About Yankee Dabbler

Yankee Dabbler is a U.S.-based eCommerce brand serving a passionate community of hobbyists and collectors. With a strong catalog of niche products and a loyal customer base, the brand focuses on creating a smooth, trustworthy shopping experience that converts intent into completed purchases.

As the business grew, Yankee Dabbler became increasingly focused on optimizing checkout performance — ensuring every element in the buying journey adds value rather than friction. To make confident, data-backed decisions, the team relies on experimentation instead of assumptions, using TestSignal to validate changes before rolling them out.

But they had one big question: Does Shipping Protection improve revenue — or does it quietly drag down conversion and sales? To get a clear, data-backed answer, Yankee Dabbler ran a controlled experiment using TestSignal Theme Testing.

The Challenge

Yankee Dabbler noticed that Shipping Protection was being added to the checkout experience — but its real impact was unclear. The theme, layout, and design were identical. The only difference was whether Shipping Protection was enabled or removed.

Before making a permanent decision, the team needed to answer a critical question:

• Is Shipping Protection helping revenue — or hurting conversion?

• Does it add friction during checkout?

• Are customers willing to accept it without abandoning the purchase?

Experiment Setup

• Experiment Type: Theme A/B Test

• Theme Tested:

  • Control: Same theme with Shipping Protection enabled

  • Test A: Same theme without Shipping Protection

• Traffic split: Even across all variants

• Duration: Sep 12, 2025 - Sep 17, 2025

• Timezone: America/New_York

High-Level Results

Key Insights from the Data

The data showed a clear pattern:

• Removing Shipping Protection increased revenue efficiency

  • Higher revenue per visitor

  • Significantly higher AOV

• Shipping Protection introduced checkout friction

  • More hesitation during checkout

  • Slightly higher abandonment

• Although conversion rate dipped slightly without protection,
  the overall revenue gain more than compensated

In short:
Shipping Protection reduced the value of each checkout session.

Final Outcome

Yankee Dabbler decided to remove Shipping Protection from the checkout flow.

• Revenue increased without changing traffic or pricing

• Customers completed purchases with fewer interruptions

• The checkout experience became simpler and more conversion-friendly

Most importantly, the decision was backed by real customer behavior — not assumptions.