Redwoods' Treewalk: Saving 274 Staff Hours Each Quarter and Optimizing Operations

The Redwoods Treewalk® customer service team was spending significant time every week answering high volumes of calls and emails about routine topics — pricing, opening times, and basic logistics for their treewalk experience. Owner Bruce Thomasen saw an opportunity to use the website itself as an extension of the customer service team.

Working with digital marketing partner Maverick Digital, Redwoods launched a website upgrade that included a custom Yonder chatbot named Sequoia.

Results: 2,327 Conversations. 5% Escalated to Staff.

"Since the website upgrade including our new chatbot — Sequoia — customers have virtually stopped contacting us by phone and email, which is exactly what we wanted. In 90 days over our busy summer period, the chatbot had 2,327 conversations, and just five percent have been passed to staff for response. Most people got the answers they wanted instantly. During that time, we saved around 274 staff hours, because the chatbot answered the questions for us." — Bruce Thomasen

Forty percent of those conversations happened outside 9–5 office hours — critical for an attraction that operates until 11pm in summer.

Administration manager Kip Mather:

"We receive fewer emails now as the chatbot answers most questions. It's great."

Bruce is now a committed advocate for tourism chatbots:

"They're not separate. If you've got a website, you need a chatbot too."

Customised to the Business From Day One

Sequoia was built on Yonder's unique question bank — built from over a million tourism conversations — which allowed the chatbot to understand and respond to questions effectively from the moment it went live.

Tim Olson, head of digital projects at Maverick Digital:

"Sequoia is an always-on solution. He was customised to suit the needs of Redwoods right down to his look. Yonder's bespoke solution is built for each business — rather than getting a solution that's 'good enough', Redwoods got something that was tailored to them."

Continuous Improvement Through Conversational Data

Redwoods uses Yonder's analytics to refine chatbot responses, improve their website, and anticipate customer needs.

"Analysis of chatbot conversation data identified problems we didn't even know we had. Questions about pricing were coming up very frequently, and it was three clicks into our website to get the info — so we used that insight to make pricing info more visible." — Bruce Thomasen

"Continuous improvement is an important part of our business and Yonder has given another tool to make that easy. It has really helped us streamline the customer journey."

"Yonder offer a great personalised service at great value."