Doudlah Farms Email Migration to Google Workspace
Overview
During the November 2025 Amazon margins review, the DFO team identified significant pain points with their existing Outlook-based email setup and decided to migrate to Google Workspace. The migration covers both Doudlah Farms Organics and Old World Popcorn, with goals of separating brand communications, creating a shared orders inbox, and consolidating fragmented calendars.
Decision made: Migrate from Outlook to Google Workspace (~$15/month for two users at $7/user/month).
Related meeting: [1]
Problem Statement
The existing Outlook setup had several compounding issues:
- Storage limits: Outlook's small storage cap caused send/receive failures once the inbox exceeded ~2,000 emails, requiring constant manual deletion
- Brand confusion: All communications — DFO and Old World Popcorn — flowed through a single
lucy@doudlahfarms.comaddress, creating confusion for customers and no clean separation between brands - No shared inbox: Jason (warehouse) had no visibility into orders, requiring Lucy to relay information manually
- Calendar fragmentation: Three separate calendars in use (Outlook, Gmail, iPhone), causing missed calls and scheduling conflicts
Migration Plan
Accounts to Set Up
| Account | Purpose |
|---|---|
| Google Workspace — Doudlah Farms Organics | Primary business email for Lucy/Mark; replaces Outlook |
| Google Workspace — Old World Popcorn | Separate brand identity for OWP customer inquiries |
orders@doudlahfarmsorganics.com |
Shared inbox for order management; accessible to Lucy and Jason |
orders@oldworldpopcorn.com |
OWP-specific orders, forwarding into shared mailbox |
Key Requirements
- Unified inbox: All orders from both brands can route into a single shared mailbox, but outbound replies must send from the correct brand address (DFO vs. OWP)
- Jason access: Jason needs read/respond access to the orders mailbox for warehouse fulfillment coordination
- Calendar consolidation: Migrate to Google Calendar as the single source of truth; eliminate the Outlook/Gmail/iPhone split
- On-site setup: Mark Hope to visit and configure email clients on local machines after accounts are provisioned
Why Not Free Gmail?
A free @gmail.com address was considered for Old World Popcorn but rejected — it signals low trust to customers and wholesale partners. Google Workspace at $7/user/month provides custom domain email at minimal cost.
Action Items
- [ ] Mark Doudlah — Call Mark Hope with credit card info to provision Google Workspace accounts (~$15/month)
- [ ] Mark Hope — Set up Google Workspace for DFO and Old World Popcorn domains
- [ ] Mark Hope — Configure
orders@shared mailbox with access for Lucy and Jason - [ ] Mark Hope — Set up OWP email addresses with correct send-as routing
- [ ] Mark Hope — Consolidate calendars into Google Calendar; sync with iPhone
- [ ] Mark Hope — Visit on-site to configure email clients on local machines
Context & Notes
- The Outlook storage problem was exacerbated by bot traffic generating large volumes of failed order notification emails to the DFO inbox — a side effect of the website bot attack documented in [1]
- Mark Hope noted the Outlook → Gmail transition is "not horrible" — the main adjustment is behavioral, not technical; nothing lives locally in Gmail so storage limits are effectively eliminated
- The
orders@shared mailbox pattern is a recommended best practice for small teams: if one person is unavailable, others can see and respond to customer inquiries without gaps
Related
- [2]
- [1]
- [3]