Growing an eCommerce Platform during the Covid 

We talked to Francesco D’Avella, Storeden CEO about creating a multi-channel online shop and here is what he said about it.

First of all, how are you and your family doing in these COVID-19 times?  

Francesco D’Avella: Fortunately, my family and I are well and healthy. Neither of us has been affected, and I do feel lucky. 

The Corona Virus situation has definitely changed our habits in a very short time. The smart working concept has always attracted me, but to be forced to work from home without any human contact is another story. 

This worldwide pandemic has pushed the Italian digital economy, but the consequences are too severe. Sometimes it happens that I look at pictures of my child’s birthday, and he was alone, and I feel so bad. 

I am close to the families and companies that are fighting against these difficulties, and I wish we will come back to our lives as soon as possible. 

Tell us about you, your career, how you founded Storeden.

Francesco D’Avella: We started as a web agency a few years ago, we were vertical on the e-commerce world and focused on customer satisfaction. We used to work with the most important Open Source and SaaS solutions.  

We realized dozens and dozens of websites, and we had never found a product that fulfilled our needs completely. So, we have started creating a new top-notch solution, Storeden. Storeden has got the advantages to be a solution in the cloud, such as easy to use, the speed of implementation and the customization typically of the Open Source platforms. Our goal was to create a complete tool where it is possible to customize simple operations, such as to modify the checkout, to add navigation filters and to customize the software features.

As icing on the cake, we wrote the first code thinking on the headless platform and multichannel natively. We were really pleased with the results. In just a few years, we have reached important goals, and we have to say thank you to our customers and partners for their incredible buzz. They have seen in Storeden the added value, and they have been a crucial key for improving our solution and to turn it as one of the most important e-commerce platforms in the Italian market.  

How does Storeden innovate?  

Francesco D’Avella: We give concrete responses to the market requirements. Maybe the concept looks easy, even trivial, but it is what allows us to create a 1 to 1 relationship with our clients, partners and resellers. We want to listen to their needs for shaping and proposing Storeden in accordance with their expectations.

How the coronavirus pandemic affects your business, and how are you coping? 

Francesco D’Avella: In 2020, we had an increase of more than 200%, despite the promotion that we activated for helping the Italian companies to deal with the lockdown. We gave a 60 days trial to the companies that they started creating their business online for the first time.

Did you have to make difficult choices, and what are the lessons learned? 

Francesco D’Avella: The Corona Virus has been a nasty surprise for all of us. We were not completely prepared.

The construction of our new office was close to being concluded, and when we saw the first Corona cases, we started working from home. Safety of our employees is our first priority.

Our subscription plans were free, and for ensuring support, during the first lockdown, we worked 24 hours per 7 days.  

Who are your competitors? And how do you plan to stay in the game? 

Francesco D’Avella: Our competitors are the most common solutions used from Salesforce to Shopify. They are realities that invest important amounts in communication and branding operations.

We do not compete in marketing investments; instead, we prefer to focus on what we do best: to create and develop software and processes. Nowadays, we invest in the development platform, technological infrastructure and customer satisfaction.

We have been able to create a close relationship with the agencies. They are a real Storeden extension, building a strong added value to all of our clients.

We have never had lenders or large multinational companies, and the real investors are our clients. For this reason, our goal is their happiness with the Storeden’s platform. We give support to their growth, without any compromise regarding the logic of profit.

We love what we do, and our wish is to build an e-commerce platform most loved by the Clients.

Your final thoughts?

Francesco D’Avella: Now that the vaccines give hope, and finally the light is at the end, I can confirm this global pandemic has changed our sector, and more companies understand the importance of being online. In fact, we developed a marketplace for a network of local companies. 

The Earth could breathe during the last year, and we are involved in being a company 100% green. We select our suppliers carefully, and we try to reduce the impact on the ecosystem. We do what we love: Software. 

Your website?

https://en.storeden.com/ 

http://www.storeden.com