Lumingerie - an idea that lenders did not believe in, produces sales
How did Lumingerie come about?
The founder of Lumingerie, Mervi Komulainen-Horneman, shares about the initial phase of her company: "The idea started from the fact that I struggled to find bras in larger bust sizes. I always ordered them from abroad and that had its own difficulties. I thought that I was probably not the only Finn who had the same problem. I started thinking about whether it would be an idea to set up an online store selling bras for larger bust sizes, and that's where it started."
The other owner of Lumingeri, Mikko Horneman, shares about the challenges at the beginning: "At the time, lenders thought that the idea was completely stupid. The discussions got boring every time I told them it was an online store. I couldn't get a loan or financing, so the company was founded from my own savings."
Mervi toyed with the idea for half a year. There happened to be an entrepreneurship course in her area in the fall of 2007, and she decided to attend. "During the course, I made a business plan and at the end of that year I built an online store foundation. In January, I decided that this was worthwhile." Lumingerie opened in February and the first order came in right away.
"I don't know where the first customer found us, but maybe through word of mouth. In the first few months, I didn't do any marketing, I just told my friends that I was opening a store like this." For Lumingerie, word of mouth really worked, because orders came steadily from the beginning. At first it was about one order per day.
Lumingerie wasn't the craziest business idea after all
The one order per day pace has come a long way. Now Lumingerie has a turnover of around 800,000€. In addition to the owners, there are three permanent employees and two summer employees. There are about 1,000 products in the online store, and if all sizes are taken into account, there are over 20,000 individual products.
"90% of our traffic and sales come via Google, email and Facebook, the most from Google," says Mikko. Search engine optimization has become an important part of their operations. Lumingerie pays a lot of attention to titles and product descriptions, and the quality of other content is considered good enough to link to it.
"Our organic visibility is so good that we don't advertise in Adwords at all," shares Mikko.
Online shopping platform Oscar Prosper
Mervi shares about the change of Lumingerie's e-commerce platform: "Initially we used Smilehouse's Wosbee."
"When Wosbee ended, we switched to Prospercart, which is now Oscar Prosper," continues Mikko about Lumingerie's e-commerce platform. "When we changed the platform in 2012, we first tested the most popular platforms available. We selected this one because it wasn't too stiff, we found important features in it, and it is possible to modify and customize it ourselves."
"In this way, we were able to build aspects that are important to us into the online store. No platform is perfect, but you have to know what features are vital to you and what you are willing to give up," explains Mikko.
How did the implementation of Paytrail go?
Lumingerie started using Paytrail's service in May 2011, of course at that time Paytrail was still Suomen Verkkomaksut. "In the very beginning, the order confirmation message sent instructions on how to make a bank transfer or pay using Paypal, because they were free options. When more orders started coming in, it was clear that paying had to be made easier for customers. Then in an online merchants group I learned about Paytrail", Mervi recalls about the initial phase of the collaboration.
Mikko recalls the implementation of the service: "There were no problems with the implementation. For both e-commerce platforms it was as easy as entering the credentials and ticking a box." The service solved Lumingeri's problem and, according to Mikko, made paying in the online store easy. Especially when bypassing the payment page was introduced, where one intermediate step was removed from the checkout process.
A working partnership
According to Mervi, things with Paytrail have gone smoothly: "If we have had questions, we have received answers quickly and things have been taken care of. If there has been a problem on Paytrail's end, we have been contacted and informed quickly."
Mervi shares about Lumingeri's most used payment methods: "Most of our payments come through Osuuspanki and Nordea, a total of 58% of sales. After that comes Visa and Danske Bank, as well as Mastercard and S-bank. The rest comes through other credit cards, Paypal and smaller banks. We still offer account transfer as an option, but it is used rarely"
Mikko shared that paying via mobile devices has increased over the past year, and the banks' own payment pages have been a bit difficult to use on a phone. Since more than half of Lumingeri's traffic comes by phone, Mervi and Mikko hope for a good solution to the matter. One solution, MobilePay, became available just after the interview. It remains to be seen how soon MobilePay or the upcoming Siirto will be adopted by consumers and potentially solve the challenge with mobile payments.
What is the best thing about Paytrail's online payment service?
"The best thing about Paytrail's online payment service is two things: firstly, that the payment confirmation is received immediately after the order, which means that the products are sent immediately and the order is processed. Secondly, that the payments come really quickly and reliably. You don't have to wait for your own money." shares Mikko.
"Our sales volumes are so large that we often have to place new orders. That's why it's important to us that payments come quickly when money is needed. We have been very satisfied."
Mervi and Mikko shared the following thoughts to other online businesses
"Customer service is something that enables Finnish online stores to compete against foreign online stores. You can't, and shouldn't, compete on price. We invest a lot in customer service."
Lumingerie online store
Location: Oulu
Founded: January 2008 as a private trader and in 2015 moved to a Ltd.
Turnover: around 800 000 €
Staff: owners, three permanent employees and two summer employees
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