Background

Founded in the early nineties by creative visionary Kathleen Plate, Smart Glass Jewelry pioneered a unique approach to sustainable fashion accessories by transforming discarded glass bottles into stylish, wearable art that garnered attention from major brands and retailers. The company achieved significant commercial milestones, including a 2006 commission from Coca-Cola to create a signature line using their iconic bottles, and grew from small boutique distribution in the Southeast to become a nationally recognized eco-accessory brand with an expanding product line and loyal customer base who appreciated both the aesthetic appeal and environmental ethos behind each handcrafted piece.

Challenge

Despite years of successful growth through traditional marketing channels and wholesale relationships, Smart Glass Jewelry began experiencing the disruptive effects of an increasingly omnichannel retail world, resulting in stagnant email subscriber acquisition and declining orders from their historically reliable tradeshow events. Owner Kathleen Plate observed that her previously effective grassroots and word-of-mouth marketing approaches were yielding diminishing returns, with fewer orders and subscriber additions coming from wholesale and retail tradeshows, necessitating a strategic pivot toward digital marketing to maintain growth momentum in a changing marketplace where consumer discovery and purchasing habits were rapidly evolving.

Solution

Smart Glass Jewelry sought to address these challenges by leveraging Springbot Exchange’s Audience Expander, a sophisticated tool that made enterprise-level data sharing capabilities accessible to a small business that would otherwise be excluded from such technology due to cost and complexity barriers. Working with a dedicated Campaign Service Specialist, Plate matched her store’s existing customer data to identify look-alike audiences with similar demographic and behavioral characteristics, then launched a targeted three-series email drip campaign designed to introduce these potential new customers to the unique story and products of Smart Glass Jewelry, effectively extending their reach beyond geographic limitations and known networks.

Key Outcomes

The implementation of Audience Expander delivered rapid and significant results, growing Smart Glass Jewelry’s active subscriber list by 10% in less than three months and providing a sustainable source of new prospects for ongoing marketing efforts. The quality of these new subscribers was validated by a robust 5% engagement rate with campaign communications, indicating strong interest and relevance among the expanded audience. Most importantly, these marketing improvements translated directly to business results, with online sales increasing by 38% compared to the same period in the previous year, demonstrating the commercial impact of their enhanced digital marketing approach.

Conclusion

The partnership with Springbot has enabled Smart Glass Jewelry to successfully navigate the evolving retail landscape by adopting digital marketing strategies that complement their traditional strengths while reaching new audiences beyond their previous geographic and demographic limitations. Owner Kathleen Plate acknowledges the necessity of this adaptation, noting that she recognized the industry was evolving and that her business needed to embrace change to continue succeeding. The support of a dedicated Campaign Service Specialist provided the expertise needed to implement sophisticated marketing techniques without requiring extensive in-house resources, allowing this innovative small business to compete effectively in an increasingly digital marketplace while maintaining focus on their core creative and production processes.