Mohawk Fine Papers Launches New eCommerce Site

Mohawk’s Hillary Davis Explains

By:  Cary Sherburne

May 15th, 2009 -- I was interested to see the latest web venture undertaken by Mohawk Papers, a new online paper store at MohawkPaperStore.com.  The company has been one of the leaders in the paper world in terms of the tools and information provided for visitors to its primary web site, MohawkPaper.com, including detailed information about its own environmental initiatives as well as an environmental calculator, an eco-guide and tips for specifying sustainable papers.  In addition, Mohawk was one of the first to map each of its papers against the various digital print engines to help designers and print service providers select the most appropriate paper for digital printing projects.  Now it seems that they are the first mill to launch an online paper store designed for use by the consumer (if they are not, I am sure I will hear about it!).  WhatTheyThink spoke with Hillary Davis, Interactive Marketing Manager, to get the details.

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WTT:  Hillary, can you explain how this new web site fits into the mix for Mohawk and its customers?

HD:  Our current site, MohawkPaper.com, is primarily a corporate communications site built for information, news and tools.  The new site is an ecommerce site where we will be selling reams, boxes of envelopes and samples to consumers.  We dipped our toe in the water with Strathmore.com, which was designed as a corporate identity tool onto which we added a shopping cart to sell small quantities of hard-to-find items of Strathmore products only. It has been out about 1.5 years and has served its function well.  MohawkPaperStore.com is the next evolution which offers all product lines, everything from folio down to 8.5x11” sheets, including the new grades from the SMART acquisition.

WTT:  What would be the biggest benefit for the retail customer?

HD:  Not only are they getting all cut size items directly from the mill, which is a big convenience factor, they have access to everything in one place.  Right now, it can be difficult to get certain items from stores or other online resellers who only carry the most popular items. If you have special requirements, those papers can be difficult to get in reams or smaller quantities. They can also order samples, swatch books, individual sheets of paper in a more integrated and seamless experience. 

WTT:  How is the shipping handled?

HD:  For an everyday retail customer, they will pay shipping as normal for any ecommerce site.  We have a partnership with UPS, and the retail customer can decide what shipping speed they want to pay for.  Our warehouse is well-served by UPS and the cutoff time is 4 PM Eastern, which makes papers available next day if they are needed that quickly.

WTT:  What makes this different from other paper ordering sites?

HD:  We spent a lot of time developing new search tools that will allow the everyday retail customer to order paper from us, get what they need quickly and understand the product lines without all of the professional jargon.  Most of the sites we have are geared to a professional graphic designer or merchant.  For the retail market, we translated the language of the industry into layman’s terms to function on a more basic level for the individual user, from the college student to grandmothers.  They can search by project type, such as wedding invitations, and see every item that is optimized for that type of project, or they can use the more advanced tools we left in for more professional customers like printers, who we expect to get traffic from.  They can also search for specific topics, like the environment.  There is a search tool dedicated to the environment, with information about wind power, FSC certified papers, and carbon neutral.  We are also focused on helping users find paper that is optimized for different digital presses.

WTT:  Do you think there will be channel conflict with the merchants?

HD:  We have actually built our web initiatives to support the merchants. It is impossible for a merchant to stock all 3,000+ items that we offer, but they know that the end user wants to choose from the largest variety of colors, textures and weights. With this in mind, we developed a special site for merchants where they can place ream orders and have us blind-ship it to the customer on their behalf. However, many customers are not familiar with Paper Stores or do not meet the order minimums for Paper Merchants. We feel it is important to offer that customer a place to find a wide variety of paper choices.

WTT:  What else might we see in the future?

HD:  As always, we continue to update our merchant site, and we expect to be able to announce more progress there in the coming months.

WTT:  Is there anything else you would like to add before we close?

HD:  We think it is pretty lead edge for a mill to be doing this in the way we are, focusing on the needs of the retail audience and providing them with all of these customized tools that will be useful and make their buying experience pleasurable.  We are very excited about it.

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