Case study · Coastal Living Co.
How an Australian DTC Brand Scaled Customer Support 3×
A fast-growing home goods brand tripled support capacity during peak season without hiring locally — protecting CSAT and repeat purchase rates.
3×
Support capacity
4 hrs
Avg response (peak)
22%
Repeat purchase lift
10 days
Team live
At a glance
Challenge, solution, and results
Challenge
Coastal Living Co. was drowning in order enquiries during Q4. Two in-house staff couldn't keep up — response times hit 24+ hours, refund requests piled up, and negative reviews started appearing.
Solution
Apex Admins deployed two customer support VAs and a part-time media buyer — handling inbox, returns, Shopify order issues, and Meta ad optimisation through the holiday rush.
3× support capacity, 4-hour average response time during peak, 22% improvement in repeat purchase rate, and ROAS improved 18% on holiday campaigns.
The story
How Coastal Living Co. scaled with remote talent
Coastal Living Co. had built a loyal following for sustainable home products — but success created an operations bottleneck. During their first serious Q4 on Shopify, customer enquiries tripled while the team stayed at two.
Founder Emma Chen considered hiring locally but couldn't justify full-time headcount for seasonal demand. Apex Admins proposed a flexible pod: two support VAs scaling from 20 to 40 hours weekly, plus a media buyer for peak campaign management.
Within 10 days, the team was live in Gorgias and Shopify — handling order tracking, returns, product questions, and review responses in Australian English with brand-appropriate tone.
Peak season response times held at 4 hours average (down from 24+). Repeat purchase rate climbed 22% quarter-over-quarter. The media buyer's campaign optimisations delivered 18% ROAS improvement on Meta spend.
"We scaled through our biggest season without a single local hire. The support team felt in-house from day one."
Key takeaways
- Seasonal e-commerce needs flexible scaling
- Support quality protects brand reputation
- Combining support + paid media creates compound ROI
- Remote teams integrate with Shopify/Gorgias stacks
Timeline
How it unfolded
The key phases from first conversation to a working remote team.
-
1
Week 1
Brand voice guide, Gorgias setup, and VA shortlist.
-
2
Week 2
Support team onboarded; media buyer briefed on campaigns.
-
3
Month 1
Q4 peak handled — response times under 4 hours.
-
4
Post-season
Scaled hours down; retained core support team.
Talent deployed
Roles Coastal Living Co. hired
Hire Virtual Assistants
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