Gilpa: Subscription dog food brings loyal customers to the shop
How a quality food specialist uses subscriptions, loyalty points and over 100 expert articles to build customer longevity with dog and cat owners.
We've always known that our customers are regular customers. A dog doesn't change food every week, and a good relationship with a dog owner should last for the lifetime of the dog. The Shoporama subscription is the tool that finally put it in the right frame.
About Gilpa: A feed store, a farm shop and a lifelong passion for dogs
Gilpa has been trading in dog food and cat food since the late 90s. The business is run by Lena and Erik Aalund from a country estate at Karlsgårde near Varde, where they are surrounded by their own Labradors. Both have a lifetime of experience as dog owners and actively train their dogs for field trials and hunting.
It's that experience that makes Gilpa more than just a webshop. Customers can call, write and ask about everything from puppy food to senior nutrition, and get answers from someone who feeds their dogs the same thing every day. Gilpa is not a broad online discount store: it's a specialist with 33+ carefully selected varieties of dog food and cat food, a taste guarantee, and free shipping over $29.
That specialization is the whole reason why the subscription system makes sense. Once a dog is on the right food, every bag becomes repetitive: same brand, same size, same rhythm. That's where the Shoporama subscription feature kicks in.
Sack subscription: one setup, fixed rhythm, regular customers
On virtually all Gilpa feed products, customers can choose "Order by subscription". The price is slightly reduced and the customer chooses how often the bag is delivered. From that day on, the dog food moves out of the customer's head and into Shoporama's subscription engine: next delivery date, payment and shipping are automatic.
For Gilpa, it means predictable revenue, fewer "forgotten" purchases and significantly longer customer lifetime value per dog. For the customer, it means one less thing to remember and a small saving every month. Classic win/win.
- ✓ Subscription price activated per product with one click
- ✓ Customer chooses the interval, e.g. every 4 weeks
- ✓ Payment is automatically deducted via payment gateway
- ✓ Reminder before next delivery and customer self-service
- ✓ Easily pause, reschedule or cancel again
The subscription price is clearly displayed next to the one-time price on the product page.
Three tools, one goal: the loyal customer
The interesting thing about Gilpa's setup is not that they use subscriptions. It's that subscription is one of three tools that work together: the blog draws in new customers via Google on specific feeding questions, the subscription maintains the rhythm when the dog is on the right food, and the customer club rewards the customers who stay.
All three are built-in features in Shoporama, and they talk to each other all by themselves. Same customer. Same email. Same history. No third-party apps, no separate platforms and no synchronization issues.
Blog
Over 100 guides on feed and feeding written by Erik himself. Attracts traffic from Google and positions Gilpa as an expert.
Subscription
Once the dog is on the right food, "Order on subscription" becomes the logical next button. Discount, fixed rhythm and no empty bowls.
Customer club
Every purchase earns 10% in bonus points. Points turn into dollars, and the customer gets an extra reason to stay in the Gilpas feed universe.
Over 100 guides written by the owner himself
Gilpa.dk has a blog with more than 100 articles on dog food, cat food, allergies, training, pancreatitis, breed-specific food and a wide range of other feeding topics. Most of them are written by Erik Aalund himself, which appears in the author line under each title.
This kind of content isn't just SEO filler. It's Gilpa's specialist position put into writing, and it draws customers in via Google searches on specific feeding questions. When the new dog owner searches "cold-pressed or extruded dog food", it's often a Gilpa article that answers, and that's where the relationship starts.
- ✓ Built-in blogging feature in Shoporama, without a third-party CMS
- ✓ Author and metadata per post for credibility and E-E-A-T
- ✓ The blog lives on the same domain as the shop and boosts its SEO
- ✓ Each post can link directly to related products
The blog has over 100 posts, most of them written by Erik Aalund himself.
Gilpas webshop in practice: category, product and subscription
What's in it for Gilpa
Predictable revenue instead of campaign pressure
When a customer is on a subscription, Gilpa doesn't have to "buy" the sale back with a new discount code or ad crown every month. The bag comes. The money comes. The customer stays.
Loyalty is rewarded, not just marketed
10% in bonus points on every purchase turns into real dollars on the next order. The regular customer gets more back than the one who jumps between stores, and it can be felt in the customer's next choice.
Expert content draws in big spenders
Over 100 articles written by Erik himself meet the dog owner on Google before the basket is even opened. When the customer finds Gilpa via a specific feeding question, trust is built and the purchase is close.
Everything lives in the same shop
Subscription, loyalty points, blog, orders and customer account are all in one experience in Shoporama. No apps to tie together, no duplicate customer profiles.
Erik from Gilpa tells us
We've been feed shopping since the late 90s and we've tried a few systems along the way. The great thing about Shoporama is that everything we need is in the same shop. Subscription, bonus points, customer club and blog. We don't have to glue ten different apps together to make it all work.
Customers set up their own subscription, they can track their bonus points and they read our articles without us getting involved. This leaves us time for the most important thing, which is to be on the other end of the phone when a dog owner calls with a specific question about food.
The subscription is what we use the most. The customer chooses their food, the customer chooses their rhythm, and off they go. No missed orders, no empty bowls on a Sunday evening. The blog is the second. We've written over 100 articles because we know a lot about feed and we might as well share it. People who find us on Google trust us before they've even put anything in their basket.
This way of running the shop matches exactly what we try to be: a professional webshop, not a discount portal.
Subscription is a perfect fit for feed
Dog food is one of those product categories that is made for subscription. Same brand, same size, same portion day after day. Once your dog is thriving, there's no need to choose a new product every time, and no need to manually visit the shop every month.
This is in stark contrast to fashion, gifts and other categories where the customer expects something new every time. For Gilpa, this means that the subscription is not just a feature on top of the shop. It is the natural end point of the entire customer journey: from feed guide and specialist blog, to the first purchase, to the fixed subscription, to customer club points on every delivery.
This is exactly the kind of business Shoporama's subscription feature is built for: recurring deliveries of physical goods at set intervals, automatic payment and full self-service for the customer so the store doesn't drown in support.
Nicki Frandsen
Gilpa's webshop is built by Nicki Frandsen. Strategic sparring partner and Shoporama developer for self-employed and small businesses.
Do you sell something customers buy again and again?
Food, coffee, vitamins, supplements, hygiene products, lunch boxes. If customer demand returns, subscriptions can make a big difference to your bottom line. Let's talk about what that might look like for you.