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Etsy Shipping - Feature Update

Great news, just in time for the holiday rush. Stitch will now send shipment and tracking information back to Etsy. Prior to this update, Stitch would mark an order as shipped on Etsy after being marked as shipped or complete in Stitch, but the detailed shipping information wasn’t transferred back to Etsy. Now, when a buyer goes to review their order(s), they will have all the necessary information to track their own package(s). This will help save time and cut down on convo exchanges.

Also, if you’re working with our amazing integrated partner ShipStation, you’ll notice that the shipping information, automatically generated by their application, will flow back through Stitch and onto Etsy. It’s like a holiday miracle!

This is guaranteed to save you time while you are working feverishly to get your products in the hands of customers during the holiday rush. Let us know what you think about this new feature by leaving a comment below.

Stitch on!

While we continue to work on major projects like our recent integration with SAIL and our current work on Stitch 2.0, we want to keep knocking out smaller feature updates that will help our customers be even more efficient. Today we’re announcing two new features in Stitch that will help our customers be more effective with their communication to both internal people (business partners & employees) and their customers.

1. Weekly Digest Emails - Determine which of the people using Stitch will receive the weekly digest email.

2. Emailing Customers - Admin settings allow you to adjust where emails are sent.

Weekly Digest Email

A few months ago, we developed an automatic weekly digest email that is delivered to any Stitch user attached to an account. Now the owner of the Stitch account can determine if they want everyone in the organization to receive the email or just the owner of the account. See the images below for further instruction.

Emailing Customers

Prior to this update, Stitch users that sent orders, invoices and/or packing slips directly from Stitch would automatically get CC’d on the outgoing email. With this update, Stitch users can determine if they get CC’d, and also if they would like to send a BCC. See additional detail in the images below.

With feature updates like the aforementioned and the update from earlier this month, Stitchers can continue to make their Stitch account more personalized and gain more control of what the application is doing for them.

We will keep making Stitch even better on a regular basis; and we appreciate all the great ideas we get from Stitchers. No feedback goes unread and we have regular meetings to discuss what changes will have the most impact on our customers. Please leave us a comment and let us know what you think. We’re all ears.

Stitch on!

Original Article

Our Stitch Spotlight series is a way for us to feature our amazing customers and the products they make. We like to put the spotlight on the creative, power house business owners that use Stitch to grow their business and organize their lives! We love learning how people use Stitch, and sharing with our community. Our Stitch Spotlight series also helps show new customers the different ways our current customers are using Stitch.

This month, we’re putting the spotlight on Kelly McCants of Modern June, specializing in handmade housewares for the hip home. Modern June sells retro-inspired aprons and other goodies for the cool “housewife” - including aprons, tablecloths, placemats, bags, floormats, and more! All goods are handmade from original Modern June designs. Modern June is a medium sized business with employees and is based in Virginia. They sell a standard product line, along with custom orders. Modern June is available through wholesale, Etsy, and soon through ModernJune.com!

Tell us a little about your business.

I run two shops on Etsy: Modern June & Oilcloth Addict. Modern June sells pretty and practical housewares and Oilcloth Addict offers a lovely selection of oilcloth, laminated cotton and chalk cloth. My team and I sell our wares at the Country Living Magazine Fair in Ohio, Georgia and Texas and at several Indie Craft Shows. I’m very excited that Stitch Labs will help us stay organized while we’re on the road.

Thanks to Stitch Labs, I have found Big Commerce! ModernJune.com is finally under construction and we’ll be adding a kitschy kitchen department in addition to our current wares. It’s long been a dream of mine to be able to sell related items alongside our handmade goodies. This dream is now becoming a reality thanks to the ease and convenience Stitch Labs has provided!

How did you find Stitch?

I found Stitch through a friend and fellow Richmond Craft Mafia Member, Meghan Barbato. Meghan has spent years helping her husband run his company and now she’s sharing her wealth of information and professional marketing experience by becoming a business consultant for her crafty friends.

When I first heard that Meghan was going out on her own and could help me with the business end of things, I told her that my company’s number one problem was inventory. She suggested Stitch, and I joined up that night.

My best selling product is custom tablecloths so getting started in Stitch Labs was difficult for me because I needed to make time to manually set up inventory. In the end, I found it necessary to close up the shops for a few days so I could get everything in order. After that it’s been smooth sailing!

What have been the biggest benefits of using Stitch?

The biggest benefit to using Stitch Labs is knowing what we have in stock! We have one central inventory of fabric that supplies the two shops and, while it’s not ideal, it’s the best we can do with limited capital. Before I made the decision to switch to Stitch Labs, our inventory was a complete wreck! Despite our best efforts we were always running out of fabric; we never really knew what we had in stock. Now we’re never surprised, we know how much yardage we have in stock at all times.

For me the bonus has been the ability to see exactly what is selling. My assistant and I just love all the charts and grafts, it make us feel very professional. When Kathie first learned that she could collect data and create reports for me she got very excited! What person doesn’t like a pie chart?!!

Besides Stitch, what other systems (apps/websites/etc) do you use?

Stitch Labs has turned us on to Ship Station!! We’ve lost track of the amount of money that service has saved us thus far, but I know for a fact that it paid for it’s self within the first week. Being able to compare prices is amazing!!

Any advice or tips you’d like to share for other product-based business owners?

Working for yourself at home can be a lot like working in a vacuum, so finding like minded people that work in a similar field has been essential for me. If it weren’t for my crafty, entrepreneurial friends I wouldn’t have found out about Stitch Labs. I am thankful for Facebook and Twitter to keep in touch with these people while we all work away in our studios.

It’s really great to have all my inventory and sales it one spot. Stitch Labs is a life saver!!

: : : : : : : :

You can follow Modern June on Twitter, Facebook, and on their blog. Leave us  comment if you have any questions, or just to say hi!

Original Article

As I mentioned in my initial post about SAIL, we were unbelievably excited to get out of the Lab and test the Stitch/SAIL integration with customers. We took a road trip East to share the good news with some of our closest friends at Etsy and Shopify!

Customer Testing

After working hand in hand with the SAIL team to get all the bugs worked out, it was time to get this integration in the hands of some Stitchers. Lucky for them, we make house calls! Several of our customers opened their doors, workshops and stores to let us test our most recent awesomeness. One example is our good friend Lisa Andersen Shaffer of Zelma Rose. Lisa was the first to get her hands on our integration in July and she has been swiping away ever since. She wrote an outstanding blog post about it recently. If you haven’t seen it, be sure to check it out. Lisa shares the best practices she’s already discovered and will share more in the future.

[caption id=”attachment_4663” align=”aligncenter” width=”584”] Brandon and Lisa testing the Stitch/SAIL integration[/caption]

On the Road

Our first stop was to Brooklyn, NY. Yep, that’s right. We made a trip to the handmade capital of America - the Etsy headquarter building. We first visited Brooklyn last December, directly after we integrated Stitch with Etsy. That was a great trip because it enabled us to introduce ourselves in person and gain a better understanding of what went on at their home base, along with the direction of the company. That relationship has continued to grow throughout the year and we were very excited to share this integration with them and their community before the busy holiday show season.

This trip was even better than the last. We had an opportunity to visit with more people and share the good news about SAIL with their mobile and seller education teams. Brian Hamilton, VP of the SAIL project at VeriFone was also able to join us for the event, so we had the whole gang there! Being in a room with a group of people that are doing everything they can to help businesses save time and sell more is an exciting experience. We couldn’t be more appreciative of the opportunity to share the good news with Etsy. A special thanks to Carrington Williams (Business Development - Etsy) for helping us organize the day.

[caption id=”attachment_4667” align=”aligncenter” width=”584”] Brandon, aka our Thinker Upper, demonstrating Stitch+SAIL at Etsy[/caption]

The second stop on our East Coast swing was North of the border. We shot up to Ottawa to meet with our good pals at Shopify. This was our first trip to Ottawa, and let me be very clear when I say this,  it was unbelievable! (I feel like Barack Obama with that, “let me be very clear” thing.) After visiting Ottawa and seeing the culture at Shopify, we had a hard time saying goodbye. They were unbelievably gracious hosts. Brennan Loh (Business Development at Shopify) provided us the opportunity to meet so many people on their team and discuss how they have gone from a handful of talented engineers, to a cutting edge commerce company empowering over 30,000 entrepreneurs and small businesses to reach their goals.

[caption id=”attachment_4673” align=”alignright” width=”350”] Jake and Brandon with Brennan (BD at Shopify)[/caption]

A special thank you to Brennan for his hustle all day. Also, Mr. Harley Finklestein (CPO), for imparting wisdom on us and taking pity on a scrappy start up by treating us to dinner at an awesome Ottawa restaurant. Keep on coolify-ing commerce guys! You’re onto something special up there.

So now our good news about SAIL is out publicly.  Even TechCrunch and GigaOM were excited about sharing the news earlier this week. Be sure to see what they had to say as well.

Parting Shots (Sports Reporters Reference)

Since we are constantly working to make Stitch happen in the Lab, we rarely get an opportunity to get out and see our stakeholders live. Everyone that is affected by Stitch is a stakeholder. From our team, to our customers, to our partners and investors, we’re all a part of this journey. It’s important to stay in close contact with them and share good news when we have a chance.

Finally, something really struck me when we were visiting the Shopify office building, aside from all the great people. They had inspirational signs and artwork everywhere, but one really resonated. When I asked Brennan about it, he said their CEO Tobi (awesome guy, by the way) preaches this saying, and I have to agree. People working on great projects should be proud of what they’re doing and tell people about it. Not in a boastful or tacky way, but in a way that shows their passion and how they’re putting their heart into everything they do. We have a weekly “all hands” meeting at the Lab when everyone talks about where we stand on our initiatives. We can do an even better job of this. Sometimes we get so caught up in the day to day that we forget to share all the great things we may be developing. There are people everywhere doing what they can to really change the world; and it’s exciting as hell! So simply, “Do things, and tell people.” It’s an interesting concept. We welcome you to share what you’re doing with us! We’re here to support our customers and stakeholders. Leave us a comment below :)

It was an excellent trip and we really appreciate both teams allowing us into their world for the day. More to come in the future, but for now, it’s back to Stitchin’.

Stitch On!

Original Article

Crazy Big Exciting News Summary

Today we are extremely excited to announce our latest integrated partner, SAIL, by VeriFone! What does this mean? It means that Stitch users will now have the ability to accept payments offline (e.g. trunk shows, trade shows, and craft fairs), easily select the products they sold on the spot, and have that sale, along with customer information, immediately added to their Stitch account without any further action needed on their part. The transaction will also automatically communicate with their online selling platform if they are using one our integrated partners (e.g. Etsy, Shopify and/or BigCommerce). There will be no more guesswork about what was sold, where it was sold, or whom it was sold to. The entire process can be automated.

Watch the video below to see this amazing new integration in action:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?list=UUcU1kLAVAqyiGkrszvBhFVw&v=mCvtgzDkkTE&feature=player_detailpage

Why SAIL?  

This is simple. The group working on SAIL is a small group of entrepreneurs working within VeriFone to create an application that will help small businesses succeed. Like us, they see the value in opening their network and working closely with other applications. They too want to make the Internet a place where small businesses can have access to powerful and affordable tools. They are iterating at an unbelievably rapid pace and have worked hand in hand with us to bring you this solution.

Benefits and Details

Since we began creating Stitch, we knew that in order for us to even begin to reach our potential as a company, we needed to provide a mechanism for our customers to automate the selling process for all the ways they sell. With the addition of SAIL, we’re taking another major step toward that goal. Our customers have the opportunity to use Stitch to sell in one or any combination of the following:

• Wholesale – Through their online wholesale shopping carts, or their offline phone and fax process, Stitch’s order and invoice management allows for wholesale businesses to prosper.
• Retail – Whether they sell online with one of our integrated partners or not, Stitch affords the ability to track sales and segment them by channel. Now with the addition of SAIL, online and offline retail can be automated and “Stitch”ed together.
• Consignment – Using Stitch’s order and inventory management capability, consignment sellers have a better handle on where they stand with their merchandise.

There are so many BENEFITS to share; it’s difficult to pack them in to one blog post. Here are a few major benefits that have risen to the top as we have tested this integration with select Stitchers:

• Contact management - All customer information for every sale can now be automatically added to one central location. No more manual entry of people that write their name on a piece of paper at a show.
• Inventory management - If you are selling offline (e.g. trade or trunk show), you no longer have to worry about going onto your online store and adjusting inventory during or after a show. Stitch can handle it for you.
• Analytics - Stitch users can gain a better understanding of how they’re performing through each sales channel, so they can focus their resources more effectively.

What are these Stitchers saying?

“Using Stitch as an inventory management system, and now integrating SAIL means I can spend my time doing what I do best, which is a dream come true for any small business owner.” Lisa Andersen Shaffer - Zelma Rose

“Integrating Stitch with SAIL eliminated all kinds of redundancies in my record keeping making it super easy to get paid!” Kate Ellen - Kate Ellen Metals and Crown Nine

*VERY IMPORTANT DETAILS*

Because we deal with many different selling platforms, there are several challenges with regard to how products move from one application to another. No two applications manage their products in the exact same way. For example, SAIL is the first application we integrate with that we can push products into from Stitch. One of the main reasons we can do this is because SAIL, unlike our other integrated partners (e.g. Etsy, Shopify and BigCommerce) isn’t meant to be a customer facing application. People aren’t shopping from it. Only the sellers will be interacting with the SAIL application, therefore, there isn’t much additional information, other than the product information itself, that needs to be added to SAIL. Because the SAIL integrations is different, it is imperative that those people planning to use SAIL in conjunction with Stitch visit our support center and read through our FAQs about this integration. Users are going to love the fact that they can integrate their SAIL account with Stitch and be up and running in literally seconds.

We have plenty more exciting news to share about this latest update. We have additional blog posts and testimonials coming throughout the entire week. Please leave us a comment below and let us know what you think. This is news we couldn’t wait to share with the Stitch nation. It’s definitely going to make their lives a bit easier…wait, I mean a whole lot easier! Yep, that’s what I meant.

Stitch on!

**UPDATE** This news has been featured in GigaOM and TechCrunch!

Original Article

We are very excited to bring you this new feature update. Stitch will now enable you to customize your outgoing messages for orders, invoices, and packing slips. Prior to this update, there was a standard message automatically included that you could update each time you sent an email through Stitch, but now, you can set the default message of your choice. The message you create will be included in every message you send. Don’t worry, you can edit the message on the fly if you’d like.

To set the messages, select Admin > Orders, Invoices & Packing Slips

Scroll to near the bottom of the page and you’ll see the fields where you can enter your customized messages. Be sure to save your changes.

Next time you need to send an order, invoice or packing slip through Stitch, your message will automatically be included. You can still make edits as you wish.

We’re sure this new feature will continue to help you save time and sell more. It has been a highly requested feature and we will continue to roll these out as we prepare for Stitch 2.0 in the near future. We’ve got more big news just around the corner. Stay tuned, and keep Stitchin’. Let us know what you think by leaving a comment below.

Also, be sure to check out more of our recent feature updates.

Original Article

As I sit here and reflect on the past week, all I can think is, WOW! A ton can happen in one week at a start-up like Stitch Labs. Last Sunday, we had an opportunity to visit RenegadeSF to see many of our customers live and in person. On Wednesday, the Stitch team headed out to the Mission for some good old fashioned team bowling, and by Friday, we had launched a new FREE Stitch plan and a brand new integration with Google Drive! Just another quiet week in the Lab.

Renegade Craft Fair Hits San Francisco

As I mentioned in a previous post, there is nothing better than getting out of the office and speaking to the people involved in helping make Stitch Labs what it is and will be. Last Sunday was one of those opportunities. Stitch customers from the East Coast, PacNW, Bay Area, Midwest and SoCal gathered at Ft. Mason for the semi-annual Renegade Craft Fair. Last year, as we were just starting out and building Stitch, we didn’t know anyone at Renegade. We were just talking to anyone that would listen. This year, it was like we were going to see old friends. So many Stitchers were there and looking to talk about what’s working, not working and how their businesses have benefited from using Stitch. It was so exciting to hear their success stories and talk about what’s coming soon. We appreciate having time to speak with so many, and can’t wait to do it again.

Stitch Team Bowling

I don’t want to steal anyone’s thunder here, so I’ll just say we had a blast at the Mission Bowling Club. More to come on that, I’m sure. I will say, even though I didn’t win (which royally pisses me off), it was a great time, and I did have the sweetest form. What? Doesn’t everyone have their own bowling ball and shoes? They should. Bowling’s back, baby!

Free Stitch is Here

On Thursday morning at about 3am, yes 3am, the ThinkerUpper himself (CEO, Brandon Levey), pushed the code to enable our new FREE plan. We had been contemplating this idea for quite some time and it’s not a decision we took lightly. We know Stitch is a very powerful order and inventory management application, and is helping businesses everywhere sell more. We also know people are willing to pay to operate their business with Stitch. So, why would we have a free plan? We decided to have a free plan so the thousands of businesses that have signed up to use Stitch can effectively grow into hundreds of thousands and even millions in the future. We truly believe that small businesses and entrepreneurs are the driver of the world’s ailing economy, and if they can grow their business by using Stitch for free, they can grow into a paying customer when they begin selling their wares through several different integrated sales channels.

Stitch Integrates with Google Drive

Our backend ninja Robert has been cranking out some serious code since he started with us. He’s done everything from major server work, to our integration with ShipStation and finally to Google Drive this week. Robert has done an amazing job and has more up his t-shirt sleeves. Our integration with Google Drive allows all our customers to move completely to the cloud. Now, all the reports and csv files that used to have to be downloaded to a users’ computer, can live in their Google Docs. No more software needed! All you need is an account with Google, another free service.

Things are a little different at an early stage start-up. In all my years in Corporate America, I don’t believe we got this much done in one week, maybe even one month. It’s not that one is better than the other, they’re just different. We are still at a point where we can be extremely nimble and make changes very quickly that have significant impact on both our company and our customers. It’s weeks like this that make you ask, “what day is it, no seriously, what day is it?” We have so many great things to share over the next several months. Stay tuned. It’s going to be an awesome ride!

Stitch on!

Original Article

We’re taking your data to a whole ‘nother level! Stitch now integrates with Google Drive (formerly Google Docs).

Can I get an “aww yeah!” for the cloud?!

With Stitch, you can generate beautiful reports from your sales data. Stitch has over 20 different reports available, giving you a deep insight into how your business is doing. Stitch also helps you manage your business contacts: vendors, customers, distributors, and more. With our exporting capabilities, you can maximize your marketing efforts by creating email lists, utilizing direct marketing, targeting by region, etc.

Now, you can work with your data any way you want! You can export contacts and reports right to Google Drive, allowing you to share your documents with others and collaborate in real time. We want you to control your data, be able to manipulate it to suit your needs, and access it anywhere.

Check out this video to learn how to set up the integration in your Stitch account and export your data:

http://youtu.be/vKV10UUphVM

Don’t forget to leave a review in the Google App Store to let people know how Stitch is working out for you. We’d greatly appreciate your feedback.

Original Article