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Customer case studyMB Collective β€’ Published: June 2025 β€’ Sector: Fashion E-commerce

How MB Collective processes 80% of 200 daily customer enquiries and saves around 50 hours per week

Scale five international fashion webshops without customer service growing in direct proportion to order numbers.

MB Collective

"Our customer service no longer grows in direct proportion to our order volume. We can scale without adding hours or people."

MB Collective MB Collective TeamOwner, MB Collective
Β± 80%

Automated

Of recurring customer enquiries processed fully independently

Β± 50 hours

Time saved per week

Estimated weekly time saved for the operational team

1 min

Response time

Immediate automatic handling of known scenarios

About the customer

About MB Collective

MB Collective operates five fashion webshops with international fulfilment. The webshops are active in the European Union, the United Kingdom and Australia. A team of seven employees handles approximately 200 customer enquiries every day across the shops. All webshops run on Shopify. Customer communication arrives through Google Workspace mailboxes on their own domains. The international scale and large order volume created a continuous stream of recurring questions about shipping, tracking, returns and stock.

About MB Collective

The problem

The challenge: 10 to 16 hours of customer service a day

Before NexReply, every customer enquiry was handled entirely manually. An employee read the message, looked up the relevant information and then wrote a response. With around 200 enquiries a day, this took the team an average of 10 to 16 person-hours per day.

Most common email scenarios

  • 🚚 Shipping and tracking enquiries (where is my parcel?)
  • πŸ”„ Return enquiries (how do I return my order?)
  • πŸ“¦ Stock enquiries (is this item still available?)

The impact of a heavy support workload

A persistently full inbox, an average response time of five to six hours and little room for work that helps the webshops grow further.

200+ per dayIncoming customer enquiries

The impact of the support workload

Pressure on operational capacity

The team spent most of the day on repetitive checks.

Slow international response times

Customers in different time zones had to wait a long time for a response.

No economies of scale

More orders immediately meant a proportionally larger support team was needed.

In fashion, many questions concern specific order data, so the answers must be correct. A wrong answer about a delivery costs us more than no answer.

MB Collective MB Collective OwnerOwner, MB Collective

The decision

Choosing NexReply: up-to-date Shopify data and control

Before

  • No direct Shopify integration for order data
  • No review mode for complex questions
  • No support for multiple webshops and mailboxes
  • No seamless Google Workspace integration

With NexReply

  • Direct Shopify integration for order data
  • Retain review mode for complex questions
  • Support for 5 separate webshops and mailboxes
  • Seamless integration with Google Workspace

Non-negotiable requirements:

  • Direct Shopify integration for order data
  • Retain review mode for complex questions
  • Support for 5 separate webshops and mailboxes
  • Seamless integration with Google Workspace

The approach

The solution: NexReply as an intelligent automation layer

NexReply was connected to Shopify for order, shipping and stock data, and to the Google Workspace mailboxes of the five webshops. Because each webshop has its own brand and tone of voice, communication was configured separately for each shop. MB Collective deliberately started in review mode to build confidence for each type of question.

Configured automations

Order on hold

Immediately informs customers about payment or address checks.

Backorder communications

Provides accurate updates on expected delivery times.

Return procedure

Automatically sends the correct return label.

Delayed delivery

Retrieves the live status and proactively updates the customer.

Stock and restock enquiries

Matches questions with current restocking dates.

Send missing items / Resend the order

The integration with the fulfillment partner automatically handles partial or full reshipments, without requiring you to log in to the partner’s portal.

Responses are based on:

Tone of voice

Gentle, helpful and suited to a premium natural products brand.

Business rules

No AI hallucinations; replies stay within approved boundaries.

Live context & data

Actual Shopify order data linked to Monta shipments.

Operational process flow

6 steps from incoming email to resolution

  1. Email arrives

    The customer emails support@mbcollective.nl

  2. Question type identified

    NexReply analyses the exact intent

  3. Current data retrieved

    Order & shipping data from Shopify/Monta

  4. Rules checked

    Business rules and templates checked

  5. Reply prepared

    Written accurately in the brand's tone of voice

  6. Sent or escalated

    • βœ“ Sent automatically
    • β†— Sent to a team member

Technology

API integration with Shopify and Google Workspace

NexReply was connected to Shopify for order, shipping and stock data, and to the Google Workspace mailboxes of the five webshops. Because each webshop has its own brand and tone of voice, communication was configured separately for each shop. MB Collective deliberately started in review mode to build confidence for each type of question.

  1. Shopify

    • Order data
    • Customer information
    • Order status
  2. NexReply

    • AI Engine
  3. Google Workspace

    • Mailboxes
    • Emails
    • Replies
  4. Monta WMS

    • Stock
    • Shipping
    • Tracking

PostNL Shipping Integration

Tracking and delivery status available directly through Monta WMS

"What pleasantly surprised us most was how quickly it went live. Within the first month, responses were already fully automatic, and support from NexReply was always immediately available."

MB Collective MB Collective OwnerOwner, MB Collective

Shopify API

  • Order details
  • Customer information
  • Product details
  • Order status

Google Workspace Inbox

  • Central management of 5 separate mailboxes
  • Seamless email synchronisation without delays
  • Responses sent directly from the company's own domains

Monta WMS

  • Stock
  • Shipping and tracking

The Results

Significant time savings and drastically shorter response times

Results at a glance

Time spent per day
2–4 hours
Previously per day
10–16 hours
With NexReply per day
Around 2–4 hours

Response time comparison

From hours to minutes

Before

Manual

Response time
5 - 6 Hours
Working method
Check every email manually
Time spent
10 - 16 hours per day

Now

With NexReply

Response time
< 1 Minute
Working method
Standard questions handled automatically; exceptions reviewed
Time spent
Around 2 - 4 hours per day

Less manual work

From 10–16 hours per day to around 2–4 hours per day.

Less inbox pressure

Standard questions are handled automatically, giving the team a calmer workload.

More time for exceptions

The team has more capacity for complex questions and strategic improvements.

Consistent communication

Customers receive faster, more consistent replies, with less risk of human error.

The strategic impact

  • Less pressure on the customer service team.
  • Consistent replies across five separate webshops.
  • Greater visibility and shorter response times.
  • More time for work that contributes to further growth.
  • Scale internationally without an equivalent increase in support capacity.

Tone of voice: better than expected

Maintaining their own tone of voice was initially one of the biggest concerns. In practice, the responses proved close to what the team would write itself.

"Because each shop has its own tone, it was important to be able to configure this separately for each webshop."

MB Collective MB Collective Owner

Market position

NexReply vs. the market

NexReply vs. the market
RoleNexReplyTrengoMinimal AI
AI email recognition Yes, with context No Not specified
Order data integration Real-time Via API only Not specified
Draft reply + approval Yes Not specified Not specified
Dutch language support Native Dutch Yes Not specified

Would you like this for your webshop too?

"If you receive many of the same questions, just try it. Start in review mode so you can see what goes out, and enable it for each question type once you have confidence in it."