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AllSaints Spitalfields

World leading fashion store grows with Rackspace Hosting providing the stable foundation for their highly successful e-commerce website.

AllSaints is a hard edged, worldwide fashion brand launched in 1994. It has grown dramatically and famously through its non-conformist rock chic style and the establishment of many retail outlets and franchises, as well as an online presence throughout the world – a flagship store in New York recently opened to massive public acclaim and huge initial takings.

Imposing web presence
The company boasts a very imposing web presence, helped by its ubiquitous Ram Skull Logo, which has helped solidify and identify the name amongst style conscious shoppers as a must-visit store, both online and offline, for a lead on those design led fashions that never follow trends. AllSaints is famous for its non-conformity and each store maintains a totally non corporate feel, relying on local history and character to build the look. A long history of supporting and collaborating with the music industry is ingrained with many famous artists linked to the brand. The company’s website hosts new music acts, which have been recorded and filmed in the warehouse space below the E1 London design studios. These weekly basement sessions present live performances, interviews and upfront podcasts for a global audience.

Today’s range of menswear, womenswear, childrens wear, gifts and accessories is a far cry from the first standalone store established in Fouberts Place, just off Carnaby Street. The company website is equally groundbreaking featuring the massive clothing range alongside exciting music performance. It’s a place to go to see what’s creating a stir. Their popular lookbook section gives a real feel for what’s on trend.

Managed vs Co-Location
Danny Angus is Head of e-commerce platform development at All Saints Spitalfields. “Our web presence and e-commerce system was outsourced to an external agency until 2009 when it was brought in-house. As part of these changes we reviewed a number of potential hosting partners and considered the merits of co-location versus fully managed hosting. We had completely outgrown the former provider and were looking for a hosting partner who could offer a genuine 24/7 support operation that would reduce the skills we needed to retain in-house, along with rapid hardware acquisition and an ability to deal intelligently with challenges.

Having reviewed a number of potential hosting partners we selected Rackspace® Hosting. The decision was based on their industry reputation for genuine Fanatical Support® and some very trustworthy independent assessments, particularly Gartner’s Magic Quadrant.

Reputation and capability
Danny said, “Having worked in e-commerce for over 10 years I was very aware of the reputation and capabilities of Rackspace. We spent a great deal of time with the company defining our precise requirements and evaluating the fit of the two companies. Rackspace exceeded our expectations and even during the pre-sales process they took adequate time to fully assimilate our needs and understand precisely what was required. The quality of their technical support staff was a critical factor in our decision to host with Rackspace. Redhat and MySQL certification were also key differentiators.”

Highly capable, resilient and responsive
Danny went on to say, “Rackspace has proven to be highly capable, resilient, and very responsive. We spend a lot of money on getting it right, but achieve huge value for that money. We have been able to reduce the in-house skills base and no longer need to employ a Sysadmin specialist or Database Administrator. The Rackspace partnership has enabled us to focus on and rise to unpredicted challenges. Our current system comprises three hypervisors, twelve virtual webservers, four database servers, two MySQL servers two Red Hat servers and four Database slave servers, all linked and load balanced and protected with firewall and managed backup.”

Business growth doubled year on year
Danny revealed, “Our current rate of growth has seen the business double year on year since 2006. I firmly believe that we could not have achieved our continued growth without the help and support of the Rackspace team. I love their Fanatical Support promise because it actually does exist. It’s a genuine desire to go that bit further and people do actually take notice. The support from the Rackspace team is well beyond that which I would expect from an outsourced facility. The team from Rackspace is now helping us define the system configuration for the next five years of growth”.

Strong argument for premium hosting
Danny summarised, “In e-commerce there is a very strong argument for the provision of premium managed hosting that provides exemplary service and a level of support that totally removes that tier of worry. I would totally recommend Rackspace as a commercial hosting partner. The company goes well beyond what I would expect from an outsourced service provider and gives me confidence that our site is being looked after by dedicated professionals.

If you are a high flying fashionista or your style is rock chic and you need a vibrant online shopping experience, then a visit to AllSaints Spitalfields will open your eyes to the very latest in culture, fashion and music that expresses individuality and attitude.

For the haute couture of hosting then there really is only one place to visit. www.rackspace.co.uk or call the team for a FREE chat about the infinite possibilities for your e-commerce project on 0800 988 0100.