In this episode of UnBoxed, Angelina Ly, Owner & Founder of Fireflyslime, sits down with host Deb Menter to share how she grew her brand from a hobby into a successful e-commerce business. She talks about the evolution of her shipping process—from handwriting labels to using automated software—and how technology has saved her time, money, and stress. Angelina also reflects on adapting over the years, the lessons she’s learned in packing and shipping, and why integration between order and shipping systems is essential for efficiency.

Key Takeaways:

• Shipping Software to the Rescue: Automating shipping labels and processes is a major time and cost saver for small businesses.
• The Need for Technology Integrations: Integrated systems between order platforms and shipping tools eliminate extra work and errors.
• Packaging Matters: Investing in durable packaging materials reduces product damage and replacement costs for every order - including bulk sales.
• Scaling for the Future: Scaling e-commerce successfully requires balancing efficiency with hands-on quality control.

Guest speaker: Angelina Ly, Owner & Founder, Fireflyslime
Angelina Ly is a first-generation Vietnamese American and founder of Fireflyslime, a passion project she began at 14 that has grown into a thriving community of slime enthusiasts. A recent Business Administration graduate, she handcrafts sensory-rich slime products in Seattle, WA, inspiring creativity, relaxation, and joy. Her journey has led to collaborations with retail stores, hands-on workshops, and features on platforms such as FOX’s Studio 13 and Scholastic Magazine. Driven by her belief that slime is more than just a toy – it’s a tool for creativity, therapy, and connection – Angelina continues to foster community and spread joy, one slime creation at a time.

Host: Deb Menter, Pitney Bowes
Deb is on the Client Lifecycle Team at Pitney Bowes, where she helps clients navigate complex rate changes, mailing system migrations, and greater shipping savings and value. You’ll also find her moderating Pitney Bowes webinars, where she addresses common client concerns and provides actionable solutions.

The material, opinions, and information presented in the podcast are for general information purposes only and is not professional advice. Listeners should consult appropriate professionals for specific advice tailored to your situation. The podcast and its content is provided as-is and any use is at the listener’s own risk. The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by guests or hosts are their own and do not necessarily reflect the view of any company.

The material, opinions, and information presented in the podcast are for general information purposes only and is not professional advice. Listeners should consult appropriate professionals for specific advice tailored to your situation. The podcast and its content is provided as-is and any use is at the listener’s own risk. The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by guests or hosts are their own and do not necessarily reflect the view of any company.

Deb Menter
Hi everyone and welcome to UnBoxed presented by Pitney Bowes, we're your source for all things shipping. I'm your host Deb Menter mentor and I'm super excited to be joined today by Angelina Ly, Owner and Founder of Fireflyslime. At just 14 years old, Angelina found out that one of her favorite crafts was quickly gaining traction online and she started a slime business.

After eight years, she's grown Fireflyslime into more than just an e-commerce business, selling at slime conventions and hosting pop-ups. So Angelina, thanks so much for joining me today. Let's dive right in and we'll start pretty easy.

Can you talk about how you developed Fireflyslime? I particularly love how you came up with the name.

Angelina Ly
Yeah, well thank you so much for having me. Yes, Firefly Slime has definitely grown a lot more than I have would have ever imagined. What just started as a creative outlet, I love all things creativity, so I love painting and sculpting and crocheting and anything that has to do with putting things together.

I just started making slime for fun and because I saw people do it online, I wanted to post some of my own creations. So, I started a little Instagram account back in 2017, I believe. And I just started posting anything I was making. I would turn slimes into little beach scenes. And put different colors and swirls and just anything that was like fun. And then it started to quickly gain traction.

Slime kind of had another resurgence when I was starting slime as well. So, as people were discovering slime, they were also discovering me. So, I was gaining a lot of followers initially, which really boosted like, oh, I really need to start posting more because people love what I'm doing. And then people started asking, where do I buy this and where do you make this? And so I started a quote unquote temporary store that just kept growing and growing. And as the years went by, I just kept like reinventing the things that I was doing and expanding my temporary store into more of like a full-time permanent e-commerce shop. And it's been amazing. I've been able to do so many incredible experiences through Fireflyslime.

I have been able to travel the country to go to different slime conventions. Believe it or not, that is a thing.

Deb Menter
I love that.

Angelina Ly
I've been able to host pop-up shops. And I was on the first slime competition show called Slime Wars.

I have been in Scholastic Magazine and on Fox and on Fortify Business and just so many crazy experiences that I never would have imagined. So I'm so grateful that my 14-year-old self decided to start this little hobby because it has taught me so much about what I know now.

Deb Menter
That's amazing. And I'm still floored that at just 22 years old, you've had this business for so many years. So when you think about crafting and doing all those things, I also am a big crafter. I love doing it. And it's so great for things like stress relief and creativity. And how have you found creating slime for yourself, but also how you found it for your customers? How do they use it? Do they use it for extra creativity, stress relief? I think you talk about that a little on your site, so can you tell me a bit more about that?

Angelina Ly
Yeah, so I think slime has a misconception that it is just for kids and it's just for play. And most people know it as like the Nickelodeon green slime, like messy goop.

And when I had to talk about slime for the first time, I have to show a lot of photos and videos to kind of get people a reference that it's so much more than just that. Of course, there is that creative outlet of it. And I personally use it for like, that is the biggest reason that I love slime, because you're able to make it into something like whatever you imagine. And I think a lot of people, especially nowadays where we're so caught up in work and our responsibilities and just life that we don't take a pause to do fun things and creative things and have more hobbies.

So I think just slime is a really great outlet for that. Whether that you love playing with slime on your own or you're doing with your friends, I think slime is a really great community builder. I host a lot of slime workshops whether that's in college campuses or just local communities specifically targeted towards like the finals weeks of schools or just busy times of the year because I think getting a bunch of friends together to make slime is a really fun activity and a lot of my audience also uses slime as stress relief so whether that's just sitting at home and you want something to fidget with during those long zoom meetings or you may use slime as an anxiety relief.

You have something to distract yourself from the moment by having something tactile to mess with. A lot of my customers have ADHD, anxiety, anything that would require some type of like physical distraction. And I think it's really great that I'm able to provide that outlet, that it's you know much more than just a kid's play toy.

Deb Menter
Absolutely. I think, and even, Imean, yeah, when you say slime, I also think of Nickelodeon slime. I'm, you know, an 80s kid. So that's what I remember. Yeah. Double dare and getting slimed on.

But I think it also gives that bit for adults too, that bit of nostalgia, that it's not exactly the same thing, but it has that same vibe. Do you find, you get a lot of repeat customers looking for different types of textures or even the same one over and over?

Angelina Ly
Yeah, so I definitely see a variety of both where a lot of people know what they like and they like to stick to that one thing. If they have a favorite texture, they'll just keep buying things of that texture because they know it works for them. And other times people love exploring different things. So I'll try to offer as many like texture bundles and texture packs as I can so that people can like try different ones that they haven't tried before. that's fun. There's a bunch of different uses, I would say, for different ones.

The ones that are more like a dough form and they're more holdable, they're most similar. Yeah, I usually say that they're more like a dough. I recommend to beginners because they're the least sticky, they're the least messy. They're very shapeable so that it's just very easy to get into slime that way.

And there's also a lot of other ones that may be made and with a slightly different formula that can hold beads in it. So that when you stretch it makes crunchy sounds and it has like that tactile feel of feeling all the different beads inside. And there's ones where if you squish them a certain way, they make a different sound. And there are a bunch of different ones that like if you're not specifically seeing slime videos or kind of in that world, you would never have known and you would have thought that only the runny Nickelodeon slime. So it's such a cool thing to discover because you'll realize that there's so much more to it and every texture has its own perks and things like that.

Deb Menter
Was there a moment in this journey, oh as you know, since you've been 14, was there an aha moment for you, this light bulb moment where you're like, this is it. This is why I'm doing this and this is what I'm going to keep doing for a while.

Angelina Ly
Yeah, definitely. So of course there was like little ones here and there where I was like, wow, this is something I really need to keep doing. But I would say the two that come to mind that were very early on were one with my social media account. So I started the social media account, of course, with no business intention. I just wanted to create it for fun.

And as I was gaining followers where initially I was gaining followers by the thousands a day. So I was like, oh, this is something that people really enjoy. And it's cool that I'm getting this audience without intending on getting an audience. I think a lot of people who start businesses want to start a business. And then they have to figure out like, what can I sell? What kind of things can I provide? But I kind of had the opposite experience where I had something already and other people wanted me to turn it into business.

Deb Menter
Yeah, it was very organic.

Angelina Ly
Yeah, it was very organic. It really did blossom from a passion for just creating things. And I never was like hunting for money or anything like that, or I never had that intent. So it was really cool to see the business blossom in the community that it really grew really so early on. I think having any type of social media skill at 14 is unheard of.

So it was really cool. I got very lucky that I got that initial boost and it kind of pushed me to kind of create more from that.

And on top of that, when I started doing in person like events and selling things in person, the very first event I did was in Chicago and it was my first experience with selling a product face to face with someone.

Having an e-commerce business, I feel can be very, very different where a lot of times the products that you make, you know you ship them off and you don't see them again or you don't see what happened to them or who they're gifted to or what people do with them.

So it's a really cool experience to see how people shop in person and like what they're looking for and how excited they get when they see slime and just yeah that first initial in-person event really sparked it for me because a lot of people that i had met through social media that I’ve never seen face to face or I’ve only seen through like their username I realized like wow these are really like real people in real life that either like came here to see me or came here to see other slime accounts.

And it was like my, I guess, like I've kind of felt like a celebrity that day where it was my first time signing autographs and taking pictures of people and people would come up and be like, I followed you on Instagram for like three years. And it was just so cool to see like that I'm making any type of impact on a real person and not just through a screen. So that definitely had motivated me a lot when I first started.

Deb Menter
That's great. I love that. I love that feeling of being at any kind of event and being able to connect with people, especially when you've been theoretically behind a screen the whole time you've been selling up until that point. So that's a lot of fun. And it sounds like you have a very wide and growing market, which is incredible. And you know your market really well.

We can see your workshop behind you, but I know that you are a one-woman show. How has this growth over time between e-commerce and and then getting into kind of in-person events, how has that changed how you've developed your products and then even how you get into packing and shipping? Knowing that all of this time you've also been in school, you've had some internships, some other jobs. It's a lot to do as one person.

Angelina Ly
I would say the biggest thing is definitely time management.
I like to do a little bit of everything. So when I was in school, I would join every club and host every event. I love feeling fulfilled that way where I'm making can great use of my time and doing as much as I can. But of course, when you are doing so much, it can be hard to juggle. So a lot of that does come down to learning how to manage your time.

Yeah, being one woman show definitely can be a struggle, especially because I started with no prior business experience and no one in my family had business experience.

So I didn't really have a mentor to lean on or anything like that. So a lot of the things that I learned were from the internet and from social media. And I had followed a lot of people that were similar to my age or had just started a business and we all kind of grew together in a way. So we were learning from each other's experiences but also had to do with a lot of like learning on the go and learning from trial and error.

And I think that's the best type of learning that there is because, you know, it's hands on and you can only learn so much from watching someone else do it versus doing it yourself. So a lot of the things that I had figured out were just from testing different things and you know getting a lot of feedback. So whether that's like slime recipes or anything that I'm making, I would listen to a lot of feedback on what people liked and what people didn't like and whether that's like online reviews or just in person.

And also my personal preference as it has grown over the years of learning the most efficient way to make certain things or how to make things better. Always just being open to change and just trying to evolve as time grows so that it can only get better and better.

Deb Menter
That's amazing. I think it's really, it's also wonderful to hear that you've built this community of like young entrepreneurs really that are getting into e-commerce. And so you talked a little bit about some of the technology you use, efficiency and how you've gained that.

So let's talk about how shipping software has helped you in both of those aspects. You know, leaning on some technology and making your process more efficient.

Angelina Ly
So when I first started, i would hand write every address on every label, which was incredibly time consuming because I didn't have any like shipping label machine or I didn't have any software for that. So I would purely just have the address from the order and I would take a Sharpie marker and I'd write it on each mailer. And then I would drive to the post office and I would stand in line, which could take over an hour if it was busy, to purchase my shipping label.

And it was so time consuming. But then I quickly learned that I needed some type of automation, any type of shipping platform that I've ever tried it has helped so much with just saving time, saving money, because then it can take the address and all of the information, like the weight of the packaging and then you know size dimensions, things like that, and just automatically generate it. And I would just have to click a button to purchase the label and it would print right away.

It has saved me so much time. And I'm not just saying that, it's one of the biggest time savers that there is. And yeah, and it's really great to start a business with having as much automation that you as you can, because, you know, you probably don't know as much about shipping if you just started or if you're really young, or you're just kind of getting into that world of entrepreneurship.

So having a lot of the things that are there for you right in front of you like analytics and just all the tools that are just in front of your fingertips is super helpful because then you can focus more on the things that you really love doing like creating the product and things like that rather than standing in line at the post office like I used to do.

Deb Menter
Yeah, no one wants to be doing that. I know you ship both domestically and internationally which is amazing and something that not every e-commerce business is doing. Do you with your leveraging of a shipping platform, do you typically offer free shipping, flat rate shipping? Do you allow your customers to make the a decision for themselves so they have control?

Angelina Ly
Yeah, so generally the customer can decide on whether they want a faster or slower shipping rate. Of course, that would depend on the weight of their package because the cheapest shipping option, which is Ground Advantage for USPS, it can only go up to a certain weight, then they would have to use Priority Mail.

So there generally is an option between Priority Mail I believe, Priority Mail Express and then any other faster options there. And then when it comes to my end, I would just make the decision whether would be more cost effective to use a flat rate box or just calculate it based on their weight.

So yeah, it's kind of like two different ways on both ends where The customer gets the options, they get to pick the different types that I offer, but also when it comes to me actually shipping it, I can take a look at what items are there and then decide what would be best.

Deb Menter
Oh, that's great. I love that you can do both of those things.

Angelina Ly
And then on my side, it's a really great like a one-stop shop for like entire list of all of my orders. And then I can just click a few buttons and then either bulk print all of my labels or go through them individually.

I prefer just to go through them individually so I can check each one, make sure I have all items in stock and then check things like weights at the package. And yeah, it's just a really great tool for automating a lot of that process, but also seeing all the analytics, which I love to take a look at.
It's just a very great tool for someone who I guess just wants one platform for everything instead of a bunch of different things which serve different needs.

Deb Menter
You talked about leveraging different types of shipping software, but do you also have, I assume you utilize kind of an order software as well within the some of the technology you use. So how important is it for you that those systems talk to each other?

Angelina Ly
Very, very important. I think if the systems didn't talk to each other, it's just another task for me to do to import all of my orders into my shipping software. So having that, I guess, connection between any type of ordering platform and then shipping platform is super essential because then I'm able to grab all the information, whether that's like the customer's address and then all of the item information and everything like that.

I think it's super necessary to have that connection. And yeah, I think it's like one of the most important parts of a shipping software that they're able to pull all the information that is essential to package the order and make the process super efficient into your shipping software.

Deb Menter
So do you also deal with bulk orders maybe for parties or for you know teachers buying their students that slime for end of year parties? Who knows? Is that something that you deal with? do you do it online? Do you do it separately with custom orders?

Angelina Ly
Absolutely. So, I do a mix of both where they're online and then there's also some that are local. So, I got a lot of bulk orders, whether that's for birthday parties, party favors, people just want to host like slime workshops. I partner with some retail stores as well. So, they'll order some slimes for their stores.
And yeah, so I would generally have them contact me via email and then they would let me know like the quantity they're looking for, any type of customization.

And then I would use the shipping platforms to automate the package weight and I would check all of that. A lot of the bulk orders do have a slightly different process when it comes to packaging because they there's a lot more in the package. So I have to make sure that they're super secure, and they're generally heavier, so it may require a different type of box. So, yeah, I definitely do a lot of bulk packages and they're really fun to make because then I get to see like a bunch of slime jars and I'm always so curious of like where they're going to.

Deb Menter
That's a really fun. And I think you bring up such an interesting point about how you have to differently pack and ship things with those different sizes. Because I imagine an individual might buy, I don't know, two or three at a time or a few if they're maybe be giving them to friends.

But when you do bulk orders, how have you over the years even changed how you pack and ship your products to make sure there's no leakage or if you needed a temperature controlled, I don't think you do because I think you control for that. But how has that evolved your packing process?

Angelina Ly
Yeah. So making sure that things arrive not damaged is super important. One on the customer side because you know nobody wants to have a broken and damaged item when it arrives.

But also on my side because then I don't have to pay for any replacements. And then, you know, it's not great on like my business if things arrive damaged.
So I take precautions on both sides, whether that's the item itself and also packaging. So with the item itself, I have gone through many variations of the material of my jars.

And I really prioritize durability as a big aspect of whether I'm choosing one over the other one. And the one I have right now is really great. I very rarely ever get emails about things being damaged, where where that might have been a little more common earlier on when I was using a different material.
So I'm confident that I'm able to like chuck this off of the roof and it won't crack. So it's really great.

Deb Menter
Have you tested that theory?

Angelina Ly
Yeah I dropped it accidentally from very tall places, but I do want to want test that for a video for fun. I've been trying to find like a bridge or something crazy.
So more on the product side making sure things that I use are very durable but also on the shipping side I currently use a mix of like bubble mailers and having individual bubble bags that I put items in and I seal them in and then sometimes I always use bubble wrap or different like paper materials that i kind of stuff in the package to make sure that the less wiggle that there is there, the less likely it's going to get damaged because it's not like hitting the size of the walls of the box.

Right. Yeah. And a lot of deciding of like what type of box or material that I use to ship definitely just comes from experience and packaging thousands of packages throughout the years.

I'm able to decide whether it would fit in this size or this size or this size box or if it would be more efficient to use a certain flat rate box depending on the weight of the package, the amount of items in there. And then I know off the top of my head, like what that cost would be.

So a lot of the automation kind of just comes from my brain of looking at all the items in front of me and knowing like, okay, this would be better in a flat rate box. So this would be better in a six by six-by-six inch box or things like that. So it's kind of it's kind of very fun. It's like a superpower knowing like simply what to grab from just looking at it.

Deb Menter
Yeah. And like you said, that hands-on experience, nothing beats it. You know, you're the one doing this yeah day in and day out. So you it's all just up in there in your brain. So, you know, you've talked about doing in-person events, ah you know, looking at the timeframe, you've been doing this over the course of a very like big event in our common history and COVID really changed the way a lot of people are selling.

And so I'd love to hear from you, how you found yourself getting into different places, how you had to shift maybe your strategy during COVID. I think e-commerce boomed. We all know that it really boomed, but you had just started in-person events. And I know, I think you're getting back into it now, but how did that shift your strategy?

Angelina Ly
Yeah, so I think COVID was definitely something that no one was prepared for, whether you're a small business or a large corporate corporation. Like now that we have to take precautions on things like that, but it was definitely a very new experience for everyone in the world.

And on the e-commerce side of things, I definitely saw a big boom in orders because everyone was stuck at home. They were looking for things to do. They had to find a way to entertain their family.

Deb Menter
Anxiety.

Angelina Ly
A lot of anxiety about the world and not knowing what things are, like what's happening. So having a tool for stress relief is really great for that. And yeah, I had just started going to in-person events and traveling and that definitely did take a pause when COVID happened because all of the slam conventions and things like that had been shut down and canceled.

And as you mentioned, I just got back into doing it again, now that things have calmed down a bit. I think last year I was doing like one per month, which is generally a lot for doing pop-ups.

But now that I've kind of got like the structure, like I know what I want to bring. I know what events are successful and which ones have my audience. I know which ones I want to repeatedly apply for. and It's really great to have that system going on.

And I definitely try to do as many that are like more focused on my local colleges and college kids love slime and doing things with like high schools and like family events, things like that. And i would definitely see that there's a huge range of age groups that love slime and it's really great to see that like it's not stigmatized to just kids as it used to be a lot of adults love slime you know yeah so COVID definitely did shift a lot of things a big part of it was of course supply chain issues, I was really hesitant to buy things in bulk initially because I didn't know where I wanted to take this business. 

But with COVID, I realized like, oh, I should have been doing that because everything got delayed and I had to stop offering a lot of the products that I was making because I wasn't able to get certain raw materials and ingredients because I do make everything in house. So all the slimes mixed with a big industrial mixer that I have here.

Everything is jarred up by me, stickered by me. So yeah. I had to source a lot of the raw materials and just my supplies, that had been paused, and I had to find other solutions for that. So, now that I'm more established into the business eight years later, I definitely do order a lot of the things that I have now in bulk, like a lot of my ingredients, a lot of my shipping supplies, I get in bulk.

And yeah, a lot of just supplies in general, I have like this big, shelf over here, which is a lot of my shipping supplies, have a chunk of it there and then the rest of it goes into storage. So yeah a lot of stuff that I'm just holding onto that, it's more cost effective that way, but also I know that I will have it here if anything ever happens. So it will able it will be able to hold me off for a while. And I think that you know so many businesses fell into that.

Deb Menter
No one expected the supply chains to have as much trouble as they were because you know globally we were all struggling. So, it's just a different piece of that full shipping journey that got delayed because you weren't able to get what you needed. So where how do you see your business growing over the next few years?

Angelina Ly
Yeah, it's a really crazy thing to think about because every year that I'm continuing to do this, I'm like, wow, it's been five years. It's been six years, seven, eight years. And I really didn't think that it was going to continue any longer than two years. Or even when I first started, I didn't think it was going to become a thing at all.

So it's been really rewarding to see that people are still super interested in it, that I still love doing it, and that I'm able to have so many cool opportunities from the business continuously.

Every year brings a lot of new opportunities and things that I'm able to do and collaborate with and work with brands that I never would have imagined being able to work with.

And I would definitely love to continue Fireflyslime as long as I'm able to because this has been my passion project and my creation that I've been working so hard on for the past eight years. So I don't know, I'm really excited to see where it takes me and I'm really open to you know every opportunity that comes my way. And as long as people still show that they're interested and that you know I'm definitely making that impact on people, then I will forever continue to grow Fireflyslime.

Deb Menter
I love that. And then I just realized, I said it in the beginning, but I don't, I'm not sure that, I asked a very long question, so I'm not sure you got to it. Can you remind us all how you came up with the name Fireflyslime?

Angelina Ly
I created the name Fireflyslime without any intention of starting a business again. So I purely just wanted to create a username for my Slime account on Instagram.

And i just wanted something very simple. A lot of the slime accounts at the time were adding like numbers and periods and x, not x, which points, underscores to their usernames. And I wanted something very simple, just something-slime or a slime-something. So, I started inputting a bunch of different words into you know the username and a lot of things were taken already.

I have this string light in my room of dragonflies that were above my door. So I tried dragonfly slime and that was taken. So i was like, okay, next best thing, Firefly.

And it was available, so I took it. And then now I really do play into it. I have all of my logos have fireflies and all of my like my mascots on my website have fireflies.

I have this cute character that I use for all of my like branding. And I've had a whole line of like glow in the dark slimes that are kind of playing more into that firefly aspect of things. That's so fun. It's really cool. I really love what I've been able to turn it into.

Deb Menter
That's a lot of fun. And I think it's very memorable. So Angelina, thank you so much for your time today. This was such a fun conversation, and I can't wait to see where Fireflyslime goes.

So if you liked what you heard, please like and subscribe to this podcast and we will see you on the next episode of UnBoxed.