How Tuckernuck Scaled a White-Glove Customer Experience Without Losing the Personal Touch
- 56% of inbound calls automated, reducing repetitive call volume
- Top call driver (returns) now handled automatically, freeing agents for high-touch customer interactions
- Supports hybrid retail & eCommerce model by answering store questions and capturing voicemails for follow-up
Often, the most meaningful discoveries aren’t the ones you go looking for.
They unfold gradually, almost without realizing it at first. A turn you didn’t plan to take. A piece you reach for again and again because it just feels right. It’s less about where you are, and more about the feeling of finding something that fits.
Tuckernuck was built around that idea.
From the beginning, the brand has been rooted in the thrill of finding something special, whether it’s a new brand, a new style, or a new way to feel like yourself. What started as a place tied to memory and exploration quickly became something broader: a way of thinking about style, shopping, and storytelling. Not just products, but pieces with perspective. Not just a destination, but an ongoing sense of discovery.
Today, that spirit shows up everywhere in the business – from the brands they curate to the way customers experience them.
YOUR FRIEND, YOUR STYLIST, YOUR ONE-STOP SHOP
In 2012, Tuckernuck launched out of a garage with three founders, a camera, and a vision. They wanted to bottle the feeling of East Coast summers, the ease of a great boutique find, and the warmth of someone who actually knew your taste – and deliver it online.
That idea of discovery still defines the brand today. For Mary Esty and Alexandra Ferrell, it’s a responsibility that lives inside the customer experience.
Mary, Tuckernuck’s Director of Customer Experience, has spent the last five years shaping how the brand shows up in its most human moments. Alongside her, Clienteling Program Manager Alexandra translates that same sense of ease and familiarity into something operational, repeatable, and that can hold as the company grows.
Together, they think about customer support as a relationship to maintain.
“We want every customer interaction to feel like talking to a friend,” Mary said. “That means creating a personalized experience. recognizing returning customers, making them feel heard, and ensuring every touchpoint is warm and comfortable. It’s the feeling of your favorite boutique, brought online.”
The goal is not just to answer the question, but to recognize the person asking it. There is a certain level of care implied that goes beyond resolution.
Alexandra put it simply: “We deliver a true white-glove customer experience. Our goal is for customers to see our team as a key reason they chose us over any competitor.”
At its core, the mission is to show up for every moment in your life—big or small—with pieces you love and an experience that feels thoughtful, personal, and easy. The kind of experience that keeps you coming back, not just for the product, but for how it makes you feel.
FLIPPING THE SCRIPT
A beautiful mission is one thing. Executing it at scale is another.
Here is the thing about Tuckernuck’s customer base: they want to call. Voice-to-voice, someone picks up, problem solved. It is a profile that is incredibly loyal, and accustomed to the idea that a brand worth shopping with is a brand worth calling.
“Phone calls had really started to weigh on the team,” Mary admitted. “We see a high volume, and while we didn’t want to take that away, we knew we needed a more streamlined way to manage it.”
With the phone remaining a crucial outlet, and calls piling up every busy season, something had to change. Wait times were getting longer and the team was stretched thinner.
And then, at a Gladly community event, Tuckernuck heard Caraway Home and a few other brands talking about how they were handling it. Flip was the solution everyone was talking about.
For the first time, it felt like there might be a way to handle the calls without sacrificing the experience they had worked so hard to build.
There was not much debate about whether to move forward. The fit felt obvious almost immediately.
“It was an automatic yes,” Mary said.
THE GO-LIVE THE WEEK BEFORE CYBER MONDAY
In a move that might charitably be described as audacious—and by anyone who has survived a retail holiday season, described as something else entirely—Tuckernuck went live with Flip right before Cyber Monday.
The phrase “trial by fire” exists precisely for moments like this, though presumably whoever coined it was not also managing return volume for a fast-growing fashion brand.
“We ended up launching right before Cyber Monday, which was definitely a bold timing decision,” Mary said. “But we knew we needed the additional support going into that level of volume.”
And, through close collaboration and the right technology in place, it worked.
Within the first weeks, automation rates climbed to nearly 20%, with almost no manual configuration required. The top inquiries (order status, return initiation) were contained before a single agent had to pick up. The holiday season, which had always felt like a gauntlet, felt a little more like a game they could actually win.
“We were immediately impressed,” Mary said. “The automation rate we saw pretty early on was impactful, with barely any intents. From there, we just continued to build.”
Two years later, the automation rate has grown to 56%. The team hasn’t had to think about what they’d do without it – partly because they haven’t had to, and partly because the answer is bleak.
“If Flip suddenly wasn’t there, the impact on the team would be immediate,” Mary said. “We’d likely need to scale headcount quickly to make up for it.”
WORKING SMARTER, NOT HARDER
Ask Tuckernuck what Flip does for them today, and the first answer is not a feature. It’s time.
Specifically, time back.
Returns are Tuckernuck’s single biggest driver of inbound call volume – which is, notably, not the industry norm. While many brands cite “where is my order” as their top inquiry, Tuckernuck customers pick up the phone primarily to navigate the return process.
Flip now handles the bulk of those calls.
“Flip has made a really big impact, decreasing the volume and allowing the team to have more meaningful conversations with customers who need help beyond a yes or no answer,” Alexandra said. “More complex scenarios – we now have the time for that.”
The effect rippled well beyond the call queue. Scheduling opened up. Agents who had spent entire shifts tethered to phones could rotate off. The rhythm of the workday shifted enormously.
“Our team can step away from phones at times,” Alexandra said. “With lower volume, we’re able to reduce how many people are handling calls at once, which has a meaningful impact on morale, team culture, and overall happiness.”
When burnout is a real operational risk, giving people breathing room is its own kind of metric – one that does not show up in a dashboard but makes a real impact everywhere else.
Mary saw it right away: “Flip showed us how to work smarter, not harder. It opened our eyes to where we can automate operationally – so we’re not constantly adding headcount just to keep up with call volume.”
THE DASHBOARD, THE DATA, AND THE ONGOING COLLABORATION
If you asked Mary and Alexandra what they value most about the Flip relationship, the first answer is still not a feature.
“I really value the strategic partnership,” Mary said. “Flip consistently brings proactive ideas – what’s working, what we can expand, and where we can improve. That level of insight isn’t something we see with every platform, and it’s something we truly appreciate.”
Alexandra explained, “Anytime I go to the Flip team for quick updates, whether it’s adjusting an intent, toggling something on or off, or updating hours or messaging, they handle it immediately. It’s something I never have to worry about, and that makes a real difference.”
The dashboard helped tell the rest of the story. Each month, the team reviewed performance, looking at customer satisfaction scores, identifying where automation fell short, and deciding what to build next.
“We love the dashboard,” Mary said. “Seeing both the AI CSAT and the combined score helps us quickly spot where Flip isn’t fully solving for the customer and identify opportunities to build new intents. It’s been incredibly insightful.”
The conversation was no longer about how to manage the volume – though the volume was managed. Tuckernuck was now thinking ahead about how to keep improving the experience, how to find the gaps, and how to close them.
SAME PROMISE, SMARTER INFRASTRUCTURE
Looking forward, Flip and Tuckernuck are always looking at what dreams they can bring to reality.
Currently, sights are set on inventory lookup, so customers can call and find out what’s in stock instantly. Eventually, the ability to make purchases over the phone entirely. Small expansions, each one in service of the same original idea: make it easy, make it personal, make it feel like someone is genuinely there.
Ultimately, that’s the whole game.
Not the metrics, though the metrics matter. Not even the leaner team or the smoother holiday season or the agents who can now help someone plan a vacation wardrobe instead of just processing a return – though all of that matters too.
What matters is whether the customer hangs up and feels like she was taken care of. Like someone knew her, understood what she needed, and made the whole thing easy.
The best things can be easy to miss if you don’t set out looking for them.
Flip was a little like that too – something Tuckernuck stumbled into at the right moment, through the right conversation, with the right people. A tool that became infrastructure. Infrastructure that became essential. Essential that became, quietly, impossible to imagine existing without.
Some of the best things in life are like that – easy to overlook, quietly indispensable, and already part of the fabric before you noticed they were woven in.
And for retail brands, some of the best things in business are partners like Flip.
