Case Study: Joan Baker Designs

WebJaguar Brings New Platform, New Website and New Opportunities to Joan Baker Designs

Challenge:

  • Needed to replace static website
  • Wanted customizable features to improve efficiency
  • Needed platform that would be easy to use for employees

Solution:

  • Contacted WebJaguar

Results:

  • Dramatically increased website capabilities
  • Customizable functions improve efficiency, customer service
  • Smooth transition from previous system



"It's a good package. I'm quite pleased with it." -- Wayne Flower

For more than three decades, the talented artisans at Joan Baker Designs have created stunning decorative art glass items, from wall panels to vases to candleware. Based in San Clemente, California, the company was started by Joan Baker with just $50. Today, Joan Baker Designs ranks among the world's leading producers of quality painted glassware gift products.

Despite its steady growth and success, the company has lagged behind many other businesses in their web presence, which did not have the capacity to show off the beauty of their products or make it easy for customers to find the information they need.
"The company had only static pages, and they weren't great," said web manager Wayne Flower. "What we had online could be defined as the bare minimum for a company of this size."

Several attempts were made over a number of years to address the situation, but for various reasons none were considered viable. "We just weren't able to get it off the ground," Flower said. "But it was finally decided that something had to be done."

After several platforms were investigated, Joan Baker Designs found the WebJaguar platform from Advanced EMedia. "They were a local company, which was very important to us. But the main reason we chose them was that the WebJaguar platform fulfilled a lot of our needs," Flower said.

What can Joan Baker Designs do through their website now that they couldn't do before WebJaguar? "In a word, everything," Flower says. "We didn't have an online store. We didn't have anything dynamic. We didn't have a way to present our products and our imagery. Now we're able to display our entire inventory on the website."

"We knew for a company not familiar with the technological advances made in platform capabilities, that WebJaguar would be a solid choice," said Bachir Kassir, president of Advanced EMedia. "With WebJaguar they had a platform that would take them to the next level, but also be easy to use for their staff and customers who may not be acclimated with online ordering or other automated processes."

In the weeks since WebJaguar was installed, the employees of Joan Baker Designs are still discovering how the new site will reduce their workload. "Our customer service people and accounting team are just now starting to take advantage of its capabilities, and the sales staff now realize they have a great new tool to pull up product information instantly," Flower said. "It's a good package. I'm quite pleased with it."

And after years of making due with an underperforming site, Flower enjoys checking the analytics every morning to see how the new site is performing. "We're still at the stage where we're getting our existing customers familiar with the platform so they will start placing orders through it," he explains. "But already we've had some new customers find us as well, and requests to set up an account, which is nice to see."