Webshop Jindl: 'This is the most beautiful thing there is'

'Jindl is a webshop with products to get kids moving and make the lives of young families more fun and easier. A climbing frame for indoors, for example. Bjorn, Jasper and Tom started their webshop in wooden toys in the middle of corona time. More than twenty years ago, brothers Bjorn and Jasper took over a webshop in radio-controlled toys from Tom. Because they were too busy with other things, they stopped that webshop at the time. Years later, it started itching again. Bjorn and Jasper, who by now had children of their own, started the Jindl toy webshop together with Tom.

It was now or never.

When the brothers started their very first webshop, the Internet was in its infancy compared to now. 'We sold radio-controlled toys online,' Bjorn explains. 'And we slowly expanded that assortment with things like bike trailers, walkers and more. Then we got a taste for it, but we were still young and other things took over. That web store then stopped. A shame in hindsight, because we were very early adopters at that time.' In 2021, they decided to start a new webshop, Jindl, together with Tom. Bjorn and Jasper both stopped working in ICT. 'It was now or never. With Tom's office and storage space, we immediately had a good base to start from.'

Starting from scratch again

With Jindl, they did start from scratch again. 'What we learned from our previous webshop is that we had to sell good products above all. They should not break down quickly and you had to be able to enjoy them for years. That's how we initially arrived at wooden toys. Jasper and I have young children, so it was a perfect fit.' The first choice was wooden climbing frames for children. 'We had seen those once and that seemed fun for children. The great thing is that they actually get children moving and that is something that has been lacking in recent years. With children as a starting point, we started with a few products. We expanded that range step by step. The first batch of climbing and walking frames we picked up ourselves with a van from a manufacturer in Germany that we were working with at the time. From there we added several beautiful brands to expand the assortment and put the webshop online as quickly as possible. And we just did that ourselves by feel. Just starting. Then you learn the most along the way.'

The first order

The moment the first order arrived at Jindl was very special, Bjorn says. 'Jasper and I borrowed some money from our grandmother 22 years ago to be able to take over our first webshop. The very first order at Jindl, a set of wooden blocks, arrived on Grandma's birthday. It was meant to be. Blinded by pure joy, we sent the wrong product at the time. We can laugh about that now, haha!

All three have their own qualities

Tom, Jasper and Bjorn are all three owners. The idea is that we all use our own qualities. This way we combine our strengths to make Jindl something beautiful. Tom has a lot of experience as an entrepreneur, facilitates the growth of Jindl and always has good advice if we get stuck on something. Jasper and I are in charge of the day-to-day management. Jasper's focus is on purchasing, customer contact, accounting and social media. I mainly deal with marketing and everything to do with text. We do the product development for the Jindl brand together. If someone has an idea, we look at it and discuss the possibilities with our producers.

Marketing

How do they approach marketing in an industry where there is a lot of competition? 'We advertise a lot through Google and Meta and from the start of Jindl we have taken care of website optimization and text writing. We are now starting to reap the benefits of this. We have the marketing completely in our own hands. We also took care of that ourselves from the beginning. That was also the idea, Later we worked with two different agencies and they certainly helped us well. Still, last year we did everything ourselves again and we'll keep it that way for now. Besides advertising, we are getting more and more visitors organically. In our eyes, that is essential to keep growing, because advertising seems to be getting more and more expensive. At least, in the way we do it now.'

'Customer service costs time, but mainly delivers a lot'

'In addition, the quality of our products is simply good,' Bjorn continues. 'Many customers come back more often as a result. Finally, we have tremendously good customer service. The secret? Whether you contact us via app, email or phone: you always speak directly to one of the owners. That way we can immediately give you the right advice. Jasper is usually the first point of contact for customers. If he's not there, I take care of it. And do you have a problem after the purchase? Then we solve it. We take every complaint seriously and we always respond quickly. Yes, that takes time, but above all it delivers very for. And we know that every company says that, of course, but reviews and the rating speak for themselves in this case. Almost perfect!

Delivering to professional institutions

Jindl supplies, in addition to consumers, a lot to professional institutions. 'Materials and toys are actually always needed there. Many of those institutions know how to find us through our advertisements. Of course, people work at every company and we have tried to reach them so that they mention Jindl within their organization. That works out quite well. There is always room for more, of course, and we work on that every day.'

Growth is a challenge

Still, Bjorn mentions marketing as one of the biggest challenges for Jindl. 'How do we reach even more people, who also buy something, without increasing the advertising budget too much? We find that being profitable and growing sufficiently with advertising can be quite a challenge. That is why we are very alert to this and try out many different things.'

Constantly looking ahead

'Another thing is inventory. We prefer to be able to deliver quickly and many customers expect that. That means we also have a lot of stock. That can also be a challenge sometimes. Not only because of the quantity, but also estimating and calculating what you need. Especially if, like us, you also have your own production line, you have to think about that carefully and constantly look ahead. But all these challenges are what make running Jindl so interesting.

Managing stock

How exactly does that work? 'We almost always approach it the same way. If we have a new product, we first have a relatively small batch made. If it then turns out that it catches on, we increase the next batch and then the next one again. After a few months, you can usually calculate how much is sold per month. Taking into account the seasons, we make an estimate.

Rather too little than too much

With the experience of the last few years, this is going pretty well. We have rather too little than too much of some of the products that are a direct hit, but we consider that a luxury problem. We don't really hold stocks. If a product is really not going well, we try it at a lower selling price. That is at the expense of the margin, but better than not selling at all. When a product like that is sold out, we throw it out of the assortment.

'Successfully marketing a product gives a kick'

What Bjorn likes best about running Jindl is the kick it gives to produce an item, put it on the market and then see that it sells. 'Honestly: it doesn't always work out as expected, but very often it does. A good example are our climbing frames and learning towers. They are very popular and we sell a lot of them. We also like to decide for ourselves how we want to do something. And preferably by ourselves. So we regularly dive into new material to make things our own. That gives us energy. Especially if it succeeds what you have in mind.'

Developing new products

What is involved in developing a product yourself? 'There is a difference between developing a completely new product and marketing a new model. Take our learning towers, for example. That product is not new, but the Jindl learning towers are. What we do is first make a sketch ourselves. With that, we then go to one of our manufacturers and work it out together. That sounds very simple, but it takes quite some time. Moreover, after that there is a lot of work ahead of us. Think of the packaging, an assembly manual, photo shoots, the description of the product and, depending on the product, the necessary tests for safety. With us, these are usually tests around the EN71 toy standard.'

'You know yourself that everything is good, but do customers experience it that way?'

So there's a lot involved in that. 'And then you still have to start selling them. With new products, it always remains to be seen how the first 25 sales go. You know yourself that everything is good, but do customers feel the same way? Or do they run into something you didn't think of? That is, in short, quite a process from idea to sale.

Expanding to Germany

In the future, Bjorn, Tom and Jasper want to make the Jindl brand bigger and stronger with more good and fun products. 'In addition, we are going to work on expanding our reach. One of the ways is that starting in 2025 we are going to be more focused and active in Germany. We are already selling there, but have noticed that it works a little differently than in the Netherlands. There is a lot of potential, but we have to strike the right chord there.'

'Translating everything literally doesn't work'

"In Germany it is very important that everything is presented in a German look and feel," Bjorn continues. 'Translating everything literally with Google or Deepl doesn't work. We would therefore prefer to work with someone whose mother tongue is German and who also knows something about marketing. Then we will quietly go from the boroughs bordering the Netherlands to become a bigger player in Germany. In addition, many Germans are used to shopping on marketplaces like Amazon and eBay. We want to gain a position with our own shop. Then that requires considerable attention.'

Collecting reviews

When they started, Jindl did not yet have any reviews. How did they approach that? 'We did start collecting reviews fairly early on, but actually too late, only after six months. At some point, when we ourselves felt it was a nice number, we started promoting them more prominently on the website. We think that definitely boosted sales as well.'

'We have to do something for it'

They always respond directly to customers who are not completely satisfied. 'Because not being completely satisfied is not necessary in our eyes. So far, we have found a solution for almost every problem there has been. Except when customers themselves do not want to cooperate, but we have only experienced that a few times. Our average of 9.7 also indicates that things are generally more than okay. We have to do something for that, by the way.

Keep communicating

'Above all, continuing to communicate is enormously important,' Bjorn tips. 'Is it unexpectedly not possible to deliver something on time? Tell us why. Preferably in advance and not after the customer has contacted you. I have to say that now with the numbers of packages we send, it is sometimes a bit more difficult, but we try to stay as clear as possible.'

Doing a lot yourself

Do Bjorn, Tom and Jasper have any other advice for starting webshops? 'Trust yourself. What we have noticed is that it is best to do a lot yourself in the beginning if you have the opportunity to do so. Create the webshop yourself, pack it yourself, add products yourself, write about it, advertise it yourself, do your own bookkeeping, purchasing, etc. Now, by the way, that's no longer possible, so Lobke, our colleague in the warehouse, now makes sure all the packages are sent out every day.

'The greatest thing there is'

'Another point we would recommend is still to keep stock. Then you can deliver quickly and customers know what they are getting off with. Dropshipping directly from the factory, we do only in exceptional cases. For example, if the dimensions of a package are too large and thus the shipping costs become too high. And if you want to create something beautiful for the long term, don't think you can just walk in quickly. It is still hard work. We have to push every day to grow. But if you like that, it's the best thing there is.'

Check out Jindl's membership page here.