Texas Ayumi, who runs a Shopify store, is starting a new series aimed at growing her store, candidly sharing the realities of running a Shopify store solo — sales figures and all.
It's really just Texas Ayumi talking solo, but we're delivering this first installment in a format that makes it feel like an interview!
Dot Miso is currently hosting its largest-ever miso festival pop-up, "Nippon Miso Dochu"!
※ Nippon Miso Dochu runs through Sunday, October 27, 2024
Running Shopify Solo Means Countless Tasks
—Today, I'd like to ask Texas Ayumi, representative of Dot Miso, a miso select shop, all about running Shopify solo!
Texas Ayumi (hereafter Texas) Hello, I'm Texas Ayumi from Dot Miso. I launched my Shopify store in March 2021 as Japan's first shop specializing in miso balls, and after going through a lot of twists and turns, I now run it as a "miso select shop."
—You say you're running "Shopify solo," but are you really doing it all by yourself?
Texas Completely solo. Within Shopify itself, that means site design and the actual build, adding products, creating banners, email newsletters and campaigns like discounts, selecting and setting up apps, order processing... and now I'm even doing all the packing and shipping myself.
On the business side, that's customer support, inventory management, ordering, developing new products, day-to-day operations and cultivating business partners, networking, general affairs and accounting odd jobs... I do it all myself.
—That's an incredibly wide range of work.
Texas Of course, I do outsource some things — running Shopify operations on a contract basis, or asking someone to handle marketing or design project by project — so it's not entirely solo. Back when I was running the miso-ball business, I had several part-timers helping with manufacturing, shipping, and sales.
I feel like I'm pouring every hour I have into all these various tasks, but in terms of the sales numbers, honestly, there's still so much more I need to do.
The Real Talk: I'd Honestly Love to Have Staff
—Is there a reason you're doing this solo?
Texas No, honestly, I'd hire staff if I could! But at our current scale, hiring someone stably is tough. To be honest, I'm barely managing to keep the company and myself afloat.
That said, I'm not just putting on a brave face — I still genuinely think I can pull this off solo, at least until I hit my next target.
—What's your target revenue?
Texas My near-term target is 4 million yen in monthly sales.
Right now? I'd be jumping for joy if we hit 1 million. To be really honest with you, there are months where our Shopify sales are a single-digit number of ten-thousand yen.
—Single digits sounds rough! Wouldn't it be better to just quit and get a regular job?
Texas Honestly, in months like that, I barely feel alive. My personal life falls apart completely too (laughs).
Right now, our sales focus has been shifting toward department store events, pop-ups, and wholesale. When I'm focused on offline, online sales just don't happen at all — I don't have the bandwidth to run any online initiatives.
Making sure we get steady sales online as well, all the time, is my current goal for running Shopify.
—This is the third year since you opened the store.
Texas By year three, I thought we'd be a company with employees, launching new ventures left and right (staring into the distance).
I started the company with a bank loan, and under the original business plan, I could only get financing for about six months' worth of cash. I was planning to turn a profit within about three months, so I figured that was plenty and had zero worries at the time. Reality wasn't nearly that kind, though.
We're now in our fourth year since founding, our second fiscal period since incorporating, and we're still somehow alive.
The Reason I Chose Shopify: "Someone Recommended It"
—Why did you choose Shopify? Did you compare it with other platforms?
Texas Not at all — my total research into Shopify beforehand was about 10 minutes. What I looked at in advance was basically just the monthly running costs and a quick glance at the admin dashboard.
When I was about to launch my own e-commerce store, someone I trust was actually running their business on Shopify and recommended it to me. That was it — I decided on the spot.
—That's incredibly casual, and based entirely on someone else's word!
Texas I've never once regretted choosing Shopify! Though, granted, I don't really have anything to compare it to.
Major e-commerce malls, ASP-type malls, or Shopify versus Color Me Shop — I did properly think through what strategy I'd use to sell. But it was information from a source I trusted, and honestly, even if you spend ages picking a platform, you never really know which one is best anyway.
—Was there anything else you paid attention to when choosing a platform?
Texas Whether there are knowledgeable people nearby for whichever platform you choose, whether there's official support, whether the community is thriving — that matters more, I think.
With Shopify, I saw people on X actively running hypothesis-testing experiments, and it felt exciting. It seemed like I could easily get the latest information, ask all kinds of questions, and that it had real future potential.
Shopify's thriving community site
Running a Shopify Store Is Anything But Straightforward
—Shopify is marketed as easy to set up a store with — how was it in reality?
Texas It was a huge struggle! It's not easy at all!
Sure, opening a bare-minimum store where you can sell something is easy, and pretty much anyone can do that. Even the initial setup requires some baseline knowledge and steps, though.
I'd worked in e-commerce at my previous job, so I had a decent foundation of knowledge, and I could whip up banners and images pretty quickly with Illustrator or Canva. But even if you say you're "just using a design template," this is actually what you start with!
You have to prepare your own images and fit them in yourself, and even if you ask someone else to build it for you, you need a clear image and vision of what kind of store you want.
Shopify is easy, but it's not something you can take lightly.
—Right, that's a bit different from the "anyone can do it easily" image.
Texas Well, sure — if you're determined enough to spend the fixed cost and actually run an e-commerce business on Shopify, you can find most of the information you need just by researching, and you can do most of it solo even if you're not a specialist.
But when you see a really great site built on Shopify, don't assume "this must all be no-code, Shopify is amazing!" Plenty of great Shopify sites also involve people tinkering with the code.
"Copying" Is the Secret to Running Shopify Solo
—What's the first thing you should do when running Shopify solo?
Texas With solo Shopify, there's just so much to do and never enough time. So first, it's about having a clear image of "this is the kind of store I want."
Find a Shopify-built site that's close to the image you want. I use a Chrome extension called Wappalyzer to research this. There are also ways to find out which theme a given Shopify store is using, by the way.
And it's not just about design — the same goes for marketing tactics. Thoroughly copy the people who are succeeding. I think that's essential when you're running Shopify solo, with limited time and effort.
—Thoroughly copying. Once you decide to do that, it must cut down on the times you get stuck agonizing over which tactic to try!
Texas Actually, I'm not that great at it, though. I'm better at running with ideas I've come up with myself. I wouldn't call it fully original, but it's more like nurturing ideas that didn't come from reference material. So I think that can be a strength in terms of differentiation.
But that also means it's a tactic where you have no idea if it'll actually get results. All I can do is test it myself, spending my own cost and time. It's a constant uphill battle, honestly.
—The more I hear, the more solo Shopify sounds like an absolute grind.
Texas That said, just running and maintaining a store, and handling shipping — that kind of thing is plenty manageable solo. Beyond that, it depends on how much marketing you want to do, how far you want to push it, and how involved you personally want to be — that's what determines how many staff you actually need.
Of course, I do think it's best to leave the things you're not good at to people who are good at them.
And another important thing for solo Shopify is deciding what not to do.
Instead of Deciding What Not to Do, I "Do Everything"
—"Deciding what not to do" — I hear that a lot!
Texas Plenty of successful business owners say that deciding what not to do is important, but honestly, isn't that incredibly hard? The moment you decide not to do something, doesn't it just nag at you even more (laughs)?
So in my case, I just do it. I do everything. And then I sort things out afterward. Even I'll admit that's a clumsy approach that just makes things harder for myself, but I think it's actually the fastest path for me.
What matters is quick execution, and the judgment to know when to cut your losses.
—If you say you'll "do everything," can you actually follow through on all of it?
Texas When it comes to tactics, yes, I do them all! But I have decided on things I won't handle as day-to-day operations. I'm currently in talks to outsource shipping and delivery. Honestly, I do want to keep control over the packing and the whole gifting experience, and I believe that ties directly to sales. But right now, it's just not my top priority. I want to keep making those trade-off decisions calmly.
—What's the biggest challenge you're facing right now with solo Shopify?
Texas Of course, it's that things just aren't selling (laughs).
I still don't have a clear picture of why it's not selling. There could be all kinds of reasons. If anything, I think there are too many possible factors, so my efforts end up spread thin and half-baked across all of them.
But I think it all comes down to marketing first, before things like store functionality or design improvements. Of course, I'd love to improve the design and branding too. That would be great if I had plenty of cash, more hands on deck, or exceptional creative sense.
If that's not the case, the thing I have the most control over — the thing that can save me — is marketing.
—Straight up, can a Shopify store succeed even when run solo?
Texas I want to believe so. Actually, I'm going to go out and prove it from here. Everyone, please keep watching! Let's all do our best at solo Shopify together!
This Shopify series, "Texas Ayumi's Solo Shopify: Seven Falls, Eight Rises," runs once a month. Look forward to the next installment!
