Ecommerce Ops Intern - AI, CRO & Data Skills at ICG in Columbus
Career & Market Insight
This internship at ICG is a high-intensity, high-upside opportunity best suited for someone who wants startup-speed career acceleration rather than a structured graduate program experience.
Skills you'll develop are genuinely in demand:
- SQL + AI-assisted data analysis — a skill pairing growing rapidly in ecommerce ops roles
- Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) — a specialized, measurable skill valued by D2C and marketplace companies
- AI tooling (Cursor, Claude) — hands-on exposure to agentic AI workflows is a differentiator in the 2025 job market
- Pricing strategy and marketplace operations — transferable to roles at any ecommerce platform
Culture signals: ICG is a classic acquisition-led holdco at growth stage (~50 people, $100M+ revenue, 6 acquisitions in 18 months). Expect a lean, execution-first culture with minimal hierarchy. The description explicitly says no active mentorship — this is sink-or-swim by design, which is a green flag for self-directed learners and a red flag for those needing structured guidance.
Compensation: No salary disclosed for this internship, which is a yellow flag. Clarify early in the process whether this is paid and at what rate.
Path to full-time: The explicit conversion opportunity is a genuine green flag — if you perform well, this could become a permanent role within a fast-growing holding company with exposure to multiple portfolio businesses. The breadth of work (data, AI, marketplace ops) in a single summer gives you a multi-domain portfolio that's hard to build at larger, siloed organizations.
About Inspiration Commerce Group (ICG)
We're a team of ~50 people who've done 6 acquisitions in 18 months and scaled from $0 to >$100M in revenue. We're a global group with businesses across the US, UK, and EU. We buy and build companies that help people find and buy the products they love. Our portfolio includes leading fashion marketplaces like Italist, HEWI and Verishop, affiliate marketing platforms like Stylight and MyBestBrands, B2B technology solutions like Bonsai, and niche Marketplaces in the Creator and Construction spaces like Everpress and DOZR.
About the Role
We're looking for someone to join us as a Summer Intern (Ecommerce Operations) on our Italist luxury fashion marketplace.
Throughout the summer you will pilot a number of projects we have in our backlog, testing and experimenting to see what works (that we'll then invest in long-term) vs. what doesn't. You'll have the opportunity to leverage AI in your work, and to develop your skillset across Account Management, Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO), Pricing Strategy and Data Analysis/Business Intelligence.
This is a hands-on role — you will not be building decks and plans, you'll be taking project briefs and doing the actual work. This is full-time over the summer, and has the opportunity to convert to full-time or part-time after the internship. We are open to both current students, new grads, and folks making a career pivot or returning from a leave.
This is a full-time, remote-first role in Canada, the UK or the EU.
Things You'll Work On
Piloting Projects: We have a backlog of projects we're looking to pilot across the business — you'll take project briefs, launch new initiatives quickly, iterate based on data, and then present your results so we can decide what to double-down on vs. what to pass on for now.
Reporting & Data Analysis: You'll dig deep into data across our business to draw insights and make data-backed recommendations on actions we can take. You'll learn to query data using SQL via AI interfaces, build reporting and dashboards, and set up alerting/monitoring with various integrations.
Building with AI: We are in the process of becoming more AI-first as an organization, and you'll be part of that transformation. You'll write code, build prototypes, manage API integrations, create automations and more through Claude, Cursor, etc.
Attitudes We Look For
We don't care what your current job title is, how long you've been working, or whether you have a pedigreed background. We do care about you being tightly aligned with our operating principles:
You're competitive and love to win. You're always looking for an edge and hold yourself (and others) to a very high bar.
You do whatever it takes. You're willing to do what others won't to achieve what others can't. What we're doing is hard. Really hard. Sacrifices are required in the pursuit of greatness, and we're chasing greatness.
Founder-level ownership. If something breaks, you fix it. If there's an opportunity, you chase it. You never say "that's not my job".
Curiosity with teeth. You don't just ask why something isn't working — you dig until you know, then you ship a fix.
You ask for forgiveness, not permission.
You're a self-starter. You love being in the weeds and rolling up your sleeves to get things done. You never let roadblocks stop you.
Who This Role Is Right For
Someone who has been building with AI on the side and is excited to apply that to real-world problems in a scaled business
Someone who has thought about running their own business, launching a startup, and being entrepreneurial
Someone who is willing to work very hard over the summer to develop skills much faster than they think possible
Someone who thrives in chaos: throw you a new challenge on Friday, and you'll know by Monday what you want to do and how you want to do it
Who This Role Is Not Right For
People who want a stable, predictable or repetitive role/set of tasks
People looking for active mentorship (i.e. you'd rather have someone tell you exactly what to do vs. figure it out on your own)
People who are excited about building and managing a team vs. handling the details themselves
People who find comfort in following a playbook
People who don't want to be in the weeds, spending hours querying a database and slicing data to find new insights
People who prefer stability over speed or "strategy over execution"
Logistics & Next Steps
Process: Everyone will hear back within 3 days of applying. Our process involves calls with 2–3 members of our team.
Work Setup: We operate remote-first with some time spent in-person together throughout the year as needed.
Working Hours: We trust team members to manage their own schedules and believe that taking time off to recharge makes you more productive in the long run. That said, we're early enough that everyone's work makes a big difference on the company's trajectory. Typically, the team checks out around 6pm to protect personal time and may log back in later at night to finish anything left undone.