Learn how this pop-up shoe store doubled its SMS sign-up rate

The BBC recently reported that only 20% of returned merchandise is actually defective. And most of the time, these good-as-new products end up in landfills. It’s estimated that returns generate 5 billion pounds of waste every year.

The Warehouse Sale is a traveling pop-up store that’s on a mission to make fashion more sustainable—and affordable, too.

A former Nike executive told Portland Business Journal that most shoes are marked up 100%. This number can go as high as 500% for other brands. The Warehouse Sale? They never sell their shoes for anything higher than the wholesale price.

They’re able to offer such low prices because they purchase returned merchandise in bulk, sort through it themselves, then sell it out of warehouses where they only hold short-term leases.

Few people wouldn’t jump at the opportunity to buy designer shoes at 80% off. This leaves The Warehouse Sale with just one challenge—get the word out to as many people as possible.

Building a segmented list of subscribers

We spoke to Rachel Baileys, Marketing Manager at The Warehouse Sale, to find out why they turned to SimpleTexting. She explained that SMS has been a part of their strategy from early on, but their last platform left them disappointed.

It lacked key features that she and her team needed.

"With SimpleTexting, everything on our profile was easy to figure out on our own and implement. If we have an issue or question, the support team is very quick to respond and always gives thorough and thoughtful answers!"

Rachel Baileys

Marketing Manager

One of the most important features Rachel needed was an easy way for visitors to The Warehouse Sale’s site to provide their phone numbers. Previously, they had to text in a keyword.

With SimpleTexting, Rachel was able to build a web form and embed it on the store’s homepage.

In addition to phone numbers, the form collects ZIP codes. This lets Rachel and her team build segments based on the location of subscribers.

As soon as someone joins, they receive an autoresponder with more info about the pop-up store nearest them.

Driving visitors and sales with exclusive offers

When The Warehouse Sale restocks its inventory or opens a new location, it sends a text to the relevant segments. In other words, they can target their messages to the right people in the right place.

One of the most valuable benefits of SimpleTexting is the ability to see if people are engaging with your texts.

Within a month of switching to our platform, the data was clear—web forms and promotional texts work.

The Warehouse Sale’s list has grown by 100% and the average click-through rate is 20%. Compare that to the average click-through rate of email which is less than 3% for retail brands.

Of course, this is just one metric that provides insight into the effectiveness of SMS.

The Warehouse Sale is able to offer wholesale prices because they don’t have shipping costs. You can only purchase their shoes in person. So while clicks are important, they’re only the beginning.

The delivery rate with SimpleTexting is over 99%, which means nearly every text Rachel sends gets read. And of course, more opens and clicks leads to more customers visiting the pop-ups.

No matter your industry, text marketing can deliver positive ROI quickly thanks to high open and click-through rates. Want to try it for yourself? Sign up for a 14-day free trial. We have an extensive library of videos to help you turn SMS into a revenue-generating channel.