The enduring eCommerce narrative is one of adapt or die.

There are the early, aggressive adopters – think Amazon, eBay, Alibaba and Rakuten – followed by the more recently emerged behemoths like Shein and Temu.

Many of these companies have accrued vast monopolies on retail that threaten to become so optimised in its value and efficiency, there’s room for little else. The change to the face of the high street, and generational shopping habits, are inescapable.

Alongside these well known giants, there’s other international success stories that see entrepreneurs take a reflective look at what they have to offer that’s unique to their customer base.

Some of the best examples that spring to mind are Grab, a now core part of Southeast Asia’s digital economy; Farfetch in Portugal, which propagates locally-made artisanal craftsmanship for the high-end market; or Flipkart in India, which takes into account the countries myriad local languages, dialects and propensity towards a cash-first economy to provide goods and services.

Each of these started with their local surroundings in mind and scaled from there – to wild success.

So where does Scotland fit in?

People have “got preconceived ideas about the size of the opportunity, what it might cost to do it in this country. As it stands, there’s not really a lot of companies that do eCommerce in a big way here,” says Callachan.

Sure, whisky and tourism are products we can intuitively market to the world. But, if we truly want a groundswell of eCommerce activity in this country, a more native assessment is required – watch a single episode of Still Game and you’ll see that, traditionally, it’s the local newsagent that serves as the hub of our communities.

Let’s start there.

So how do we not only save, but propagate our local offerings? Dundee-based Snappy Shopper has been doing just that, creating digitised convenience stores that go beyond the normal sundry offerings – they actively incentivise local businesses to join up and operate from a centralised delivery point that still works functionally as the same kind of newsagent that your granny used.

Whether it’s a Morton’s roll or a Stephen’s Bakery donner pie, there’s an eCommerce win-win on the cards that just needs a technological foundation that keeps the shops that house these unique products alive, while helping them reach more people than ever before – that’s what Snappy Shopper functionally does.

Typing my own postcode into the app offers a newsagent that not only sells standard groceries, but acts as a centralised point to order freshly-made packaged meals from the local Indian takeaway, there’s also an option for a local cupcake maker and a butcher – unique, homemade offerings from local, family-owned businesses that you won’t get anywhere else.

Many of these businesses have been around for generations and are about as far from digitally native as you can get.

So, how does one undertake what – on the face of it – seems like a monstrous digital transformation project that takes in thousands of businesses in different places, selling different things on different days with different prices?

In an interview with DIGIT, as we approach the inaugural eCommerce & Digital Trade Symposium at DIGIT Expo, we speak to Snappy Shopper CEO Mike Callachan to answer these questions and examine the company’s success through the lens of eCommerce in Scotland, exploring where it’s currently at and how some of its tenets can potentially be extrapolated for others to emulate.

Snappy Shopper | Modularity and Simplicity

A commonality between independent Scottish retailers is that they’re scared of technology.

Creating an eCommerce framework that accounts for this is at the heart of what Snappy Shopper has designed.

“You think about that local corner shop – the fabric of the community, they’re typically family-owned. Maybe you’ve got mum and dad in the shop who inherited it from their parents and have operated the business the same way across generations,” says Callachan

Snapper Shopper’s key to getting these businesses to digitise is through simplicity.

“What we see our job as, is taking the unique selling points of that shop within its given community and bringing it online.”

As described before and as Callachan points out, this can include various local businesses selling their products through a centralised point – the newsagent.

On the technology side, Snappy Shopper provides retailers with a “touch screen device with a built-in printer, scanner and camera.”

This ‘Snappy Order Manager’ is supported by two apps, one for your drivers (to be used for things like age verification, GPS etc) and another app for handling stock.

Using this, shops can easily build out their “menu” using its white-label technology, listing and de-listing products and offerings using barcode scanners that automatically update the app for them.

The back-end tech that powers Snappy Shopper is also agnostic when it comes to the various ePOS systems that newsagents use.

“When an order comes through, the supplied Snappy Order Manager device rings and flashes with two buttons: green and red. Accept order or don’t. Once they accept, the printer gives the order and the address, and the amount paid. Done.

“When you break down the steps, you arrive at something that the retailers just get very comfortable with very quickly.”

It’s clearly something customers are comfortable with as well, with stats from the company claiming that 80% of Snappy Shopper sales are from new customers.

What’s so compelling about the Snappy Shopper community-first, capital light model is that it feels extrapolatable at its core – the technology involved isn’t overly complex, expensive, or hard to use. It’s just been disseminated intelligently.

Making Scottish eCommerce Visible

That’s why outreach and marketing are so core to a successful eCommerce venture.

It’s all good and well having the technology, the know-how and plan, but how do you get your eCommerce proposition out in the wild in a way that’s visible and engaged with?

A key realisation for Snappy Shopper was that they weren’t just marketing their brand – they were promoting the convenience stores themselves.

With regards to marketing, Callachan explains, “There’s one thing that underpins all of it. When we launched, we learned that people connected more with their local stores than with a new brand.

“By empowering stores to market home delivery themselves, we became part of their community.”

Essentially, it’s a marketing strategy that doesn’t vaunt Snappy Shopper’s accommodation of local products, it’s the marketing of the products themselves and the people that make them.

Scottish people are proud of their local products – put them front and centre of your eCommerce strategy, as opposed to the business entity that’s selling it.

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It’s an approach that’s made Snappy Shopper a force within the Scottish tech ecosystem (in an astonishingly short amount of time), with the company attracting £19.4 million in investment in 2021 – funding that allowed them to scale and refine their offering, with 150 employees (“and growing”) on the company’s roster.

More recently, in December 2022, Snappy Shopper raised another seven-figure round of funding, this time with its eye on international expansion.

With the company now expanding throughout the UK and Ireland, it remains dedicated to its Scottish roots and the values that have made it successful – community, accessibility, and support for local economies.

These values resonate with their customers, many of whom rely on local shops not just for goods, but also for social connections.

“Many customers, especially those with mobility challenges, depend on these stores,” Callachan notes.

“By enabling online orders, we’re helping maintain these relationships, which are often about more than just commerce.”

How to Grow eCommerce in Scotland 

It’s hard to measure the opportunity eCommerce presents in Scotland as there’s simply a lack of data to inform.

It was in 2021 that we last saw a Digital Economy Business survey in this country (and in the UK, in terms of Government-sanctioned data). Granted, we had a one page ‘progress’ report earlier this year but, it’s fair to say, there’s not a whole lot of empirical metrics out there for entrepreneurs trying to build a case rooted on up-to-date statistics.

According to Scottish Enterprise, global eCommerce is projected to account for 41% of total retail sales by 2027, a substantial increase from 18% in 2017. 

For Scottish companies, this translates into a potential £9.3 billion in additional sales, highlighting the imperative of enhancing the country’s international digital trade capabilities, in order to be in the conversation for this growing demand.

It’s with this in mind, that Scottish Enterprise has launched a new survey aimed at understanding the prospects of digital and eCommerce in Scotland, revealing significant opportunities for companies to expand their reach in international markets. 

It’s a leg-up that Callachan never had when he started Snappy Shopper, and seeing the success he’s had shows that there’s real opportunity in Scottish eCommerce. 

Join the Conversation!

Mike Callachan, along with a plethora of eCommerce and Tech leaders will be speaking at this year’s DIGIT Expo, being held on November 21 at the EICC in Edinburgh. It’s not too late to register for your free place!