Ryan Abood, President and CEO. (Courtesy of Gourmetgiftbaskets.com)
Three-Year Average Annual Growth: 64.8%
Rank on Private 100: 61
Headquarters: 60 Gourmet Place, Exeter
Product/Service: Provider of gift baskets
President and CEO: Ryan Abood
Founded: 2002
Total Number of Employees: 63
Website: gourmetgiftbaskets.com
In the highly competitive world of online shopping for gift baskets, GourmetGiftBaskets.com, headquartered in Exeter, consistently punches above its weight class. “It’s a David and Goliath situation in the gift basket industry dominated by people like 1-800-Flowers,” says Lisa Byrne, chief operating officer at the company known internally as GGB.
“GGB is in the mid-market section of the industry, and that gives us the scale and the size to compete with the larger players, and the agility to be flexible and pivot to market conditions like a smaller player,” Byrne says.
That ability to pivot and adapt has contributed to growth that placed the company on the Fast Five list last year and this year as well. Byrne also attributes the company’s success to workforce retention and recruitment efforts, product development, consumer research, technology and relationships with vendors and carriers.
Stocking up on supplies well ahead of delivery dates has helped the company avoid the supply chain problems that have vexed competitors. With a 106,000-square-foot operations center in Exeter, GGB has room to store supplies well ahead of time.
“We plan about a year in advance so that gives us a lot of lead time to work with our vendor partners to produce what we need when we need it,” says Byrne. “We have a huge facility and it’s one of the weapons that’s helped us scale up so quickly.”
Shannon Bakiu, director of human resources, attributes much of the company’s growth to its workforce and its ability to attract and retain talent even in this tight labor market. “We have a lot of long-service employees who have been with this company and the family for a long time,” she says. “I can’t say enough about how important they are on a day-to-day basis in the success of the business.”