I’ve been hearing retailers grumble about internet shopping, well, since internet shopping came to be. Of course this is with good reason — it’s taken a huge chunk out of brick-and-mortar sales and completely changed how they do business. But now The Boatman Group has created a glorious new website, Ivy + Anchor, that takes an entirely different approach so that everyone — especially independent retailers and local communities — wins.
Ivy + Anchor features personalized stationery and gifts from six distinctive brands with over 160 combined years in the marketplace: Boatman Geller, The Chatsworth Collection, Dabney Lee, Prentiss Douthit, Rytex, and Whitney English. From trays to pillows to holiday cards to sticky memo cubes, if you can’t find something here to suit your taste, it may be time to start questioning that taste!
The website is shopped much like any other, but with one major difference: visitors can find and select their local Ivy + Anchor retailer, and then choose and personalize their selections. The Boatman Group doesn’t take any full sale — it is split with the retailer. If no retailer is selected, the sale is randomly split with The Boatman Group’s retailers.
Once the purchase is completed, a ‘Thank You’ page comes up that again shows a list of Ivy + Anchor retailers near the shopper’s zip code. That customer can then select one of those retailers as their “preferred store” and then whenever they return, they will be supporting that local retailer.
Pretty cool, eh? I am excited to see new releases from the group — hard to pick just one favorite! — and see more retailers get involved. Speaking of which, if you want to open your own shop (even if you are home based), this is where you want to go.
