Mateusz Haberny, Oakywood: from an Etsy docking station to a global furniture brand on Shopify

Episode recorded in Polish, published 12 December 2023; figures and plans (including "this year" and "last year") refer to the time of recording.

Who is Mateusz Haberny?

Tomek: Hi! Welcome to another episode of our "Flying with Shopify" series. We have a real treat for you today. We've managed to invite our client, Mateusz, who, combining a passion for wood and an interest in technology, created a brand that is successful all over the world. Today we'll talk with him about how it all started, which decisions he sees as key and how he sees his company growing. Enjoy the episode. Hi, Mateusz.

Mateusz: Hi. Hi, guys.

Tomek: Thank you very much for finding the time to meet with us and share a bit of your story. But before we get to that story, please introduce yourself, so everyone knows who we're talking to today.

Mateusz: Sure. I'm Mateusz, the founder of the Oakywood brand, which I launched in 2017. I have a technology background: I studied computer science and econometrics. But during my studies I realized I wanted to run a business, to be an entrepreneur, and I decided to open an online store. The store quickly turned into the Oakywood brand, which, as you said, sells globally. It's a brand focused on customers abroad, not just in Poland, but around the world. We don't limit ourselves to one direction. I think it's doing pretty well, and we're trying to develop the project so that we become a global brand.

How did Oakywood start?

Tomek: That's exactly what we want to talk about today, and in some places we'll try to draw you out a bit, so you lift the veil on the secret of your success. But maybe let's start from the very beginning. Tell us where the idea came from and how it took shape for you. When we talk to our clients, we notice that the first step is often one of the hardest: deciding what kind of business to run and what product to sell. While preparing for today's episode I read your story on your website, of course, so I already know a bit, but it would be great if you told us yourself how the idea sprouted in your head. Where did it come from, and how did you start?

Mateusz: Sure. "Sprouted" is a very good word. I have to admit I never would have guessed I'd end up working with wood. My story is that I'm a carpenter's son, and from an early age I worked in my dad's workshop next to our house. I often helped him with various jobs. Then I went to university, to study computer science and econometrics. I wanted to work in IT, just like you, and I was convinced my future was there. Meanwhile, and this is linked to the fact that I'd always dreamed of being an entrepreneur, I figured that with two years of studies still ahead, it would be nice to start a side hustle, a side project where I could take risks and test myself in action.

Mateusz: It was a bit like connecting the dots. I combined my passion for technology with the resources I had. I was thinking about what I could do here and now and what resources I could use to start a business. OK, my dad has a workshop, I can make something there. I have some experience working with wood and I could combine it with technology. On top of that I found a lot of inspiration online, products similar to the ones we make today, and I decided: this is it, I'll give it a try. I have two years, I can test things. And that's how Oakywood was born.

Mateusz: Our first product was an iPhone docking station. I made it by hand in my dad's workshop, using fairly homemade methods. We didn't yet have the machinery we have now, which lets us make more advanced products. I listed that design on Etsy. It's a marketplace for makers, definitely the biggest in the world. In 2017 it was a smaller platform, and the category that is quite big today, wooden desk products and chargers, was only in its infancy. I was one of the first makers, one of the first shops making and selling such products. I think the design mattered a lot for the first sales: a nice geometric shape. It caught on right away. I saw lots of clicks, lots of visits. The first sales, the first shipment to the US.

Mateusz: There are some funny stories about that, too. Sending the first product with Poczta Polska, the Polish Post, building the shipping process and everything else, more and more of the difficulties typical of e-commerce, of selling online. Especially since we started selling abroad right away, to the US rather than in Poland, which made things more complicated. I think that came from the fact that I like to travel. I've always felt more like a citizen of the world and wanted to sell abroad. I never focused on selling in Poland first or on opening a store in Poland. Hence Etsy. That's how our story took shape: foreign markets have always been our biggest market.

The first sale and a parcel to the US

Tomek: And do you remember the first sale, that first customer? They say it's an unforgettable feeling, and many e-commerce owners remember the person's name, which city they were from and what they bought.

Mateusz: I remember that customer only vaguely, but it was definitely someone from the United States, and it was definitely the iPhone docking station, our first product. I remember a funny story about packing it, because I didn't really have anything to pack it in or a way to ship it. I think I wrapped it in some paper and sandwich wrap and then put it into bubble wrap. Shipped to the US by post. That's when I found out how much shipping abroad costs and how it works. Those are my memories of the first sale, and I think the first few went similarly: I improvised and learned how it all works. It was a great time. I think it was September, October, just before the holidays, and then the sales quickly kept growing.

Tomek: Right, Mateusz…

Mateusz: It's really exciting at first when you get those orders.

When did the side project become a business?

Tomek: That brings a question to mind. You mentioned that you wanted to find a place for yourself and test the potential you saw. At what point after that first sale did you start thinking this could actually turn into a business? That it was worth professionalizing around it, that you didn't want it to be just, let's put it bluntly, cottage-industry work, but that you saw potential in it?

Mateusz: Honestly? Right away.

Tomek: You can feel it.

Mateusz: Right away. You can feel it. I felt right away that there was big potential in it. The timing of my launch was especially important, too. It was just before the holidays, so sales picked up quickly. I quickly made a few visually similar products that matched and complemented each other, and you could see the sales. At the peak, probably in November and December, it was sometimes several orders a day. I quickly started thinking about building a business around it. I'd read a lot before and surrounded myself with content about entrepreneurship and marketing. I was also in a student organization where we learned entrepreneurial and leadership skills. I think that environment let me think right away about how to build a brand from what was there and which direction to push the project.

A strategy from day one, or ad hoc?

Tomek: OK. I have a question that I think is very interesting. When you realized that your product and offer were finding an audience, so there was potential to build a real business, did you lock yourself in an office for a few days and work out your company's strategy? What it should look like, how it should grow, what you want to bet on, who your customer is, the textbook way. Or did you go step by step, as a continuous process stretched over, say, several months, reacting to what was happening and how sales were shaping up? How did it go in your case?

Mateusz: Definitely the latter. I'm probably not the type of person who likes to work in such an organized way. Maybe I'm not a super organized person. I think it happened more ad hoc; I act more on impulse, and that's how I grew the project. Maybe I thought I wanted to strike while the iron was hot. What mattered to me then was growth on that particular platform, expanding the product range and growing sales. That's what I focused on at first. I knew I wanted to build a brand around what was emerging, but at the start that probably wasn't my priority. That's why the store website came later, and at first sales focused on marketplaces, especially Etsy, which led to some problems, but maybe more on that in a moment.

From one person to almost 30

Maciek: I wanted to ask what the road looked like from one person to where you are now, because Oakywood is now, I believe, several dozen people already, right?

Mateusz: Almost 30 people.

Maciek: That's several dozen.

Mateusz: Yes, exactly.

Maciek: I stand by it. When did you hire your first person, and at what pace, more or less, did the growth happen?

Mateusz: When did I hire my first person? Fairly quickly, because in a sense the first person I hired was my brother, now my business partner. As I said, I was still studying in Kraków at the time. The company is based in Ciche, our home village in the Podhale region, and all the products were made, and some still are, in my dad's workshop next to the house. My brother was there, finishing secondary school, and he joined me, at first more as an employee helping me make the products. So I had to hire people fairly quickly, because within the first year I had to outsource production or hand it over to employees. Then came shipping and hiring someone to ship the products, so that process was fairly quick. For the first year you could say I worked alone. But I put off hiring the first people for operations and e-commerce for quite a long time, and in fact I built the brand, the store and the ads myself. I think the first person for sales and e-commerce joined in 2020.

Maciek: That really is quick.

Mateusz: So three years after founding the company.

What would you do differently? Etsy, a blocked shop and the newsletter

Maciek: Interesting. I think it's a common case when we talk about scaling. The growth you mentioned, from one to almost 30 people over a few years, could have carried some risk in the decisions made, to put it gently. Looking back today at how your company has grown and the stages you've been through, do you feel you always made the right decisions? Is there anything you'd change? Do in a different order or at a different pace? In a word, we're exposing your weaknesses. Where could you simply have done better, though you can't turn back time?

Mateusz: Personally, I don't like to dwell on the past like that, but looking at it that way, I definitely delayed moving to selling through our own online store and building the brand. It could have happened earlier. I wouldn't have paid so much attention to selling on marketplaces. I think many e-commerce entrepreneurs fall into this trap: they focus on selling through one channel, for example Amazon, where some products can very quickly become popular and sell in large volumes. But as if with a wave of a magic wand, Amazon can block the product, or someone can create a similar product, copy it entirely and, if we haven't protected it properly, very easily knock us off the Amazon sales throne.

Mateusz: As I said, I put a lot of emphasis on growing sales on Etsy. For quite a long time, and I think too long, Etsy was too big a sales channel for us. For two, maybe three years, Etsy generated most of our sales. I had already realized that I needed more balance between the channels we use to reach customers and our sales channels, and in the meantime I was building sales through the online store. In 2020 or 2021, probably 2021, Etsy already mattered a bit less to us, but it was still a very important channel, almost 50% of sales. And then Etsy blocked our shop overnight, without giving a reason. One email and that was it. It was hard to do anything. We wrote emails, tried to find out why the shop had been blocked.

Mateusz: That showed me how risky it can be to rely on one sales channel. Luckily, Etsy mattered less by then, but it still mattered a lot, so we did everything we could to get that channel unblocked. It's still hard to say what the reason for the block was. To wrap up the story: we managed to get the shop unblocked after three or four weeks through, let's say, connections. We had a PR agency in the US, and its owner had connections somewhere higher up at Etsy, and that let us unblock the shop. When they unblocked it, again a terse reply: that they'd unblocked our channel and that it was actually a bot that had blocked our sales. It's funny, but in the meantime I also read many stories of Etsy sellers who relied solely on that channel. Those stories are truly dramatic, because people build their whole lives around that business. It's their main source of income, and they can lose it overnight. That's why it's so important to bet on your own store, your own channels and branding. That's what I was focusing on after two or three years.

Mateusz: Relying too much on external channels, on Etsy, was one thing. I would also change how we reach customers. I would have encouraged people to sign up for the newsletter and leave their email earlier. It's super important to build mailing lists from the very start, so that customers who've already been on the site, especially if we pay for that traffic, leave some trace, and to encourage them to sign up. Today almost 40–50% of our revenue is linked to email: automated emails or simply our mailing list. That's why that's what I'd focus on.

Maciek: Great, really interesting. I'm very curious about the revenue structure by channel, because 40–50% from email and, I suspect, automated sends is a lot. It just shows the power of the tool when it's done well. People often say email marketing is dead, and you're proof that when it's done well, it works. The second thing, again, is the power of the brand versus the marketplace. I think it's an amazing case.

Are marketplaces still an important channel?

Tomek: You know, I was smiling while you, Mateusz, were talking about your experience with Etsy and switching to your own store, because literally a few episodes ago Maciek and I recorded an episode comparing selling on marketplaces with your own e-commerce, and the conclusions we reached were very close to what you're saying. First, relying on an external tool is, after all, a very risky game in many ways. I don't think we even considered a scenario as dramatic as yours, with the shop and the ability to sell shut down completely. We looked more at the fact that you depend on commissions, on how they change and on how high they rank you there. I'm very glad, because it's in line with what we've said so far. One question: after your experience with Etsy, is any marketplace, Etsy or another one like Amazon or eBay, an important channel in your sales today? Do you still distribute your products there?

Mateusz: Sure, they're still sales channels, although how they've changed isn't really down to what we've done. Etsy has become a very minor channel for us. That's mainly because competition from similar products has grown so much there and those categories have expanded so much. It's hard to compete with a flood of cheap products. They're still our sales channels, but we've diversified the ways we reach customers a lot. Amazon is now probably a slightly bigger share of sales than Etsy, but it's more like 10–20% of our sales; most comes from our online store. We worked on changing that split for three years. Even two years ago we generated a lot of orders on Etsy, especially in the holiday season: November, December and the end of the year. People are there, traffic is there, people click on products and look for gifts, so it's hard to give that up, and no entrepreneur wants to. It's also a place where customers can discover the brand and later come to your online store. So it will still be an important channel for us, but not priority number one. Our own store is the priority, and that's where we want to generate most of our sales.

What made Oakywood successful?

Maciek: I'd like to flip Tomek's question about mistakes and lessons a bit. What do you see as the reasons for your success? What did you do well, and what could others learn from you?

Mateusz: Do you mean more in terms of sales?

Maciek: The company's growth in general. Maybe customer service, maybe product quality. What went well?

Mateusz: Quite a few things can be named, but in my opinion one of the key ones was going after foreign customers from the very start. It's especially typical of Polish entrepreneurs that we first want to operate on the local market. Maybe it's because Poland is a very big market and it's relatively easy to sell here. For us, it was the complete opposite. We started selling in the US, so outside Europe, and, seeing our sales on Etsy, we didn't particularly focus on Europe or Poland. That's also because Etsy gets most of its traffic in the US. It was natural for us. When I set up the store, it was also natural for me to choose Shopify, because that's where customers from the US and global customers are. So, above all, going after global customers.

What do customers praise you for?

Tomek: Mateusz, you're a modest person by nature, as we already know, so you're very reluctant to openly brag. So let me help you. What do your customers most often highlight in their reviews of purchases from you?

Mateusz: Sure. Most often two things: product quality and customer service, which we've always tried to keep at the highest level. Speed of response and product quality are probably the things mentioned most often. Speaking of the second thing we did well: our advantage is that from the very start we've made these products ourselves and then sold them, and we oversee the whole process, from making the product to selling it. Product quality is definitely the apple of our eye. It's partly a feature of wooden products that they're hard to present online in a way that shows their natural character. When a customer holds the product and touches the wood grain, it's an amazing, sensory experience. I often say this: we make products from wood, from felt, from natural materials in general. Wood and felt give a really nice haptic experience, and I think the unboxing is also really nice for many customers. Product quality and customer service are our strengths.

Shopify Markets, a 3D configurator and AR

Tomek: That sounds really good, quite honestly, Mateusz. Let's go a step further. We're at the stage where you knew you needed to invest in your own sales channel, in the online store you're developing, which we had the pleasure of building with you, and that makes us very happy. Let's focus a bit on the technology. We repeat it like a mantra: selling in e-commerce isn't just listing a product and setting its price; it's a whole range of activities and processes behind it. In our view, technology should help with that. Certainly not get in the way; it should actually help. What's your experience with technology? You came to us knowing you wanted a store on Shopify. Could you take us behind the scenes a bit: how does the store make your day-to-day work easier, how heavily do you use it, and what role does it play?

Mateusz: As for Shopify itself, a few features are key for us. Definitely Shopify Markets, which makes it easier for us to sell in different markets. Currently the site is translated into four languages. It works in all the currencies Shopify Payments supports, so practically most currencies in the world. Switching between versions of the site is simple and easy to use.

Mateusz: As for technology that lets you present a product well, especially a wooden one, in a virtual world, there have been many changes in recent years, and we used that in our joint project. We created a 3D product configurator where, for example, a desk model can be adjusted to your own needs. I think it's a really nice and interesting experience for many customers that they can see the product almost as it really is before buying it. It's especially important with wooden products, products that are expensive, to see what the final product will be. It will never be one to one. Every wooden product is individual. The wood grain is always different; that's a feature of the carpentry business, so to speak. Being able to present products in a virtual 3D world is something we use. We also have product models in augmented reality that you can view on our site on your phone. You can place a desk in your room and see how it looks there.

Mateusz: I'll be honest: the project, a new version of our website, which sprouted in our heads last year, didn't originally include so many interesting tech solutions. The project grew over time. That's probably how it goes in many projects. But seeing the possibilities, we wanted to improve our customers' experience even more. And this is really interesting: this year, personalized products make up around 30, maybe up to 40% of what we make. Last year we practically didn't do such projects, just individual pieces made to measure for a customer. This technology definitely helps, and I'm really excited about what the future will bring. At the end of the day, it's about reproducing reality as faithfully as possible. Since all of commerce is moving online, it's great that such solutions are being created, and I think they'll help move more and more sales online. Especially in our category, wooden furniture, because it's a fairly traditional business, and I think most furniture sales are still offline and will be for a long time.

Adjustable desks, personalization and IKEA

Maciek: You don't have any physical store, right? You're 100% online.

Mateusz: Yes.

Maciek: I wanted to ask whether you can see in the numbers that the 3D configurator works. But I assume those 30–40% are exactly the products from the configurator. Standing desks.

Mateusz: Yes, exactly. Adjustable desks, desk shelves, desk mats, which we also make to measure, plus two types of desks, so in total we have four configurators on the site. We want to go further and increase personalization options. Maybe we'll soon add personalization of the desktops themselves, because we get a lot of requests for that feature from customers. We want to keep developing and improving the configurator. Recently we've rolled out a few new solutions, including a cable grommet in the desktop. It's 100% customizable: the grommet can be placed anywhere on the desktop. That's a nice feature too, and we definitely want to keep developing the project.

Maciek: I wanted to ask about this particular segment, because standing desks might seem like a fairly crowded market. IKEA has them in its range. I suspect that now, with growing awareness of health and of the effects of a sedentary lifestyle, it's a product riding a wave. How are you handling it? Do you assess how saturated the market is and how it will change over time?

Mateusz: It's hard for me to judge objectively from our point of view, because for us it was a new segment last year, and that channel keeps growing. Month after month we sell more and more adjustable desks. The customizer and personalization are key. In every market segment there's room for niche products that are either personalized or made of solid wood. Those two things set us apart from IKEA: personalizing the product down to the centimeter. You choose any desk size, you can add a grommet and tailor the product to yourself. That's key, and that's why this segment grows month after month for us. We see big potential here and will expand our range of adjustable desks. I think the whole home office segment will keep gaining popularity, even though it peaked during COVID. That was also a period of really big growth for us. The post-COVID effect is still holding. Lots of people still work from home, and in many cases it has stayed that way. We're even approached by designers who design home office spaces exclusively. That has really changed.

Maciek: I think it'll be hard to reverse. Some companies are trying to herd employees back to the office, but I guess we have to wish them luck.

Mateusz: That trend can't be reversed now.

B2B: a program for businesses and wholesale accounts

Maciek: Yes, the trend is rather irreversible. Going back to the sales structure: you say you work with various architects. Do you like B2B, or is it mostly B2C after all?

Mateusz: Mostly B2C. But this year we launched a "for business" program for B2B customers. The B2B channel has always existed for us. We made various personalized projects, for example personalized chargers for events or corporate gifts. But at some point we decided it was worth expanding that offer and using our strengths, that is personalization, which our website makes possible. It's a great tool for creating such projects, so we combined it with a B2B offer. We have wholesale accounts that we can set up for customers on the site. They can order at a discount, personalize projects directly on the site and order with delivery straight to their own client. A new Shopify solution that appeared last year also made this possible. We wanted to run this fairly traditional B2B sales model in a very automated way, and that's how we created a program where B2B customers order products directly on the site at a special price. They get product and material samples from us and a dedicated account manager. We want this channel to grow. It doesn't matter much yet, but this year and last year we noticed a need in the market: interior designers and architects are looking for interesting home office solutions, for spaces at home arranged as an office for remote work. That's why we came out with this program.

Plans: new products and European markets

Maciek: That naturally leads to a slightly broader question. Can you share the company's plans for the next few years? Will you expand the product range, maybe into something completely new? Or focus, as you said, on B2B customers and tailoring the offer to a slightly different customer group, because that's also diversification of your business. Just as different sales channels are diversification, the business customer segment is, let's call it, a completely separate drawer. What ideas do you have for what comes next?

Mateusz: We're definitely focusing on expanding the product range, this year and probably next year. We have new products planned, and in a sense already in design, which we want to launch mainly next year. We're still focused on our niche: the home office, the desk and everything around it. We want to go a bit beyond the desk and offer products that help with remote work, but not only, because they can also be used in offices. But we don't want to lose sight of our focus: the customer who works from home, wants to be surrounded by natural, quality products and feel good at work, because that's really what it's about for us. Diversification: we're also betting on easy communication and easy sales for B2B customers. And we definitely want to push further into foreign markets, especially European ones, because some things changed there last year. We put less emphasis on the US and focused more on European markets, and that's where we'll focus in the near future.

Switzerland: the market that came as a surprise

Maciek: Right, I wanted to ask about markets. Is there a market that surprised you? Like you're number one in Guatemala because people went crazy for Oakywood? Anything like that?

Mateusz: That's interesting, because there is. This year there was a very interesting case that came out of our data analysis. Switzerland became, this year and especially in recent months, probably our fourth-largest market by sales, and until a certain point we hadn't focused on that country at all. Until we noticed it, somewhere around mid-year, in June I think. The analysis showed we had very good sales in Switzerland without investing anything in marketing there.

Maciek: That's interesting, because we have a client who…

Mateusz: We changed that.

Maciek: Sorry for interrupting. We have a client who makes similar things, tables, and his main market is Switzerland.

Mateusz: So maybe the market has a big need…

Maciek: Maybe so.

Mateusz: …for products like these. For us it also coincided with a distributor reaching out to us in the meantime. We started working together, and our sales in Switzerland have grown a lot. It's now almost 10% of our sales. But it was a complete surprise that came from the data, and we changed things a bit: we started marketing there and are growing sales in Switzerland.

Maciek: And with that distributor, do you work in a white-label model, making something under their brand? Or do they rather sell your products?

Mateusz: Yes, distributors sell our products. We don't make products in a white-label model.

Brand values: trees, certified wood and transparent pricing

Maciek: I also wanted to ask, because you mentioned that you make things for people who want to be close to nature. I also saw on your site that you're very conscious about the environment. How important is that in your strategy?

Mateusz: Very important. Many customers notice that the values you can see on our website aren't empty slogans that exist only there. It's the brand's vision and the foundation of how we operate. From the very start, what mattered to us was how products are made: where the raw material comes from, how it's shipped and packed, and our whole environmental impact. From the start we've run a program in which, for every product sold, we plant one tree or, together with foundations, create one square meter of forest. I think customers see that these aren't empty slogans. Every year we have a planting campaign and share materials from it. We even go out into the field ourselves and physically plant the trees, besides funding them, of course. That's one aspect. The second is sourcing raw material: certified wood from verified sources. On top of that there's transparency, which we also show on our site and which we're proud of: we show what makes up the price of a product, what share is production cost, what share is our marketing costs, and how much we earn on it. We want to be transparent. It's at the core of our vision, and it also comes from my beliefs. I want the brand to look and present itself this way.

Mateusz: It's also great that we get a lot of feedback from customers. We have an automated email that's one of our best. I can boast about it: the best marketing flow we've created is a thank-you to customers for their purchase. The email comes straight from my inbox and is written in the first person, from the founder of Oakywood. I get loads of replies from customers who write that they love that we have these values, that it's one of the reasons they buy from us, and they thank us for existing. The messages are often along the lines of: "Thanks for being there. Thanks that I can buy this product from you." There's nothing better than feedback like that.

Maciek: Great, a beautiful story.

Advice for those starting out: just start

Tomek: I can imagine. Listen, we're slowly coming to the end. Usually at this point Maciek and I strain ourselves to come up with a nice summary of the episode, but this time, with you, Mateusz, in the conversation, we have a request instead. Could you share some business advice for people who are thinking about their own e-commerce or already run one, but on a slightly smaller scale? How should they prepare, and what mindset should they have? How should they think about running e-commerce?

Mateusz: Sure. I have one key piece of advice, and it flips what you said a bit: you'll never be prepared, you'll never be 100% ready. Just start. That's probably the best advice I can give, because many people put off a project or venture, thinking they can prepare for it by reading business content, guides and so on. Many people fall into the trap of constantly needing more information, but there's no moment when you'll be 100% ready. You never will be, so start as soon as possible, because the process of building a business will prepare you. Even I don't feel 100% ready today, because as the company grows, new challenges come up that you have to prepare for, and I'll never be 100% ready for those either. Don't put it off. Start as soon as possible and you'll find out what the next step is. You'll develop it, and that's it.

Tomek: That maxim is very close to our hearts, and we often repeat it to our clients: as you say, you'll never be 100% ready, and you won't know until you try. A great thought and great advice. I think we can end today's meeting with that advice. Mateusz, huge thanks for finding the time in your quite busy, though well-organized, business life and for sharing so many valuable remarks and tips for people who will want to follow in your footsteps. For many companies you're a brand they want to model themselves on and whose success they want to repeat. Once again, huge thanks for being here and for your time. And thank you very much for watching this episode. We believe it was as interesting for you as it was for us, and that the information Mateusz shared will be valuable for you. As always, we're counting on your comments, opinions and suggestions for topics you'd like to hear about in future episodes. Thank you very much for today.