Scaling an eCommerce brand isn’t just about ads, creatives, or new channels.

Often, the biggest growth unlock comes from how you treat customers after the purchase.

In this episode of eCommerce Evolution, Brett sits down with Kristin Keys, VP of Customer Experience at Baseball Lifestyle 101, to break down how CX can become a true growth engine.

From empowering support teams to turning angry customers into loyal advocates, Kristin shares how great customer experience drives retention, increases LTV, and fuels word-of-mouth growth.

If you’re struggling with churn, negative reviews, or rising CAC, this episode is packed with actionable insights to help you turn CX into a competitive advantage.

—

Sponsored by OMG Commerce - go to (https://www.omgcommerce.com/contact) and request your FREE strategy session today!

—

Chapters:

(00:00) Introduction: CX as a Growth Engine with Kristin Keys

(03:12) Why Good CX Drives Retention, LTV & Word of Mouth

(07:00) The Baseball Lifestyle 101 Origin Story

(14:02) Reducing Refunds, Chargebacks & Negative Reviews

(20:04) Empowering Your Team to Resolve Issues on the Spot

(24:10) Going Above & Beyond: Community Stories & Surprise Moments

(30:51) Key Metrics: Return Rate, Repeat Purchases & Sales from Support

(36:50) Biggest CX Mistakes D2C Brands Make

(41:46) Parting Advice: Build a CX Team That Loves Your Brand

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Connect With Brett:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thebrettcurry/
• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@omgcommerce
• Website: https://www.omgcommerce.com/
• Request a Free Strategy Session: https://www.omgcommerce.com/contact

Relevant Links:

• Kristin’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristinkeyes23

Past guests on eCommerce Evolution include Ezra Firestone, Steve Chou, Drew Sanocki, Jacques Spitzer, Jeremy Horowitz, Ryan Moran, Sean Frank, Andrew Youderian, Ryan McKenzie, Joseph Wilkins, Cody Wittick, Miki Agrawal, Justin Brooke, Nish Samantray, Kurt Elster, John Parkes, Chris Mercer, Rabah Rahil, Bear Handlon, JC Hite, Frederick Vallaeys, Preston Rutherford, Anthony Mink, Bill D’Allessandro, Stephane Colleu, Jeff Oxford, Bryan Porter and more

If you do a good job at giving

them accurate expectations,

this is what you should expect

from top to bottom at every level,

then they're not going to be

disappointed when it happens.

Well, hello and welcome to another edition

of the eCommerce Evolution Podcast.

I'm your host, Brett

Curry, CEO of OMG Commerce.

And today we are talking about a topic

we have never dived into on this podcast

before. We're talking about

CX, customer experience,

customer service as a growth engine. Yes,

I love talking about new ad angles and

new ad types and open up new channels

like YouTube and distribution like

retail stores and all of those things.

But I am here to tell you

that the right customer

service experience can mean

so much to your marketing and

growth and retention

efforts. And conversely,

a bad experience there can undermine

what you're trying to do through the rest

of your marketing. And so today I

am delighted to welcome to the show

Kristin Keys.

She's the VP of customer experience

at Baseball Lifestyle 101.

Baseball Lifestyle is a client of OMG

Commerce. We hope on the YouTube and the

Amazon side. And it's been so fun getting

to know them and see what they do.

And I truly believe they're one of a

kind. Just the way they build community,

the way they've created an amazing

fan base all across the country.

I live in the center of the Midwest. I

go to the store. I go to a soccer game.

I see kids wearing baseball

lifestyle gear all the time.

What they've built is truly amazing.

a couple million in sales to this past

year surpassing 150 million in sales and

growing.

And now they're in Dick's Sporting

Goods and Academy Sports and a number of

others. Check out the full podcast

on the operators podcast, Bill Rum.

And Josh Shapiro laid out the full story

on that pod where we're going to go

deep on customer experience right here.

And so with that,

Kristin, welcome to the

show. And how's it going?

It's great. I'm excited to be here.

I'm very honored that you would consider

this an important topic and I'm happy

to get this information

out there for everybody.

Absolutely. So we got to hang out

in Miami just a few weeks ago.

We were both presenting at the D2C

Growth Summit. Shout out Johnny,

Hickey and Michael Alt. But as you

laid out this topic, I'm like, man,

this is so good.

This needs to be shared to a broader

audience because I think a lot of people

just view customer experience and

customer service as an expense.

It's just an expense line item and

you don't handle it properly. It is.

But if you handle it properly,

it can be a growth engine.

And I want to unpack how you

guys look at that right now.

And so I guess maybe kind of

from a high level bullet point

style here, Kristin,

how can customer experience

be a growth engine

for a D2C business?

Sure. I mean, so this is

obviously something that is

very I'm passionate about.

I think that a lot of companies just,

like you said, look at it as a cost.

It's something that's there to

fix problems, to fix issues,

to just respond when a customer

reaches out. And by being proactive,

by being above and beyond what

somebody is expecting by really

giving them the time and the effort on

your end to not treat them just like a

problem, to treat them like somebody

who is invested in your business,

that you're invested in them.

Showing them that you're invested in

them is going to make that connection and

that loyalty for that customer just

deepen. And you can take any situation,

this is something that we

talk about all the time.

There's customers that

come that are so mad.

And when you're dealing

with that customer,

one of two things can happen. They're

going to stay mad because you're not

fixing that issue for them and they're

never going to purchase from you again.

And likely they're going to tell a

million people about their experience,

how bad it was. Or you're going to get

on their level, be direct with them,

identify their issue, fix it, and then

give them a reason to keep coming back.

And when you do that, you turn all of

that, what could wind up being churn,

what could wind up being

negative publicity for your

company or your business,

you're turning that

person into an ambassador,

somebody who's going to go and tell

other people, yes, they made a mistake,

but they fixed it. We live in

a world right now, I think,

where everybody has so many

more choices than they used to.

There's so much information out there.

And one of the big things I think is

that setting yourself apart from another

company no longer is just a

product quality. That's not enough.

You have to have the whole package.

You have to, from top to bottom,

give them a great experience and be there

for anything that they need. I mean,

in 2026,

I think just with the ability to

connect on such a quick level,

you have to basically be just a

concierge service. It's not just a, "Hey,

I have this issue." It's

fully comprehensive. I mean,

so we make ourselves available on multiple

platforms and not just as a reactive

service, we're proactive.

We have a Facebook group that has

over 10,000 members in it now.

And we post in that Facebook group

daily and answer outside of our

customer service hours. I mean,

that's something that I'm on my couch at

night and I'm watching TV and I'm in my

Facebook group and I'm

responding to people.

And not because my job tells me I

have to, but because I'm invested,

I want to make sure that we are delivering

that top-notch service so that our

customers do feel like we care about

them because we do. It's not just lip

service. I don't hang up my hat at

five o'clock and say, "I'm done.

This is an all the time thing." And I

think you mentioned that you're in the

Midwest and you see people out

in public wearing our gear.

And for all of our employees,

when we see people,

we call it baseball lifestyle in

the wild. And when we see people,

we get so visibly excited, we

talk to them, we pick their brain.

And that is a genuine

desire from us to let our

customers know that they're important

to us, that they're not just customers,

that they're part of our community.

And I think that's where baseball

lifestyle really sets themselves.

Apart. It's so good. It's so good.

And I want to talk a little bit about

the community aspect and also hear from

your perspective a little bit

of the baseball lifestyle story,

but just to frame things and

talk about where we're headed,

GoodCX drives retention,

drives LTV, right?

It drives word of mouth, it drives brand

forgiveness and operational clarity.

We're going to dive into all of those.

Those are points directly

from your talk in Miami.

And I'm just so excited to dive into that

a little bit, but back up just a bit.

And for those that don't know,

I gave a few highlights of the numbers

and we talked about the gear in the wild

with baseball lifestyle,

but how was BL 101 built

and how did we get to

where we are today?

So one of the biggest things I think that

sets Baseball Lifestyle apart is that

they built a community before

they ever asked for a sale.

And this is something that we talk about

often when we speak about the brand.

And it's something that started

as a 13-year-old boy posting,

looking just for an outlet to share

everything baseball because he himself was

passionate about baseball. And

he wound up connecting with- And.

That's co-founder Josh Shapiro, right?

Yes. A 13-year-old boy posted

every hour on the hour. I mean,

he is one of the most driven and

meticulous people that I've ever had the

opportunity to meet or lucky

enough to be working with.

And I think that him and

his co-founder, Bill Roman,

I was about to talk about

how they got connected,

but they really are two of the most

genuine people that you've ever met. 100%.

Extremely intelligent, extremely good

business sense. And just how I say,

as a company, we care about our

customers, as founders, as CEOs,

as C-suite,

they care about their employees and they

don't just expect their employees to do

a good job. They want to make sure that

their employees are happy doing that.

And that's one of the things I think

is one of the biggest takeaways.

So real quick, just I started

with Baseball Live Sell

I was within the first

10 people who were hired,

I think it was probably around seven.

At that time, we were very, very small.

We had one customer service worker. It

was me. We had one distribution center.

We were not in wholesale, we were

not doing any retail. We were doing,

like you said, just about $2 million

in e-com. Four years later, I mean,

the growth has been just exponential.

We have over 300 employees,

and now I manage a team of about 20.

We're working with three and

a half distribution centers.

We're opening in retail

locations across the company,

and our wholesale and e-commerce are

kind of really just exploding from where

they were.

And so I was brought on in 2021 as a

part-time customer service agent at that

time. I think our plan was

under 360 tickets a month.

And now we close probably about

13 to 15,000 on a normal month and

over that on a busy month. So obviously,

I mean, the growth is just crazy.

But within that time, I think the

company has really never lost that,

what you would call a small town feel.

Josh and Bill are in the office every

single day. They are walking the halls,

talking to people.

They're not CEOs that sit in their

office with the door closed where

we talk to everybody and two times a

week we have full company meetings and

people are encouraged to talk.

It's not like everybody is muted and

they can't share what they have to say.

They want to hear from

all of their employees.

They want to know

everything that's going on.

Our Friday call starts with shout-outs

and you can't shout out anybody in your

own department.

So it just really encourages that

cross-departmental recognition,

but also just reminds everybody

just how important everybody is.

People who you don't normally work with,

when you get the opportunity to do that,

Everybody at our company is amazing.

And I know that sounds so silly to say,

but everybody is just so invested and

it starts at the top with Bill and

Josh. And the example that they set

and the way that they carry themselves,

it just really carries down to the

newest employee that we've hired.

They make that effort to meet them,

to know them, to involve them. I mean,

the company as a whole,

I think just really does a good job of

making everybody passionate about what

they do. And that shows top to bottom

in all of our work performance, I think.

Yeah. It's so good.

And I've gotten to interact with some of

the marketing team and the retail team

and the team that's kind of

assigned to the Amazon initiative.

And then of course,

getting to hang out with Bill and

100% agree with what you just said.

And what's so cool is if you

want to turn customer experience,

customer service into a growth engine,

you can't just flip a switch or

you can't just send an email to

your team and say, "Do this, do

this better." We're doing this now.

It does start with culture. And the

more you take care of your team,

the more they will take care of the

customer. I know BL 101 believes that,

you believe that, Bill and Josh

believe that and it's happening.

And so that is a great setup.

You've got to have that in

place first. Happy customers,

happy employees who are

equipped with the right tools,

with the right information, with

freedom to kind of make things right,

they won't make for happy customers. And

so you guys are doing a great job there

for sure. So awesome. Any other

highlights on the BL101 story? Otherwise,

we'll dive right into customer experience.

I mean, it's kind of all a

highlight, Brett. I mean,

it's really like we talk about living

a baseball lifestyle and for most

of the employees, they mean that.

I would say probably 80% of

our employees played baseball

or are avid baseball fans. So there's

really no better place to work.

I mean, it's kind of like a dream. I

mean, we're working with influencers,

they work with pro athletes,

they work with all of these people and

they're doing events that revolve around

baseball. I mean, opening day of

MLB is an actual company holiday.

I mean, they don't play. I mean,

they are invested in this sport,

in this community and in this company

ultimately. I mean, unequivocally,

there is not a day when

they don't actually do what

they say and say what they

do. And that's so important, I think,

to really just not waiver and just be the

same person that you are when you were

in 2021 and you were small to now that

everybody to talk to you.

Yeah. Everybody's talking about.

You now. All over the D2C community,

everybody's talking about

baseball lifestyle for sure.

We're so thankful to be

a part of this. I mean,

sometimes we just look back and

we laugh and we're just like,

"This is a crazy world we're living.

Did that just happen?" And it's

really just exciting and fun.

And I think everybody that works for

the company is just so invested and it

shows really that's what it is.

Love it, love it. And there's this

concept that I heard years and years ago.

It was one of my favorites in all

of business, ties to marketing,

ties to culture. But really yet

two sides of any business, right?

There's the inside reality,

what actually happens inside

the four walls of a company

that's virtual and could be

global and all that stuff.

But what happens in the company,

and there's the outside perception,

that's branding, that's

your marketing messages,

that's what the marketplace believes

about you and what the narrative is about

your company.

But I've always believed that eventually

that inside reality will influence

the outside perception. Eventually,

that's going to come out good or bad.

And so you guys have built a culture

and a setup that's just truly remarkable

and it's showing in the

results. I think so too.

Let's dive in a little bit to

what are some of the things you do

differently from a customer service

point of view? And I think maybe

a place to start, and happy for you

to reframe this if you'd rather,

but good CX,

it reduces bad things like refunds and

chargebacks and negative reviews and

social escalation and stuff ended up

in Bill or Josh's inbox as founders.

What are some things you do differently

that kind of reduces the negative

side of customer experience

if it's not handled properly?

Well, I mean,

kind of just going back to just talking

about how invested the employees are

at this company and starting

with myself, and that's been ...

I don't just consider it a job. I'm

very passionate about what I do.

So it's never like a, oh, that's

outside the scope or I'm off ... I mean,

I'm online on weekends,

I'm online on nights,

I'm doing stuff outside of what would be

considered my normal scope. And again,

this is not because anybody's

asking me to do this,

it's because I take pride

in what I do. I mean,

I get that feedback and a lot

of it I take very personally,

as an executive at this company,

I know that that perception

lives and dies on my shoulders.

So I don't ever want anything to

come across Josh or Bill's desk.

I don't want negative reviews to be

out there. I don't want any public

perception to be, "Well, they

dropped the ball on this.

" I take all of those failures personally.

So I'm never going to ignore them.

We don't hide comments and

don't address them anytime

I see.

Anything. And just a quick note, Kristin,

for all the D2C founders

listening out there,

if you're creating a job description or

you're looking to hire a VP of customer

experience, take that little

snippet of what Kristin just said,

plug that into AI, get

that working as like,

"This is who we're looking

for. " Anyway, continue.

No, I mean, just to

touch on that, I agree.

And that was something

that I said in Miami,

you have to find the

right person for any job.

One of the big things right now is right

seat, right position or right person.

And it's true. And I think

looking at customer service,

a lot of times we just

consider it a reactive,

like they're there just to

receive your complaints.

And if you treat it as an actual skill,

somebody who is going to be passionate

about making sure your customers are

happy,

you really are going to wind up with a

lot better customer service perception of

how your company is running. So I mean,

I think it really starts with

not ignoring anything that's ever

happening and always trying to improve.

So we have our frequently

asked questions on our website.

Anytime anything is kind of like a gray

area and we get a question about it,

I'm immediately reaching out, working

on that with our team to edit that,

to get that updated,

to make it more clear. We don't want

it to be a fine print type of company.

We want everything out there because I

think the biggest way that people can

fail our customers is just not

meeting their expectations.

So if you do a good job at giving

them accurate expectations,

this is what you should expect

from top to bottom at every level,

then they're not going to be

disappointed when it happens.

I think that's really where people

lose their faith is when they

think that something is going

to go one way and it doesn't.

And then when they reach out, they're

met with just these stringent, too bad,

so sad kind of mentalities. So of course,

we have posted policies and we

uphold those posted policies,

but I think allowing for there to be

real human interactions, connections,

mistakes that customers can make,

because very often it is on the customer.

They're not always right.

They did not do or expect

what we told them to expect.

And they should not necessarily

be punished because of

that. And as a company,

I think a lot of

people operate under the assumption that

it's black and white and it can't be

with customer service if you want to

have that retention, that loyalty,

that deepening of that brand, it's a

relationship just like everything else.

And everybody on both sides,

if we want them to forgive

us when we make a mistake,

if we send you the wrong

item or we do something,

we're outside of our standard estimated

shipping time or whatever it is,

if we want the customer to forgive us,

then we have to forgive them

when they make a mistake.

So if they order the wrong size

or they order the wrong item,

but it's outside of the 30 days,

there's no harm to allow anything

outside of those guidelines. So we try to

really just look at

every situation as, "Hey,

was this an honest mistake? How

can we meet them halfway on this?

How can we take care of them and how can

we ensure that they're satisfied with

that resolution?" And I think

top to bottom, we really do that.

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back to the show.

One of the other things I think that's

important or at least is working very

well for us is I talk with a

lot of other customer experience

employees and they treat their

intake kind of on a tiered

basis.

And I'm going to escalate this to my

supervisor or I'm going to bubble this up

to whoever. And we don't really

do that at Baseball Lifestyle.

All of my team is trained and

knowledgeable and empowered to fix

any situation, borrowing

anything crazy themselves.

Nobody has to wait for approval

from me to offer a gift card.

Nobody has to wait for approval from

anybody to refund shipping to do whatever

it is to make that customer.

Happy. Trained, informed,

and empowered. I love that.

And so basically you were

saying a ticket comes to a CX

associate or whatever you call them,

they should have the knowledge,

understanding, and the authority to

make something right right there.

All of them. All of

them. And really, again,

talking about employee experience

and how you value them,

how you make them feel. And

that's how I make my team feel.

That's how the company makes me feel.

That's how our C-suite makes me feel.

I feel empowered. I feel important.

I feel like the things that

I say make a difference.

And why would I not pass that on

to the people on my team and say,

"I'm no better than you.

You know how to handle this.

You know the correct SOPs for what

we expect." We talk about that.

It's a constant dialogue.

Like I was saying,

to improve the customer experience,

I'm in real time, I'm editing FAQs,

I'm making things more clear. I

do the same thing with my team.

So as anything comes up

where they're like, "Hey,

I'm not really sure how to handle this

or whatever." I'm explaining that to

everybody and I'm talking about just

the company's per opinion on how we

should handle things like

that, what our core values are,

how we want that customer to feel.

And so they know that and they're going to

deliver that stellar customer service

without having to jump through hoops

and make that customer think like, "Ugh,

I'm going to have to wait and

see if they say yes or no." No,

it's going to be a decision

for you right there.

You're not going to have to

wait and nine times out of 10,

maybe 10 times out of 10,

we're making sure that that customer is

happy before they walk away.That's kind

of just our unequivocal goal.

And that's so powerful because we can

all think of times when we reach out to

customer support, which

none of us want to do.

None of us want to make that call or

send that email to customer support,

but we can all think of times when we

were extremely pissed about something.

But then customer service makes

it right and all of a sudden

a switch is flipped and we

are now an advocate for that.

Branch. Within my team, that's

the ones that I say like,

"Don't bubble it up if you're not sure

or whatever." Bubble it up if they're

angry. I want the angry ones

because to me it's like a challenge.

Can I make them happy? I mean,

it's really fulfilling and rewarding

because literally I know that

I am saving that customer

for our company and for me,

that's the utmost importance.

Me making a difference.

And it's like meaningful LTV, right?

You're doing drops once a week,

you're always launching new products.

People buy your products religiously.

And so to lose a customer, that's a big

deal. You want to save each one of them.

Absolutely. I mean, and genuinely,

I mean, it's something ...

This is my career. This is something

that I'm very passionate about.

Like I said, I kind of run it as

if I would if I was owning it.

So I don't want that negative

connotation out there.

I don't want people unhappy. I don't want

that to be something that people say.

I want when people talk about the

company for it to be their amazing,

their clothes are amazing, their

customer service is amazing,

their content is amazing. All of us

really just want everybody. We care.

I think that's the biggest difference.

And we take that care right

down to the very bottom,

the smallest issues and

the biggest. I mean,

everything is important to us if it's

important to you. So I think that's.

Something- Any favorite BL 101

stories of how you made something

right for a customer and what

that did for you and/or for them.

And I know some of those

you maybe can't share,

but any favorites that you can share?

I mean, not even necessarily

something that was wrong.

We get messages all the time,

and a lot of times it's just

kind of sent out to everybody,

sponsorships or donations. And

something that really touched all of us,

I think was a few months ago we got

this message and it was somebody who was

talking about the socks that

we had. And his parents,

they were in a car accident

with a cement mixer.

They're like a hot asphalt mixer.

And the socks protected the sun's

feet from getting burned. I mean,

his legs were- Crazy.

It was an insane story.

And we shared this with

our team and I mean,

we went over and above to just

reach out to him to talk about this,

to send him some stuff

in the hospital. I mean,

so it's not just the

problems that people have,

it's everything as a whole.

When we see something,

we don't just auto delete it or

macro it out. We read everything.

Another thing, just again, this

isn't necessarily what you asked for,

but somebody on our team,

we kind of just send everything

to her that we get like this.

We'll get messages from people who

are like, "My son loves your company.

He has designs.

He has ideas that he wants to send you

and they'll send us pictures of new

products and they're crayon and they're

marker and they're whatever." I love

that.

He reaches out to our creative director

and he will write them back personal

notes to just kind of tell him, "Stay

with it, keep on it, follow your dreams.

This is really awesome." So I think just

not necessarily anything about making

an issue because I mean,

we will always do that,

but it's the above and beyond.

If we mess up, we will always fix it.

And that's kind of where we live and

die and we talk in our Facebook group

and we'll always say,

"We will make mistakes.

There's never going to be a world

where we're not making mistakes,

but we will always fix them.".

We're never going to get

those mistakes to zero, just.

Not.

Going.

To happen. You can't, you can't.

We.

Will send you the wrong size. We will

make an error, but we will never not care.

It will never be a, "Well,

you're just stuck with it now.

We will always work with you. " So

there's not ever a doubt in my mind,

so there's nothing in

particular to share about that,

but it's those above and beyond,

I think that really sets us apart.

Making fans for life. And again,

that only happens if you care

about community externally,

but also that you built it and built the

right team internally, which is great.

So I love that, I think the team

has to be trained, equipped,

empowered to make decisions,

to make things right.

You want to prevent things from escalating

to the owners just because you want

to handle that. You want

your team to handle that.

100%.

But there's a lot of information that

comes in. A lot of insights that come in,

there's the touching stories and stuff

that you definitely want to share,

but you don't want CX to be an island

where nothing gets outside of that

group. You want to share insights, right?

Share insights are going to help

operations and inform marketing and inform

the social team for community

building and things like that.

So how do you guys do it? How

do you recommend that you do it?

Take good information from CX and inform

the rest of the company so that they

can improve based on that information.

Sure.

So we recently started distributing

and compiling a voice of the customer

report and it's done monthly and it's

going to just touch on all those high

points.

So everything kind of that lives in

my bubble is going to be reported on,

and that's going to be.

A reason to the customer report.

I love that. I love that.

So it's going to be some insights

from obviously our actual ticketing,

our phone calls. We also

do live chat on the site,

but it's also going to include

stuff from our Facebook group,

returns and exchange data that we're

pulling and just trends that we're getting

from that.

So there's a lot of different areas that

we're able to pull information from.

In reality,

like we've said that we were so

small for so long that we use Slack.

When I see any kind of product

feedback, I'm immediately Slacking.

I'm not waiting for

that report to come out.

I'm letting product

development know, "Hey,

we're going to teach the

team immediately." Exactly.

The fabric is itchy or the ankles

are too tight or whatever it is.

I'm giving that information in real

time. Same thing with marketing,

because they'll run promotions

all the time. And really,

at this point we've asked

and they've responded,

they send us over what they're going to

be sending out so that we can kind of

scan it for any loopholes that a

customer is going to say, "Oh, well,

you didn't say it was only on Sunday."

So they let us know like, "Hey,

this is what we're going to be running.

Do you have any feedback for us?" So we

really all just work back

and forth together sharing

information to ensure that

there's no lapse for that customer

because ultimately that's the goal.

Marketing doesn't want

there to be any ambiguity.

They want the customer to get exactly

what they're telling them they're getting.

And as CX, because we see all of the

feedback, I know what to look for.

And so we want to say like, "Oh, make

sure that you put that that's online only.

Make sure that you put that that is 48

hours, we get the start date so we know.

" So sharing information

cross-departmentally is the only way

that you can really have a great

customer experience. And it starts again,

like we said,

just with them valuing the information

that you're giving them and actually

making changes and taking it

into account with ops like, "Hey,

people are saying when you send the

hats in this, they're getting smushed,

so they get sent in better packaging

now." So anything that we hear,

we're immediately just sharing that

information so that on all levels we can

improve for the customer.

Yeah. And just one of the pieces

that's missing in a D2C Or

omnichannel company where if you guys

were a small retail store only and

you could see every customer and see

how they're interacting with the product

and hear their feedback, that's one thing.

But now you've got giant departments

that never see or hear from the customer.

And so you guys are that portal. You

are the connection to the customer,

the voice of the customer.

That information is absolutely

precious and it's got to be shared.

And so I know you guys are

doing a great job of that.

And so can you talk about

any numbers where like, hey,

as we've been focusing

on these initiatives,

we've seen return rate

drop or we've seen other

numbers improve.

Paint a little bit of a picture

for us of when we get this right,

when we invest in it like you guys are,

what could that mean for our business?

Sure. And so for 2025,

I think our return customer rate was

43% and we're not satisfied with that.

We want it higher. I mean,

we wanted to double that.

So that's our goal all the time is why

would we not want that customer to keep

coming back? Like we've said,

LTV is going to be such a driver

for sales, for revenue, for growth.

So making sure that those

customers are coming back,

taking away any roadblocks that

would prevent them from coming back,

making sure that their experience is

perfect so that they are coming back.

And really just taking

care of the customer and

making sure that there's no roadblocks

for them to do what they need to do.

We talked about return rates. Right

now we have a 4% return rate in theory.

And of that 4%,

we retain about 60% of that

overall return rate. So

of the 4% that is getting return, 60%

of that, we're keeping that in- house,

whether that's in direct

exchange or a store credit.

And that's not by accident, that's

from us. Again, on every level,

ensuring we have great products,

ensuring that they're not getting them

and saying like, "Oh, I don't like this.

I want to return it. "

They're not doing that.

They're only returning or exchanging if

it doesn't fit or there's an issue like

that.

So just making sure just on every level

that there's just nothing that would

prevent them from wanting

to purchase again.

And we all just kind of support that same

metric. And there's something.

So powerful, Kristin,

about seeing those numbers and

everybody measuring against them.

So if I understood the

first metric correctly,

43% of customers come back and buy

again.That's a good number for an apparel

brand. They want to hire. But you

want to hire, right? So you've got-.

100%.

X team is looking at that,

product is looking at that,

marketing is looking at that,

retention, department's looking at that.

Everybody's looking at it.

You're looking at those numbers and then

you're discussing why. Why is it up?

Why is it down? Why is this changing?

And you're able to action on that

and that is so incredibly powerful.

And then yeah, looking at that return

rate, how do we get the return rate down?

Or it's apparel. There's

always going to be a return.

You're always going to order the

wrong. I order the wrong size.

I'm a pretty tall guy and it's like

I just get the wrong size sometimes.

And so that's never going to go to zero,

but can you retain those

customers and get them to do

store credit or exchange or whatever?

But measuring those is critical.

And those mean real dollars

of growth, real top line,

real bottom line numbers.

And so that's huge.

Any other metric that you're focused

on and what that's doing for you?

I mean, yeah.

So the platform that we use will track

how much sales are generated from

support, which means anytime they've had

an interaction with customer service,

if they make a purchase

within the following 48 hours.

So that's a big metric for us.

We want to position ourselves as there

at the time that the customer's making

that decision and ensure that they're

fully knowledgeable to make that decision,

to push checkout on that item. So like

I said, we don't just offer email.

We're on phone, we're on live chat,

we're on every level just there for

the customer to make that decision.

And so we're really proud of

our sales from support numbers.

I think- Because I can probably.

Offset or maybe cover a lot of

the costs of the CX department.

If you guys really focus on that number,

sales driven by customer support can

offset a lot of the costs, I would assume.

Easily. And again,

that's something that has never been

taken for granted from our founders.

That's something that

they've always known, again,

because I think they're so

intelligent, so smart business wise.

They have recognized that since day one,

and they knew that making sure

that the community fully supported,

fully backed us, fully invested in them,

and they did that by

investing in that customer.

And I say it all the time to

them, because they would say, "Oh,

you're doing such a great job. Our

numbers are great." And I'm like,

"It's so much of it is that you

guys have empowered me to do this,

that you have put..." And because

how many times, even at a high level,

"Well, I have to check. I

have to run this by them.

I have to put it in a proposal." And I

don't necessarily ever really have to do

that. They have trusted me since

day one to really just know what the

customer or what the company

wanted their guidelines to be,

like their persona to be to the

customers. And they've always just said,

"Make it right." Surprise

and delight, go over the top,

make sure that they know that

we're so sorry that this happened.

So we do that all the time. I mean,

it's not just something we say

or 50% of people get a yes,

30% of people get a

maybe, whatever it is. No,

everybody has a potential to be a yes.

There's no parameters to be like, "Well,

you can only refund this many

shipping fees or give out this many

discounts." There's

nobody looking like, "Wow,

you gave out a lot of gift cards last

month." No, if I gave it a gift card,

they needed it and the company trusts

me to make that decision. And not having

to jump through those hoops

really just makes a difference.

And it shows in the support that we're

getting from that community because

they know that we're going to make it

right and they're not going to have to

wait and go through all these different

channels and wait for somebody to from

high above to give the go ahead like,

"No, I can do it right in that instant.

We can take care of you. We can get this

done." And we do it happily. I mean,

we all love our jobs.

Yep. It's amazing. It's

amazing. I'm sure, Kristin,

because you're in this game all the time,

and because you guys go above and

beyond and the experiences great,

when you have to reach out

to other customer support

from other companies you're

buying from, I'm sure you

are all kinds of frustrated,

you're critiquing what they're

doing, you're saying, "Hey,

you should have done this or that or

whatever." But stepping back a little bit,

as you experience other D2C brands,

what are some of the

biggest mistakes you see?

The biggest customer service

mistakes you see D2C brands

making that they need to be

aware of and need to fix?

Sure. I mean,

I convinced myself and my husband that

this is actually market research for my

job description to

online shop. I love that.

I have to try this out and see.

So I think really where

most companies miss

genuinely as an overarching

thought is that they just

treat the customer like it's a black

and white issue and they don't allow for

you to ... It's just a macro.

It's just, this is the answer,

there's no wavering in it. And to

have to jump through hoops to get a,

let me talk to a supervisor, is

there anything else you can do?

And so I think they miss the mark on that.

I'm not treating each interaction like

that person is special. And again,

that comes at a cost, but

that cost, like you just said,

can be offset by the work that you're

doing. So it's an investment in yourself,

in your company,

because when you have that customer who

comes back and they have this issue and

you make it right immediately,

they're going to purchase again,

they're going to tell other people.

There is so many times that I ...

And truthfully,

I'm the customer that probably those

companies love because when they make me

have to jump through hoops

to return something, I don't

do it. I literally, I'm.

Laughing.

Because I'm in my office.

I have three boxes right now on my corner

of things that I should have returned

because I wanted my $90 back and

I just didn't do it. I'm too busy.

I'm the same way. They didn't make it

easy for me, so it's just sitting there.

I'd rather give it to a trend than jump

through. I look at those and I'm like,

damn that company. And so we don't

want anybody ever being like,

"Damn that company." No, we want to be

that company where they're like- Because.

You'll never buy from them again.

You didn't go to the return.

And so the company's like, "All right,

we didn't get a return." But you

do have the customer forever.

Oh, no. I keep notes, Brett.

And that would be a list I would

like to see at some point in time.

We will not publish that list, but

that would be a great list for sure.

Yes. And to that,

I don't publicly blast them because

it happens to us all the time.

I mean, they're loud on,

so if you don't do it,

we're going to go blast

you on social. Okay. Yes,

it's going to get attention and yes,

that may make us look at it a little

bit differently, but you're still wrong.

I mean, a lot of times,

and so I'm not wrong in this situation

and I still don't blast because there's

nothing to gain. Let them live.

I just will take my business elsewhere

and I don't want anybody taking- And

that's reality. ... baseball

apparel business elsewhere.

I want it all staying here.

I want everybody coming back.

I want them buying for their friends

or family until they're retired.

So yes, this is not a

short-term game for us.

What other mistakes are you seeing brands

make or mistakes that we need to be

aware of so we can fix?

I mean, again, I order a

lot off of the internet.

I think in 2026,

it's very easy to Google a

company and see where they're at.

I think companies should do a better

job of investing in that public persona,

ensuring that their reviews are

cleaned up, that if they're bad,

they're being responded to. And

that's something that we do.

We're responding to every review,

whether it's negative or positive.

We don't even want people

to post something positive

and us not reach out and

say, thank you. You should

be thanking them for that.

So I think customers don't take care of

their own reviews as much as they should.

I look and that's the first

thing that I'm going to do.

I'm going to Google a

company and get the reviews.

And so when I look and I see terrible

reviews and no responses from the company,

that speaks a lot to me.

So I mean, I think that's important.

And then really just making sure that

the information is out there and there is

no bait and switch. There is not.

And when they get you with

the automatic renewal,

that's something I am not a

fan of. I want that option.

I don't want you automatically

putting me in because again,

I'm not going to remember to cancel

it, to turn it off, to monitor it.

So don't automatically

enroll me in anything.

Make sure I opt into

it with my full chest.

If I'm getting on a subscription, I want

to know I'm getting on a subscription.

Don't auto-ship me a second

one when I didn't want it.

Yeah. Yeah. So good.

And just such a good reminder

that poor customer experience-

That's just not worth it. ...

follow you. It will haunt you.

Those negative reviews,

those negative comments that they

will haunt you for years potentially.

But if you take care of it,

if you're proactive and then

you also fix things quickly,

you're going to reap dividends

from that for years to

come as well. So any other thoughts, tips,

suggestions that we didn't cover,

Kristin? Anything we left out,

any parting words of wisdom

you want to leave the audience?

Sure. I mean,

and you said it before when you

said take that and make it a job

description.

Make sure that your

customer service team is

in love with your company.

Make sure that that customer service

team is speaking about the company,

using the words that you would use

to describe that company, invested,

making sure that they fully

understand who you are as a company,

what you want to do for your customers,

and making sure that they're

actually putting that into practice.

Not just doing the job, because

this is not ... Accounting,

you can do a job. You can

punch in those numbers,

you can look at those numbers and

compare and contrast. Customer services,

there's a lot of soft skills involved,

and that's not always easy to ensure

that you have the right person.

So make sure that your customer

service team really wants to be there,

really is passionate

about what they're doing,

and really is invested in your brand.

I think that that alone would make a huge

difference for a lot of these

companies. And again, comes at a cost,

and that does necessarily

mean that you're not using AI,

you're not using offshores.

You have people who are proud to be an

employee and are proud to be working for

this company and are going to speak

about your company in a good light.

And I think that's really one

of the most important things.

Yeah. There's a cost to

doing it the right way,

but I believe there's a greater

cost to not doing it the right way.

And so totally agree,

just go so far to have people on

your CX team that love the company,

love the product, love the mission,

love what the team and the brand is

all about, and it makes just a huge,

huge difference. So

here's what I recommend.

I recommend you go buy something

from baseball lifestyle,

see for yourself what the

experience is like. And yeah,

if you have kids, especially, man,

they're going to want some ice cream

shorts or some cotton candy, hoodies,

or some other of the amazing

weekly drops of new baseball

gear at BL101. And so with that, Kristin,

thank you so much for taking

the time. This was super fun.

I appreciate having me insightful.

And hopefully this inspired

a few people to say,

"You know what? I'm going to think

about CX differently." And I think the

online shopping community will

be better for it. So thank you.

I appreciate you having me. Thank you.

Awesome. And as always, thank you for

tuning in. We'd love to hear from you.

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share it with somebody else

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And with that, until next

time, thank you for listening.

That'll do it for this week's

episode. One final mention.

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stalled out with your growth,

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missed opportunities and if

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team or agency, they just

don't have that buyer anymore,

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