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Betting on Ourselves: The Future of Luxury Watch Shopping

As a digital product shop, we’ve built tons of digital products for clients. From an app that makes configuring sensor hubs 3 times faster to creating websites for a global beverage company that converts digital traffic to in-person sales, the impact of our simplicity approach is felt across myriad industries and verticals.

As we’ve become product experts for others, in 2020, we decided to go all-in on our own application, luxxee™. Not only because we are passionate about products, but because we are big advocates of continuous improvement and believe there is no better way to hone our process for clients than apply it to ourselves.

Our product journey

We considered a move into building our own product long before 2020. After years of being approached by startups, an idea we felt aligned with our team surfaced. Once we confirmed market demand, we agreed to move forward. Then, just as we were about to celebrate, one of the biggest digital products we were working on was put on hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Initially, we backed out of the opportunity, but sage advice suggested the product might be the light in the dark we needed. So, we went back to the founder and decided to push forward despite the uncertainty.

Fast forward to today, after taking the leap, we shifted our mindset, found the right investment partner, did our homework, raised money, and uncoupled luxxee™ from POWER SHIFTER. Now our minimum viable product (MVP) has been built, and we’ve launched to beta. “Since betting on ourselves, our team and capabilities have grown exponentially,” said JP Holecka, CEO and Co-Founder of POWER SHIFTER, and Co-Founder of luxxee™.

What is luxxee™?

luxxee™ is an e-commerce search engine branded for luxury watches. Our application offers the simplest way to find, compare, and buy genuine luxury watches. With content to help buyers understand the products, luxxee™ puts the power in the hands of the consumers, enabling them to make the best purchase decisions.

Meet the product experts behind luxxee™

We sat down with a few prominent luxxee™ team members to hear about their experience building the digital product, how the team has evolved, and what we can expect from the application.

Nathan Marshall, Technical Lead

What does it mean for you, as an agency member, to produce our own product?

“As a developer at an agency, it’s unlikely you’ll work on the same project for more than seven months at a time. Building luxxee™ has been a great opportunity to see a project through to MVP and beyond, especially since the product life cycle is so much more than its inception. Additionally, our appetite for risk is a bit higher. Since we’re not accountable to an external stakeholder, we can be more experimental in our approach. Having the opportunity to try new things and fail more often means we can adjust our process and bring learnings back to POWER SHIFTER clients.”

Sarah Bain, Director of Product

How has the team evolved?

“One of the significant benefits we realized as an agency building a product is that we weren’t starting from ground zero. Our team had already worked together on several digital projects, which meant we had a solid foundation of trust and communication going in.

From a technical standpoint, the engineering team has always been rock solid. They are fast learners, and there has never been a product that they haven’t done really well—that’s a POWER SHIFTER special. The evolution our team has experienced is an increased sense of ownership and engagement with the entire product life cycle. I am lucky to work with people who put their hearts into everything and are obsessed with what they do.”

Priscilla Ho, UX Lead

What can future watch buyers expect from luxxee™?

“Corporations should not be able to raise prices unnecessarily, so we are putting the power back into consumers’ hands. Buyers can expect a simple and straightforward shopping experience and detailed information about the products they are evaluating to help them make informed decisions. Simplicity and the notion of ‘shifting the power’ are approaches borrowed from POWER SHIFTER and ones we feel will set luxxee™ apart.”

The future of luxury watch shopping

Brick-and-mortar stores are folding as the retail industry undergoes radical disruption. This change gives consumers the ability to have a different and more tailored shopping experience online. It may have taken us years to find the right digital product, but our process is proven, and we’re ready to shape the future of luxury watch shopping. Only “time” will tell if our hypothesis was right. As of this article, we’re in private beta and invite you to sign-up and take it for a spin.

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