Case Study: Uvex Sports, Inc.

A few years ago, Uvex Sports got an offer they couldn't refuse from Microsoft and Great Plains Software (which Microsoft had just bought). They offered to integrate Uvex Sports' Great Plains accounting system with a brand new consumer eCommerce site using Microsoft Commerce Server.

Microsoft threw in the licenses for all the software, bought Uvex a pair of Dell Web Servers, and paid a top West Coast eCommerce firm to develop the site. The catch? Microsoft wanted a company that had cool products and good visuals for a case study on how Commerce Server 2002 could be used with Great Plains. That was it.

It was a win for all involved. But once Microsoft had their case study and some good screen captures for marketing purposes, the free development came to halt. That was in 2002.

Uvex ran the site as best they could using internal customer service staff to keep it going. By the winter of 2003, it was clear that the product line had out-grown the old design, and according to President Carl Helemtag, "We had a space shuttle parked in the server room, and we were using it to go to the corner store for a pack of cigarettes, because no one here really knew how to fly it."

Carl retained Rethought to fly Uvex's "space shuttle". Using the existing technology, we completely re-designed the way products were organized and displayed in order to improve on-line merchandising. In the process, we added a new Bike Helmet line. Then, we got to work on marketing the site.

Through a combination of search engine marketing, Pay Per Click Advertising, and Uvex's own PR and advertising efforts, traffic is up 51% over 2003, a fact known to Uvex because Rethought installed NetTracker Web Site Analytics software.