Goodtale newsletter > 31 March 2025

Make the most of your order confirmation email

One of your first opportunities to make a good impression

Charlotte Daniels

Happy Monday, we’ve made it to the first week of British Summer Time, and my favourite time of year. Coming up this week:

1. Content resources: Make a good impression in your order confirmation email
2. Good content: Order confirmation emails from Who Gives a Crap and Thrift+
3. Good things: Fashion Reimagined, the return of beavers and a storytelling prompt
4. In other news: The brand formerly known as Haeckels
5. Subscription offer: Get 7 days free and 75% off for life

1. Content resources

An opportunity to make a good impression

Order confirmation emails are more than transactional, they’re one of your first opportunities to make a good impression with new customers. They’re also one of the most opened emails, with reported open rates over 60%.

Use the opening section to celebrate their order and provide reassurance they’re made the right decision.

2. Good content

Two brands that have made the most of the opening section of their order confirmation email are Who Gives a Crap and Thrift+. Both make it about you, not them, and manage to reassure and celebrate in one line.

Get inspired with order confirmation email examples from Finisterre, Fussy, Ocean Bottle and more.

3. Good things

Watch: Fashion reimagined

As Amy Powney prepares to launch her new brand Akyn, it’s a good time to catch up on the 2022 documentary Fashion Reimagined. It does a great job of highlighting the complexity and tenacity required to create a traceable, sustainable garment.

News: Wild beavers reintroduced

Exciting to read that after the government change, the first wild beavers were introduced in Purbeck, Dorset.

Learn: A storytelling prompt from Pixar

Pixar shares the art of storytelling in a free course from Khan Academy. One lesson I loved was that they try to create a one liner for each story idea that starts with ‘what if’?

For example:

• What if your toys came to life? (Toy story)
• What if a rat wants to cook haute cuisine? (Ratatouille)

It’s a great prompt to use for explaining the central idea behind your business. Here’s a few that I came up with for Goodtale:

• What if ecommerce content could be good for people and planet?
• What if words could change the world?
• What if you could sell without manipulative language?

And here’s how I can imagine it applying to a few purpose-driven brands:

• What if the world was obsessed with beans? (Bold Bean Co)
• What if we were in business to save our home planet (Patagonia)

In other news

The brand formerly known as Haeckels

Can you have a brand with no name? The brand formally known as Haeckels thinks so. They’ve done away with their name and are now going under various monikers including people care, planet care, it’s about all of us and FKAH (Formerly known as Haeckels).

It’s clear why they wanted a change (they were previously named after a racist biologist), but I do find having no name for a year a little confusing. Your name is how people remember and recommend you. Will this move make them harder to find? But it’s a brave move, and I’m interested to see what they do next.

Following near bankruptcy last year, they’ve also introduced more cost transparency and a period where shoppers could ‘pay what they feel’ for bestsellers. 

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