Skinny & Co. started selling 100% pure coconut oil in 2013 and by 2021 they had made $10M. This is a story about how we helped them scale.
- Go-to-market strategy
- Product development and marketing
- Online marketplace expansion
- Wholesale sales growth
- Scaling international
Go-To-Market Strategy
The product was identified after researching market trends. At the time, coconut oil was in-demand, but suppliers were low.
After a manufacturer in Vietnam was identified, we began working on the branding and marketing, crafting the original, tree logo.
Once the first products arrived and were labeled, we began selling online via Shopify and quickly expanded into Amazon and Opensky.
They had their first sale on August 31, 2013, 5 days after Shopify went live and 3 months and 27 days from the first meeting on April 4.
Product Development & Marketing
We were responsible for growing online sales, building out the website’s content, doing SEO, and helping with social media marketing.
Our next push was in-store and for that we helped them create their first brochure for Oil Pulling, which was their second product.
In September we helped them get the word out at local festivals and health fairs and added the ability to buy online as a subscription.
We asked the receptionist at the dentist’s office to contact local news agencies to see if they’d be interested in covering the topic.
Because of the latest trend, a local TV station covered it and it got them national news coverage, which resulted in over $20K in sales.
People online began searching for the brand name as their search term, which had a higher buyer intent, meaning they were searching to buy.
Conversion rates spiked to 13%.
Wholesale Sales Growth
We then added in-house sales representatives to help sell to more businesses and hired a sales representative group to further expand sales.
We continued to expand wholesale sales and eventually we got into big-box retailers like Macy’s, Giant Eagle, Hot Topic, Box Lunch, and Hallmark.
Scaling International
In 2016 international versions of the websites were set up all around the world utilizing a freight-forwarding company, Fedex Crossborders.
We continued helping them launching new skin care products and by 2021 Skinny & Co. was in over 2000 stores and had made ~$10M.
The formula was simply to:
- Start with the right product – identify a product with market demand and/or that solves a problem
- Do content marketing right – answer questions or solve problems where the product is the solution
- Learn in feedback loops – evolve and create new products based on feedback from your existing products
- Use products as marketing – integrate the product development and launch cycle into the marketing strategy
- Leverage existing assets – expand new and existing products into new sales channels and distribution points
If you want help scaling your business either through go-to-market strategies for new products or by expanding your existing products into new sales channels or distribution points, Market Jack can help. We have experience with product design, marketing, e-commerce, and sales.
