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How we boot-strapped $10,000 at @my_obvi & built it to $30,000,000 in just under 3 Years

💵 Profitably
🚫No VC money
🚫No Equity Dilution

AMA & please provide feedback, we’re still on our journey to $100m & learning

RT if you find this valuable please 🙏

My first 🧵👇🏻
1/

Build a Lean but Mean Team

I am blessed with having 2 co-founders who manage marketing & branding/design separately.

Critical roles on our 8 person team:
-Rockstar CX Person
-Rockstar B2B Sales Rep
-Rockstar Social Media Manager
-Rockstar Video Editor
-Rockstar Web Dev.
2/
Outsource your 3PL so you can focus on growth

You need all the time you can get & you should be in charge of everything you can control up till a customer hands you $ over for their order. Let the rest be handled by 3PL experts.

Find a 3PL centrally located & price shop!
3/
Outsource your CFO/Controller/Bookeeper

This is a crucial finance stack that you simply cannot afford to pay more than $4-$5K a month for when you're starting up. However, being that it's crucial, there are many outsourced solutions at that price point. We're still outsourced
4/
WORKING CAPITAL IS YOUR BEST FRIEND

We've used a very robust fin-tech stack from day 1. When they say no, you ask again & again. When building your path to profitability, always bake in 3-5% margin for fin-tech fees, you'll be surprised how much runway you can get.
5A/
Here's our fin-tech stack, if you like me to go deeper on any of them and usage, comment and let me know!

@billcom - Streamline your entire AP/AR process through here
@Chase Ink allows for 2x points on marketing
@AmexBusiness Gold card allows for 3x points on adv. spend
5B/
continued..

We used the Parker Card + @payplastiq to achieve Net 90 on most of our Ad Spend, including Facebook!

We used @SettleFinance to extend our payment terms on our inventory by 60-90 days, but i made sure to consciously bake in 3-4% on my COGS when negotiating.
5C/
continued..

We use @upsidefinancing to fund our inventory with various manufacturers as well. Often times we are able to sell through inventory before delayed $ is due, creating a positive $ flow cycle.

We are beginning a relationship with @AssembledBrands .. stay tuned.
5D/
continued..

We are working with @rho_finance to establish a strong accord of a great cash-back play with a strong payment term attached.

What's amazing about these tools is honestly dealing with people who just get it. They understand the climate, they understand you.
6/
Negotiate EVERYTHING.

I know, it can come off annoying. But till this day, I still ask my manufacturers if there is anything we can do to save $0.05 per unit on the next run

The 🔑 to this is that you NEVER stop. 3 years later we still ask our 3PL to find ways to save .05%
7/
The numbers that matter

Focus on New Customer Acquisition Cost
Focus on AOV
Focus on keeping churn low
Focus on providing a strong reason for retention, dont just expect it.
Our reason was Innovation and FOMO.

More on that below.
8A/
Stop complicating innovation. We removed the guesswork.

We built a community & before it hit 50K members today, we only had a few hundred members for a long time. We still surveyed them & asked them what they want to see next (flavors, categories, etc.) & went to R&D
8B/
Build your innovation options around your manufacturing capabilities + low MOQs.

Till this day we purposely look for SKUs that can be made at LOW MOQs so my cost to entry can remain low and in return it fuels FOMO & Exclusivity upon selling out quickly!
8C/
The FOMO that we quickly create by selling out often gives us a restock that performs 2-3x higher than a launch

This strategy alone + community building has allowed for us to conserve cash while creating serious influx of revenue via burst launches w/ follow up restocks!
9/

From Day 1, we were able to disrupt our niche by creatively coming up with every way we could stretch our $

It inadvertently forced @ashvinmelwani to crack the code on advertising, us finding retail players for upfront cash & building a community that now is our backbone
10/
Keep Learning. Some of my favorites follows:
@ashvinmelwani - Marketing Genius
@iamshackelford - All Around Expert
@KevinDalaeli - The 🔌
@eliweisss - Knows how to treat customers best
@mrsharma - The D2C Guy
@joshua_schall - Wizard of CPG
@rabahrahil - bridging SAAS & CPG
11/
TLDR: Trust me, just read it.

Let me know what part of the thread you want to know more about, I’ll go deeper!

If you’d like an intro to any of the above services/platforms, feel free to dm me or ask me!
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Jesse Pujji @jspujji · Apr 1, 2022
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Great read!!