Q&A with George Grennhill
What's your name and your role in the company?
Hey, I’m George Greenhill, the founder and CEO of Protein Packagewhich is a UK based online health food company.
How did you come up with the idea for your Shopify store and can you tell us the story behind it?
I started Protein Package from home aged 17 whilst still attending secondary school. Protein Package is reinventing the traditional ‘pick and mix’ for the health-conscious snackers of today. We’re an eCommerce business that allows you to mix and match your favourite guilt-free snacks and nutritional supplements.
After starting to go to the gym to keep fit, I soon got the taste for healthy protein snacks and nutritional sports supplements. However, I faced a problem that didn’t have a solution. All of the healthy products I wanted to eat came as expensive individual items or in large boxes that left me stuck with the same flavour for weeks on end.
One day at school, the idea hit me... Protein Package. Why don’t I build an online pick and mix store of protein bars, cookies, powders, low-calorie donuts - everything that makes eating healthy, enjoyable.
I’m now 21 and having run the business for four years, we’re well on our way to becoming one of the bigger players in the health foods and supplement industry, providing an unrivalled choice of quality brands at the best prices to mix and match. We’re now looking to expand into other supplementation areas like energy drinks for gamers by adding brands such as GFUEL Energyto our UK product range.
What apps do you use from FORSBERG+two and for how long have you used it?
We’ve used the Order Printer Templates app by FORSBERG+two for around two years now and have had some great success with it for use with packing slips and invoices.
Why did you look like an app like Order Printer Templates?
The main reason for originally looking at an app like Order Printer Templates was because we were generally unhappy with the standard of Shopify’s in house order packing slips as they look very basic, low quality and not very professional.
What problem does Order Printer Templates solve for you?
With Shopify’s standard template, you aren’t able to add messages or social media information to the bottom of them. To encourage the online sharing of our products we run a monthly giveaway of a free box to users who share their order using the #ProteinPackage. Without this being on the packing slip, we’d either need to send request emails which may get annoying for customers or print a whole new leaflet that’s using more paper and costing more. Adding this to our slips that go inside the boxes allows us to be more environmentally friendly with our packaging but still get the same messages across to our customers.
We also feel that extra flyers in orders mostly go unnoticed by customers when opening boxes as they perceive it to be unnecessary marketing, however, by adding it to our packing slips it’s much more visible as recipients use this to check they’ve got all the products in their healthy snack boxes.
How was the installation process of Order Printer Templates, and do you think anyone can use the app?
The installation process was extremely easy and it seamlessly integrated with the Shopify platforms free order printer app. The user interface makes it quick to find relevant templates that suit your needs and you can even preview and customise them before purchasing so you can see exactly what you’re getting and paying for.
In what way do you think strong branding helps your business and customers?
Every large corporation in the world, no matter what industry they’re in, have a few things in common, one of which is extremely strong branding. The ability to add our custom branding into the box on packing slips allows us to get access to the most prominent spot in their whole experience ordering with us - opening the actual box of healthy goodies.
Because at Protein Package we stock various brands that aren’t actually produced by us, it’s often the other brands inside the boxes that gain the most exposure. However, by adding the packing slips on top of the tissue wrapped parcel, it allows us to have the limelight. As we encourage customers to share their experiences online for a chance to win a free prize, the packing slip also gets usually photographed by the side showing off our logo and business details for viewers to discover our small business building subconscious trust with users in the pre-purchase buying stage.
Is there any feature you want to highlight that was added and especially useful for you?
Because our unique selling point is the pick and mix, many orders have high volumes of items per order, sometimes over 40 unique SKUs. We, therefore, wanted to add a bespoke feature whereby any quantities over x1 so x2, x3, x4 etc. would be highlighted in a different colour so that our packing team can easily spot differences. Before using the app we had a packing error rate of around 2.5% but after installing FORSBERG+two’s app and adding the automatic quantity highlighter, this rate fell to under 0.9%
I also wanted to offer a special mention of the auto-tag feature we added that was simple to do on the platform. Because on the website we sell some short-dated protein bars, we often get customers who orde from the clearance section but once the order arrives, they would forget and then email in saying they received a short-dated or past best before item. With the auto-tag feature, any product sold with the “clearance” tag is highlighted red on the packing slip with an added note so customers can easily distinguish and recognize which products they ordered from the range cutting out many unneeded email support queries.
Have you been in touch with our support team for help?
Yes, the support team has always been excellent providing replies within 24 hours to all our queries. Sometimes with some Shopify apps, you get support that isn’t very personalized and just standard canned responses that don’t really answer your question and almost force you to either contact Shopify directly for help or hire an expert. FORSBERG+two is nothing like this, they offer tailored solutions that are fully comprehensive.
One problem we had was that our product images weren't always displaying correctly, we reached out to support and within 24 hours the issue was completely resolved.
Would you recommend other merchants to install Order Printer Templates and try for free?
We’d highly recommend the Order Printer Templates app to any store owner that’s unsatisfied with the basic solution you get with your Shopify plan or they want to take their branding to the next level. Your first template is just $29 so around £21, when you look at that investment-wise, with our average sale providing £5 of profit, if the packing slip inside the order brings in five repeat sales, you’re already getting a return which for many stores could take a matter of weeks or even days.
Want to try Order Printer Templates for free?
It's a simple 3-step process
- Select your starting template design - try as many as you like for free. Each design has a matching Invoice, Packing Slip, Returns form etc.
- Customize the design to suit your brand and style - it takes less than 5 minutes.
- Buy it once and use forever in Order Printer Pro, or Shopify's Order Printer