into road humps.
Nathan Bush: Save the rabbits.
Rob Godwin: Yeah. And they're made into speed bumps in the uk. Unfortunately, the Australian government don't support those initiatives over here. So we're having to create our own and that's what we are doing at the moment. But saying that at the moment. We did a new eco range last month, range called Love Not Wall, recycled aluminum, plastics, Wowtech Premium, which is biodegradable products. We have our E. Coli range, which is an exclusive range of fishnet stockings, which is made out of 100% recycled waste material, including things like fishing nets. So actually wearing fishnets made from recycled fishnets.
Nathan Bush: Real fishnets.
Rob Godwin: Yeah. And that's all waste that would be trashed. So we again and same with our Mindful Lingerie range with the lace and elastics being from recycled yarns and no single use plastic. So it is a vast task. But we cannot not embrace this and be aggressive in ticking off like our calendars at Christmas. Hugely successful seller. So we'll do your 24 days before Christmas, both lingerie and also toys that now the inner packaging of that is all through recycled cardboard rather than plastic. So we're making those incremental steps towards our goal in 2023. Really?
Nathan Bush: You should write the new Christmas carol for the 12 days of Christmas.
Rob Godwin: It has been done.
Nathan Bush: Oh, nice. But what I love about that, whether it's the diversity and inclusion or whether it's sustainability, how you're talking about this is that you don't see them as limitations, you see them as responsibility, but also they actually open up new opportunity rather than limiting what you can do.
Nathan Bush: Would that be fair?
Rob Godwin: Absolutely. People are looking for your eco credentials. But also like with handy, 63% of people through their research have identified as having hand limitations at some stage in their life, mostly through arthritis or general old age. Who's to say when your sex life should start or stop? So us creating, working with them to develop their first product called the Joystick, that's actually commercially a good decision. That's actually opening up a new opportunity in the aging population in making a product that is interchangeable with existing products. So you can continue your sex life when your physical body may be having limitations. So far from it, this is actually good business sense. This is evolving new niche markets going forward.
Nathan Bush: Yeah, you've got to tell us how the joystick works. I'm so curious.
Rob Godwin: So you've got a. It's a gooseneck in the middle, you have a soft top end where you can hug. So the thing again with disability customers is, depending on their disability, is to create a toy which can be used across a range of disabilities. So the first top section, which is about almost a meter long, is on a kind of gooseneck which will curve to your body and it's soft so you can actually hug it in. And that element about hugging with that personal connection has come out in the research with occupational therapists and disability testers. And we actually have a couple of webpages on products tested by our disability ambassadors as well. Andrew, who's a co founder of Handy, has reviewed a number of products in Canada and in the uk, Cathy as well. So they've written reviews for the disability community on our websites. And in the bottom end of the joystick will have an area where you can insert existing products into the middle. So if you're male, if you want to masturbate it, you can put that in. If female, if you have a vibrator or pulsating technology, you can insert that in there. So at the moment we're in the second round of research. OTs around Australia are testing this with their patients and we look forward to developing that and bringing it to the final stage of pre production.
Nathan Bush: That's amazing. So just amazing thinking.
Nathan Bush: I love it.
Nathan Bush: Now you are on the advisory board at Australia Post and Retail Global and as we heard before, you've got some great relationships with leading retailers. When you're talking to these people in our retail and e commerce industry, is there any particular message that you're trying to push for change?
Rob Godwin: Yeah, I think the bigger element I think we should all congratulate ourselves for in Australia is that we're actually a cool bunch of people. Like when I traveled. Well, before COVID when I traveled the world extensively, I used to always introduce myself as Australian because you will be embraced a lot more than being English, even though obviously the Australian cricket team's a bit dodgy. Everything else I embrace about Australian life, but we should be very proud of the e commerce industry. Big shout out to Phil Leahy and the guys at Retail Global and also Gary Starr, Rod, new CEO of Australia Post. The work we do on the CAG board with Australia Post. They are really good supplier. We rated as one of their top customers in terms of our supplier compliance recently. But I think as an industry overview we shouldn't be embracing each other and helping each other. Certainly the open invitation to anyone coming to Brisbane to come. We've got Retail Global roadshow at the end of May and we have got an open day for anyone to come around. Look around our warehouse. I think that support of each other. Be generous with your time. That we will. I would learn more from going into other companies like EB Games, Culture Kings etc. Than I do and listen to add to cart. These are the things where as a director you learn more than anything else reading any books where you see it in action. So I think being generous with your time benchmarking with other companies things like Frontliners. We picked up the Excellence in Retail award at Retail Global or Power Retail Awards the other week. Very honored for the business to receive that.
Nathan Bush: Yeah, congratulations.
Rob Godwin: But you've got to set that standard. You've got to push. You've got to use the opportunity as market leaders, as directors in E commerce to make a difference. So I would say what I'll be promoting is disability employment. Give people a go. You will be absolutely blown away and surprised. Have that inclusion and acceptance of disabilities but also learn from each other. I think also without being too negative, you've also got to call out poor performance and poor behavior. I had the honor of working with Christine Holgate. I thought how she was treated was pretty appalling. I think as an industry we have to get behind people like that and actually call out things which are in equal proportion good and bad. And I think in this circumstance Australia post loss is tol's gain.
Nathan Bush: Couldn't agree with you more. What an amazing. What an amazing move by toll to bring Christine home.
Rob Godwin: I was at the NORA networking event with Paul Greenberg and his lovely wife Adele. And she gave a speech there in front of about 120 leading executives. And you know what these events are like. Everyone's having a few drinks and it's loud. You could hear a pin drop when she spoke. And she spoke so eloquently with such passion but also such conviction. There was no negativity. She just spoke with authority. And that's where we have to get behind us. Specifically for inclusion of women in senior positions. It should be done on merit, not done on the politics behind privatization of Australia based or anything like that.
Nathan Bush: Absolutely. And we should celebrate these people too. And I think people like Yourself. We've mentioned Phil, you've mentioned Paul, mentioned Christine. There are so many people doing great things in E commerce in Australia. We've got to make sure we celebrate because the common thread between all of these people I think is that they give before they ask for anything in return. And I think you're doing the same thing. You are doing such a great job in advocating for inclusion and diversity and sharing your knowledge. Like, you know, I've heard you speak on panels where you go into detail around your operations for the benefit of smaller and other retailers in the room. So I think we have to thank you for or you're contributing as well.
Rob Godwin: Thank you. That's really pleasing to hear.
Nathan Bush: Now, if we are looking on the horizon for yourself and love Honey, what are the big things on your radar?
Rob Godwin: That's a very good question. I think from a business perspective, from personal perspective, I have to personally find a better work life balance. With COVID I threw myself into work like ridiculous hours. My girlfriend was like do you realize how many hours you work a week? I just don't want to know. But I think it's that support of your team and driving that opportunity. We had such a massive increase in new customers during that period. We didn't want to lose the potential and I think we've captured the vast majority of that potential. So I've got to address that. So doing things like going back into marathon running, going back into corporate boxing, these are things that kind of balance out the managing director status to the if you're getting punched in the head that's a very great leveler in life. Or if you're doing 42k, doesn't matter if you're a director or not, it's going to hurt. Exactly. Spending a bit more time my kids in their sporting and education activities is a good thing. I think though for love Honey, we're opening up our second warehouse soon or actually have it. But we're just putting in some new infrastructure. We're putting in some more tech as well, small back end systems. We re platformed our front end last year across our nine global websites which was a huge task during COVID and during our peak cyber weekend period.
Nathan Bush: Oh my goodness. Can we ask what did you migrate
Rob Godwin: to from in house System Old Net Java 17 years of existence and it
Nathan Bush: just evolved the Frankenmonster.
Rob Godwin: Yep. And we had to move and we went to Salesforce Commerce Cloud and that was a very detailed transformation but highly effective. I do take my hat off to we've got a great guy called James Sexton from Exasos in the UK and him and his team did a brilliant job in rolling out. So we did America first, then Australia, then the UK prior to Christmas Valentine's and now we've rolled out our non English speaking websites as well. Now we're going to look at the back end and look at some customer service software which we're implementing this month and some more backend warehouse management systems. We're expanding our team and we've got five internal promotions coming up with some new EK products coming through, lots of new mainstream announcements coming up.
Nathan Bush: What did you say about work life balance?
Rob Godwin: I don't know what is that but there is so much going on like the days, weeks, months evaporate. But I'm just such fortunate to work with such brilliant people as part of the team. I mean they take the mickey out of, out of the beard and the shorts I wear to work and the Love Honey T shirt every day. But it is an honour to work with them, for them and really driving that message and really grabbing the success of lovehoney now and in the future years.
Nathan Bush: Really, you're an incredible leader and we thank you so much for all you're doing for the industry, everything you shared today. Keep doing great stuff and look, continue pushing the limits of what's possible in ECOM in Australia.
Rob Godwin: Thank you very much. It's been great to be on your show today.
Nathan Bush: Cheers, Rob.
Nathan Bush: After we recorded this episode, I took up Rob's offer to go and visit the Lovehoney office and warehouse in Eagle Fund and it was incredible. The sheer volume of orders was huge. I saw at least three delivery trucks leave in the hour that I was there. They've also nailed, forgive the expression, the fulfillment process with brilliant automation in the warehouse. And just to wander down those warehouse aisles, the things that catch your eye was just incredible. Very impressive, but even more so I thought. Rob's mission around diversity and inclusion was not lip synchronized service. It infiltrates all parts of the lovehoney operation from their team to their product to the way they speak with their customers in every way. I felt so fortunate to see the brilliant e commerce business that is lovehoney and their focus on diversity and inclusion. And did I mention that they were generous? Rob and the team have given all add to CART listeners 25% off until until the end of June. What a glorious June. You can get the discount through our newsletter, it goes out every Monday and you can sign up@addtocart.com our brand new shiny website. But better still, better than that 25% discount. We have a $500 Lovehoney hamper to give away. All you need to do is answer one simple question and look, I wanted to have a lot of fun with this question. I could have found out a lot about you and your personal lives, but I've kept it very pg. All we need you to do is answer Sexual Happiness means and email the answer to hellodocart.com that's the answer to Sexual Happiness means and email it through to helloadtocart.com and the best answer will be mailed out their special hamper in
Nathan Bush: a very discreet brown box.
Nathan Bush: To finish up, I have three resources for you. Firstly, if you're a first time listener of Add to Cart and you want to stay up to date with new episodes, head over to add to cart.com and you can sign up for our weekly newsletter. We'll let you know every time a new episode drops, as well as giving you my three takeaways from each episode and a link to the transcripts so you can know that this is an episode that you want to dive straight into. Secondly, if you want a weekly roundup of the best e commerce case studies tools and research, sign up to the High Five Friday newsletter which is delivered to inboxes at 8am every Friday morning. I read all the e commerce news and send you the bits that I think you can take action from from sign up at 12 high 12h I g h.com au high 5 and the last thing if you are looking to explore your next e commerce opportunity, head over to esweettalent.com we are a dedicated e commerce talent agency connecting the best e commerce talent with the fastest growing brands. Check it out. Sign up to the email and and get in touch with me if you want to discuss your next move. Until next time, thanks for listening and keep those customers adding to Cart.
