Strategies
The Q4 holiday season is the Super Bowl for DTC brands. With U.S. online holiday sales projected to rise just 5.3% this year—a sharp slowdown from last year’s 8.7% growth (Reuters)—every edge matters. Meta recently spotlighted six mistakes that routinely undercut campaign performance in
Industry
This holiday season, DTC operators are bracing for a perfect storm: record-breaking order volumes and intense scrutiny on packaging. U.S. carriers are projected to handle 2.3 billion packages during Holiday 2025, marking a 5% hike from last year’s peak (Reuters). That’s a tidal wave of boxes
Industry
As we gear up for Holiday 2025, direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands face a pivotal moment. The pandemic-era e-commerce boom has waned, and growth is slowing dramatically. Online holiday sales are expected to climb by just 5.3% this year, a steep drop from last year's 8.7% increase (Reuters)
Industry
Coca-Cola made headlines by launching a prebiotic soda line to compete with upstarts like Olipop (CNBC). It’s a clear sign that the $1.85B Shopify-powered Olipop has shaken up the soda industry by creating a brand that fans can’t stop raving about. As Olipop’s CEO, Ben Goodwin,
Strategies
Shopify’s App Store is a candy shop for DTC founders—offering plug-and-play solutions for nearly every site feature imaginable. Pop-ups? Check. Loyalty programs? Got it. Upsell widgets? Just a few clicks away. But this convenience comes with a hidden cost. The average Shopify merchant uses about six apps (Uptek)
Industry
When we talk growth in the DTC space, the conversation usually swivels straight to paid ads. Yet, Little Sleepies—the bamboo pajamas brand that Maradith Frenkel started in her garage back in 2017—went against the grain. Instead of diving headfirst into Facebook ad spends and influencer campaigns, Frenkel zeroed
Strategies
The days of effortlessly riding on paid social's coattails are behind us in the DTC world. With customer acquisition costs (CAC) skyrocketing due to iOS privacy changes and fierce competition from giants like Temu and Shein, Shopify founders are revisiting the fundamentals of growth. Imagine this: the cost-per-click
Strategies
You don’t need another Facebook ad. You need a channel your competitors are ignoring. Direct mail is back—and for mid-size DTC brands, it’s quietly becoming a profit lever. Benchmarks show ~41% average ROI on direct mail, outpacing search and social, and 80–90% open rates that dwarf
Strategies
TikTok Shop is on a tear—and Q4 is when it matters for Shopify brands. U.S. sales are up triple digits in 2025, with big-name operators piling in and consumers signaling they’ll keep buying in-app during holiday moments. TikTok says 83% of shoppers discover products on the platform
The intelligence every DTC operator needs to build, grow, and scale.
SEO isn’t dead, but it’s definitely not what it was last quarter. Google’s AI-powered Search Generative Experience (SGE) is changing the rules—fast. Instead of rewarding your hard-won #1 rankings with traffic, Google now answers many queries directly on the results page, no click required. If your
If you’re running a DTC brand in 2025, BNPL isn’t just another button at checkout—it’s how millions of Americans expect to pay. U.S. shoppers financed $82.4 billion in online purchases using BNPL in 2024, up nearly 10% YoY (Reuters). By August 2025, we’d
Remember when free returns were the DTC cheat code? They lowered buyer anxiety, fueled “bracketing” (buying multiple sizes, planning to return most), and helped brands win first-time shoppers. But what started as a trust-builder has become a margin-eater. 63% of consumers now buy with the intention to return extras, up
Q4 is coming in hot—and if you’re running a DTC brand on Shopify, you already know what that means: digital ad prices are about to hit escape velocity. In 2024, display ad CPMs jumped nearly 40% year-over-year by late Q3, setting the stage for an even wilder holiday
If you feel like pumpkin spice season starts before you’ve even put away the sunscreen, you’re not wrong. In 2025, Starbucks and Dunkin’ both dropped their fall menus in mid-August—what some call “Augtober”—well before the leaves start turning (Axios). The payoff? Massive. The pumpkin-flavored products market
If you’re running a DTC brand, you already know: the brands that win are the ones that actually listen to their customers. But “customer research” can sound like code for “money pit”—expensive agencies, endless surveys, and a six-figure invoice. The reality? Scrappy, DIY research is often the most
Direct-to-consumer (DTC) eCommerce isn’t a sideshow anymore—it’s a core channel driving nearly one-fifth of U.S. online retail sales (eMarketer). In 2024, DTC sales hit $213B—up 178% since 2019 (Invesp), and they’re projected to reach $239.7B in 2025 (eMarketer). For founders, that growth comes
The DTC sector in 2025 is split down the middle. Legacy players like Warby Parker and Allbirds are retrenching. Warby is killing its famous Home Try-On program to funnel customers into its nearly 300 retail stores—because most people using HTO already lived near one (Retail Dive). Allbirds posted a
Forget the $50k studio shoot. Right now, the best-performing ads in DTC aren’t the ones that look like they belong in Vogue—they’re the ones that look like they were filmed in your kitchen, on your phone, with a little bit of mess in the background. If you’
Labor Day used to be a retail afterthought—now it’s a can’t-miss revenue driver for DTC brands, especially those on Shopify. In 2024, 67% of tracked DTC brands ran Labor Day promos, up 7 points from last year (Q4Archive). The message from the data is clear: Labor Day
Let’s skip the hype: AI-powered content automation isn’t some distant future. For Shopify DTC brands, it’s already reshaping how operators build, launch, and scale. Think: launching a new SKU and having a full suite of on-brand ads, product descriptions, and visuals live before your second coffee—no
Shopify’s Summer ’25 Edition introduced what many operators have been asking for: one-page checkout. Early tests show conversion lifts ranging from 7.5% on average to as high as 30% (ioVista). For mid-size brands preparing for Q4, it’s a chance to claw back margin at the most critical
