Klaviyo drives 122.3x ROI for Pike Place Market sweet shop Chukar Cherries

Chukar Cherries sells gourmet, snackable combinations of dried cherries, chocolate, and nuts. The family-owned retailer’s signature innovation: The team dehydrates Washington-grown cherries themselves, without adding sugar.

The brand operates two physical stores in the Pacific Northwest—one in Seattle’s famous Pike Place Market—and an online store, which has grown substantially in recent years. That’s thanks in part to tools like Klaviyo.

Learn how Klaviyo flows buoyed Chukar Cherries through the pandemic

Challenge

Chukar Cherries predates the entire concept of ecommerce. Founded in 1988, its two brick-and-mortar stores—especially the one in Pike Place Market—drove the bulk of its revenue for more than a decade.

Then, in 2020, COVID swept the globe, and a huge swathe of in-person shopping moved online.

Chukar was prepared from a technical standpoint: They had launched an ecommerce store in 1998, and started with Klaviyo in 2019. But with market foot traffic dwindling, they needed a new, more proactive way to engage and re-engage customers.

Solution

Chukar Cherries leaned on Klaviyo to keep customers engaged and shopping through the pandemic, and it worked.

In 2020, Chukar’s revenue from Klaviyo more than doubled YoY.

By 2022, even as the COVID ecommerce boom faded, Chukar made more than 4x their 2019 revenue with Klaviyo—and unlocked 122.3x Klaviyo ROI.

“I feel lucky that we had Klaviyo in place to help us take advantage of COVID market forces shifting people to internet and email, because we saw tremendous growth from that,” says marketing manager Wynne Auld. “And we haven’t come down to where we were.”

I feel lucky that we had Klaviyo in place to help us take advantage of COVID market forces shifting people to internet and email, because we saw tremendous growth from that. And we haven’t come down to where we were.

Strategy

Chukar Cherries updated their email marketing in 3 key ways to capitalize on the early-COVID ecommerce surge:

• They upgraded their automations: In 2021, Chukar Cherries hired an agency, Underground Ecom, to revamp flows—and they grew Chukar’s revenue from flows. The team added new incentives to the existing welcome flow, and launched abandoned check-out, cross-sell, and VIP flows.
• They ramped up digital holiday promotion: Chukar has always seen a holiday rush—customers love to gift their gourmet snacks—and they now incentivize it online. In Q4, they send promotion emails at 2x the frequency of the rest of the year.
• They launched Klaviyo SMS: Now, when customers reply to SMS flows and campaigns, the marketing team can send 1:1 responses in Klaviyo. “It’s exciting to be able to communicate with customers in a new channel ,” says digital marketing specialist Amy Morse.

“We’ve been in Pike Place Market for 25 years, so we’re not quite a startup that needs to break into new markets,” says Auld. “We need to remind our customers who know us and love us that we’re here, and email helps us do that.”

We’ve been in Pike Place Market for 25 years, so we’re not quite a startup that needs to break into new markets. We need to remind our customers who know us and love us that we’re here, and email helps us do that.