Discount Electronics Saves $100,000, Remains PCI Compliant with BigCommerce

BigCommerce provides a secure, scalable platform for quickly growing brands.

See first-hand the features that empower businesses like Discount Electronics to grow with BigCommerce.

152.9%

increase in revenue YoY

10%

increase in conversion with Amazon Pay integration

58.52%

increase in AOV YoY

The Discount Electronics Success Story

Technology has changed by leaps and bounds since Discount Electronics began more than 20 years ago. So has this business.

From selling pagers and fax machines back then to customized computers and laptops today, they’ve figured out how to evolve with their customers’ wants and needs.

They’ve figured out how to effectively adapt their business model, too.

What at one time was a 15-store operation is now largely an online business with 8 remaining brick-and-mortar locations in Texas. When they were ready to switch from their former ecommerce provider, SunShop, to a new platform, they were looking for one that was PCI compliant, scalable, and always reliable.

They landed on BigCommerce. Today, they’re seeing +150% revenue growth YoY and have a thriving online business.

Shopify and Magento didn’t meet needs

As told to BigCommerce by Rick Culleton, CEO, Discount Electronics.

When we were looking to switch to a new platform, we did our research.

We looked at Magento, but we felt it left us a little exposed. Because it’s open source, there’s no one you can go to if there’s a problem. Say there was an unexpected PCI compliance issue, for example. If we have that problem, everyone has that problem — and there’s nobody responsible to fix it. That made it a no-go.

Shopify didn’t seem scalable enough for our operation, either. We were determined to grow long-term into a big business, and we knew because of that, we wouldn’t be able to stay a Shopify customer forever.

When it came down to it, BigCommerce was the right choice. We liked that the company is based in Texas (like we are) and that it ticked all of our boxes for what we wanted and needed in an ecommerce platform.

Peace of mind around PCI compliance

As told to BigCommerce by Rick Culleton, CEO, Discount Electronics.

Our former platform caused some major headaches and issues around PCI compliance.

We were initially migrating to a custom-built ecommerce platform, but when we did that, our servers were hacked.

We were never able to fully fix the issue and our credit card processor of 18 years threatened to give us the boot if we didn’t get our PCI compliance issues fixed. In the end, we wound up spending a year and hundreds of thousands of dollars on a platform that nearly sunk our business.

That’s a big part of what drove us to BigCommerce. With this platform, we can rest assured that we’re PCI compliant 24/7/365. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate not having any compliance concerns whatsoever.

“Our former platform caused some major headaches and issues around PCI compliance”

Rick Culleton CEO, Discount Electronics

Cross-device and browser functionality for better UX

As told to BigCommerce by Rick Culleton, CEO, Discount Electronics.

In the past, we spent a lot of time trying to figure out what our online store looked like for different customers using different browsers and devices.

On our old platform, customers would call and say, “I can’t find your buy button.” Then we’d be scramble to figure out what they were using, we’d attempt to replicate what they were seeing, and then try to fix it.

With BigCommerce, we don’t have those problems anymore. We can rest assured our online store is reliably mobile-friendly and scales correctly no matter what our shoppers are using.

“When we introduced Amazon Pay and an expedited checkout process in our BigCommerce store, we saw a significant lift in conversions — more than 10% — almost immediately. ”

Rick Culleton CEO, Discount Electronics

“With BigCommerce, we can rest assured that we’re PCI compliant 24/7/365. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate not having any compliance concerns whatsoever.”

Rick Culleton CEO, Discount Electronics

Discount electronics quote

Amazon Pay integration instantly increased conversions by 10%

As told to BigCommerce by Rick Culleton, CEO, Discount Electronics.

When we introduced Amazon Pay and an expedited checkout process in our BigCommerce store, we saw a significant lift in conversions — more than 10% — almost immediately.

It made our checkout process even simpler and faster for those customers who were ready to buy and didn’t want to wrestle with form fields or credit card data entry.

Learn more about connecting your store to Amazon Pay here.

Direct transactions and stronger relationships

As told to BigCommerce by Rick Culleton, CEO, Discount Electronics.

We really like that with BigCommerce, our customers can buy directly from us — there’s no middleman or go-between.

Sometimes with Amazon and eBay there’s another layer to the transaction, more fees, and less certainty about who’s really behind the brand you’re buying from.

Enabling our customers to buy directly from us through our BigCommerce stores means it’s just the customer and us. I don't need to put it in a box and ship it to Amazon so that they can put it on their shelves and they can ship it later on. This way, our customers win on price and they win on flexibility. It’s good for all of us.

“With BigCommmerce, we can rest assured our online store is reliably mobile-friendly and scales correctly no matter what our shoppers are using.”

Rick Culleton CEO, Discount Electronics

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