Intrastores, with its collection of 57 specialty online retail outlets, has quickly become one of the fastest-growing online retailers in Europe with a satisfied customer base of over 50,000. As the company has grown, its in-house technical expertise has also developed. This has allowed Intrastores to switch from local managed hosting parties to, Leaseweb, and realize monthly savings of 30-40% on hosting costs.
The organization
Intrastores is a Netherlands-based online retailer that has been serving customers since 2007. Toine Bastiaans and Tim Oosterbaan, the company founders, quickly recognized the opportunity to expand their specialty online stores offering following success with their original site, ‘towbarstore.com’. Being able to offer an unparalleled selection within individual product categories has proven very successful and Intrastores now has 57 niche online outlets, with a stronghold in automotive parts and garden and home products; some of the fastest growing segments in e-commerce.
Intrastores received the 2012 Thuiswinkel Cross-Border E-Commerce Award, an accolade that rewards only the very best online retailers in the Netherlands, and has experienced year-on-year double-digit growth throughout its history. With its continued expansion across Europe, marked by a nomination for the 2012 European E-commerce Awards in Barcelona, the need for reliable, scalable hosting is vital.
The Challenge
As Intrastores’ in-house expertise grew with the company, it became more financially viable to manage servers themselves and cut the costs of using a managed hosting party.
To make the transition, the company required an expert partner, who would work closely with them to understand the exact details of Intrastores’ operations and suggest a custom solution to ensure each online store’s infrastructure remained stable and secure, while also being scalable and cost efficient. Intrastores also needed to be sure that its chosen partner had the appropriate resources to fix problems as soon as they arise, so that business would never be compromised.
Finally, the transition to the new provider needed to be smooth. As is the case with any competitive online business, if any of the webshops suffered, even if only temporarily, potential customers would inevitably go elsewhere.
The Solution
Leaseweb provided servers, advice and 24/7 support to give Intrastores a reliable and scalable platform from which to expand. Leaseweb’s global infrastructure gives Intrastores secure networking to its global customers from across its European offices.
A deep understanding of the e-commerce market, and getting close to the customer’s exact requirements, allowed Intrastores to smoothly transition from local managed hosting parties to leading quality hosting provider Leaseweb, and realize dramatic cost savings.
“This high level of expertise was imperative as we made the cost-effective transition from local managed hosting parties to Leaseweb and our own in-house experts” said Tim Oosterbaan, co-founder of Intrastores. “Leaseweb’s support department never closes and engineers are always ready to solve any hardware or network issue. Due to the nature of our business, this is obviously crucial as any downtime would have serious consequences.
“Intrastores is seeing incredible growth and with Leaseweb we actually have overcapacity – something we feel much more comfortable with than suddenly needing to scale-up. Although we are able to anticipate spikes in site activity, with Leaseweb we can be confident that we’re covered, and that our stores will not suffer due to insufficient capacity,” continued Oosterbaan.
Results
Intrastores has achieved monthly savings of 30-40% on hosting expenditure, while continuing to expand throughout Europe. Cost efficiencies were realized through timely provisioning, outsourced support and advantageous rates on networking and servers.
Intrastores continues to experience rapid growth and tightly manages capacity through a highly advanced and global infrastructure from Leaseweb at very competitive prices. Leaseweb’s understanding of the e-commerce market means that there is never a scramble to up-scale during busy periods.
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