Starrett

Overview

The L.S. Starrett Company is a global business, headquarted in Athol, Massachusetts, but with production facilities in North and South America, the UK and China. Starrett is the UK's largest manufacturer and distributor of band saw blades along with producing a large range of machine tools, drills and precision measuring equipment.

Starrett sell their product range via a large number of distributors and wholesalers based around the country.

Key Problems

Starrett relies heavily on their distributors stocking all of their products. Because of the wide variety of products Starrett produces it wasn't always possible for smaller distributors to stock all of their range. It was obvious from trade shows that the demand was there from customers, but many of them struggled to find a local outlet for the product they wanted.

Also due to varying demand for specific products it is occasionally necessary for Starrett to quickly move older stock to make space within the supply chain for newly produced stock.

Starrett therefore needed to:

Raise their on-line profile
Help promote their distributors
Allow customers to buy direct, especially for products not stocked locally
Allow customers to buy from their local distributors
Have an outlet for 'warehouse clearance' items

The Solution

The Starrett website project was split into two stages.

Stage 1 - Fully Editable Website With a 'Find Your Nearest Distributor' functionality

Stage one consisted of designing a fully editable Duo CMS website and training Starrett staff to update this site. This stage gave Starrett marketing staff the ability to update their website on a regular basis to allow them to inform customers about the details of their extensive product range and to inform users of their attendance at upcoming trade shows.

Included in this stage was a distributor database with a postcode search. Fully editable by Starrett, this feature allows users to enter their postcode into the Starrett website and get a map indicating their five nearest distributors (see inset sample).

Stage 2 - Full E-Commerce Solution Including 'Order from My Distributor' functionality

starrett e-commerce Once stage 1 was established, it became more obvious to Starrett that it needed to somehow meet the demand of customers who were enquiring about retail locations for Starrett products.

To help meet this demand Starrett decided to set-up an on-line store. However, they did not want to compete with their valued network of distributors. To prevent this situation from occurring they decided to give their customers the ability to order from the Starrett website, but at the point of payment, give their customers the option to order direct from Starrett or to send their shopping basket to their nearest registered Starrett distributor.

This option provided the best all round solution. If a local distributor had the desired products in stock it is usually quicker and cheaper to collect them locally. If not, you could order direct on-line. Either way you would end up with your chosen purchase as efficiently as possible.

In addition to the standard product portfolio, Starrett also has a 'Warehouse Clearance' section where it offers discounted products which are currently in low demand.

Result

Launched in June 2007, with a later addition of e-commerce functionality in 2009, the Starrett UK website has gone from strength to strength. Attracting around 10,000 unique visitors a month (up approx 15% year on year) and selling many thousands of pounds worth of products, it has proven to be a valuable asset in the Starrett marketing portfolio.