Daniel Entered a Pitch-Black Cave, and Each Sale Became a Glimmer of Light

Key Numbers

The Interview

Most founders with a steady business and a new idea push the new idea hard. Daniel Brady does the opposite. The owner of Heavenly Hammocks & Swings in Brisbane funds a second business, Isaan Sport, from hammock income and spends on it only as each product proves itself, because his first business taught him that stock is the costly way to find out what customers want.

Daniel founded Heavenly Hammocks in 2014. He started by storing stock at home, moved to 3PL warehousing, and now imports 20′ and 40′ containers to supply the Australian market. More than 10,000 families, clinics and schools have bought from him since.

Isaan Sport serves coaches, teachers and therapists in Thailand, where spec sheets run in two languages. One honest line the category usually skips: Daniel says a store may need five years of reinvested profit before the owner can withdraw any.

1Heavenly Hammocks has been running since 2014. When you think back to the very first year, what did you believe about running a business that turned out to be wrong?

I thought hammocks would be popular in a variety of styles and colors, so I stocked a large range in small quantities after I found a supplier who agreed to do so. It turns out that beige and blue actually make up about 3/4 of the sales on their own. So after many years, I have cut down on the range.

2You now run one business that knows exactly who it is and one that’s still finding its feet. Which one teaches you more about yourself right now, and why?

I felt that I was losing skills, doing too much menial work for the mature business for years on end, dispatching orders and doing customer support each day. Starting the new business has thrust me back into learning, building, competing, and adapting. That change has flowed into the mature business too.

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“Starting the new business has thrust me back into learning, building, competing and adapting.”

3You chose to sell only hammocks and swings, and to stock every product yourself. What did staying that focused teach you about doing one thing well?

Initially, I stocked them all at home, before having enough sales speed that 3PL warehousing made economic sense. That was an achievement, and a good milestone to meet. But actually, as the business matured, I started adding drop-shipped products too, which has been a positive. That is because it is a risk to stock new products.

If they don’t sell quickly, the storage costs can leave the product in the negative. But a drop-shipped product can still be a positive, even if it’s only a minor addition to sales.

Over the years, there have also been products that proved popular, but I was forced to phase them out due to quality issues. In that case, I could put in a lot of effort to find a better supplier, or simply promote a drop-shipped product and leave the quality control up to them.

4Many families, clinics, and schools buy your sensory swings for children who need them. Is there a customer moment that changed how you see your work, and what did it show you?

Customers generally don’t give feedback, as the business is by delivery. But I’m pleased that we’ve managed to keep complaints low for years, which can be attributed to phasing out products with a higher issue rate and focusing on the best ones, along with tailoring the manuals and support with ‘minimizing customer issues’ in mind.

During COVID, sales exploded, which showed that swings and hammocks can be a good way to keep the kids entertained, but it is most obvious when people are forced to think about it, about keeping the kids entertained while they’re at home.

5With Isaan Sport, you’ve said the hard part is working out what customers really need. How do you stay patient when the answers aren’t clear yet, and what keeps you going?

That was a similar challenge when the hammocks business was new: having to spend years learning which items are most popular, even though I had done a lot of competitor research beforehand. It is certainly a balancing act for Isaan Sport, trialing new products without risking too much capital and wasting storage space. It is going into the unknown, like entering a pitch-black cave, and each website visitor and new sale is a glimmer of light, guiding the way, but after some years, it’s like you’re holding a bright torch, with a clear sales history. In the case of Isaan Sport, I can be slow and patient, as I already have a steady income. But as it’s the newer and thus more challenging business, it can also be treated as a goal to attain.

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It is going into the unknown, like entering a pitch-black cave, and each website visitor and new sale is a glimmer of light, guiding the way, but after some years, it’s like you’re holding a bright torch, with a clear sales history.

6Growing a new business without overspending on stock means holding back when you want to move fast. How do you decide when to take a risk, and when has waiting paid off?

Waiting cuts down on wasted capital. But being stingy with capital slows everything down, so the learning and small-scale stage could take years longer. So it is a clear balancing act, but with my existing income, I am free to choose between either option.

So I am treating it as a slow-build hobby, investing slowly. As each product proves itself, I’ll accelerate the investment. In the case of the hammocks, it was growing quickly from years 2-5, after growing slowly from years 0-2.

When I started having to expand the inventory quickly, pretty much all of the profit had to be reinvested into the business, as retained equity, in the form of inventory growth. I am happy that this phase is behind me, and now the profit can be withdrawn.

7Isaan Sport serves coaches, teachers and therapists in Thailand, far from Brisbane. What has building in a different culture taught you about listening to people?

The sales process is very different. The first email leads were asking for things that had never been asked for, from the hammock customers (schools, clinics, individuals). So that was jumping in at the deep end, having to very quickly learn and provide what the customers demanded, like spec sheets, and in 2 languages. The customers are generally willing to outline what they need.

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So that was jumping in the deep end, having to very quickly learn and provide what the customers demanded eg. spec sheets, and in 2 languages.

8You test ideas on one business and then bring them to the other. What has surprised you about how differently the same idea can land in each one?

So far, the ideas have adapted well between the 2 businesses. Eg. if I implement an FAQs section on the product listings, or create a new ad integration, or a prize draw for people who leave photo reviews, or improve the accessibility features.

Though some features are still business specific eg., Isaan Sport needed a customer support system to be built to provide multiple ‘likely answers’ to select from, based on a database of prior support messages, to simplify the support process. The dual-language support requirements made that more valuable.

9AI has helped you get much more done lately. What parts of running a business do you still want to do yourself, and why do they matter to you?

For the hammocks, I had already streamlined the processes, so AI does not need to help much in the day-to-day operations. I’d not want to risk having customers receive ‘wrong responses’ for relatively minor gains. But it is valuable in coding and business improvement eg. building out systems like the customer support system, or review systems I mentioned, or competitor research systems, etc.

But in the case of our competitors (some who actually purchase our products in a drop-shipped manner), I have noticed that they either use AI for day-to-day operations, including emails, or they outsource their operations overseas, where they use AI to do the job.

It is annoying – AI emails to us are often unnecessarily thorough or lacking basic knowledge, expecting us to waste our time, so they can save theirs.

10Looking after a steady business and a young one at the same time takes a lot of energy. How do you decide where your attention goes each week, and what have you learned to let go of?

Top priority is existing and new customers, dispatching, and customer support. Once that is done, the effort can go anywhere that I’m currently motivated to work on. It varies by day, and where the chain of thought leads. I may build a feature or do some marketing for one website, and it leads me to think that it needs to be repeated for the other.

I have an import coming, which will be a product range expansion for Isaan Sport, so I rushed through 15 drop-shipped products for the hammocks, which had been planned and were pending, just to get them out of the way, as I know it’ll be tough to list the new Isaan Sport products while keeping on top of existing customers.

11After more than ten years in ecommerce, you’ve seen a lot change. What has stayed the same about what customers want, no matter how much the tools have changed?

It’s been long enough period of time that the young children have grown up, and new children are growing. So the products that have been popular for 10 years can remain popular. But the landscape has changed significantly: competitors, couriers, government policy, Google, and AI.

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So the products that have been popular for 10 years can remain popular. But the landscape has changed significantly: competitors, couriers, government policy, Google, and AI.

12If someone were starting their first online store tomorrow, what would you want them to understand about the journey ahead, and what do you wish someone had told you?

You may have to reinvest your profit for 5 years before you can truly withdraw the profits, so keep that in mind when starting up. Not understanding that would risk leaving the business capital strained for tax bills or inventory expansion.

What Changed

Lessons for Founders

• Cut the range to what sells. Daniel stocked a large range in small quantities, then found beige and blue made up about 3/4 of his sales.
• Drop-ship new products before you pay to store them. Daniel says a slow seller in storage can end up in the negative, while a drop-shipped product stays positive even as a minor addition to sales.
• Budget five years of reinvestment before you plan on withdrawing profit. Daniel warns that missing this risks leaving a business strained for tax bills or inventory expansion.
• Let the older business fund the experiments. Daniel’s hammock income lets him invest in Isaan Sport slowly and accelerate as each product proves itself.
• Fix quality at the source. Daniel kept complaints low for years by phasing out products with a higher issue rate and tailoring manuals and support to minimize customer issues.

What Daniel Would Tell Another Founder

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“You may have to re-invest your profit for 5 years before you can truly withdraw the profits, so keep that in mind when starting up. Not understanding that would risk leaving the business capital strained for tax bills or inventory expansion.”