Building a $100 Million Brand, One Bridesmaid Dress at a Time

0:00Before you dive into this episode, I've got some news to share. Shopify Masters is back on YouTube. We're dropping weekly video episodes for the podcast. All you got to do is click the link in the show notes and subscribe on YouTube so you get notified every drop. Seven and a half years ago, I was sitting in my living room, building a website and launching a brand. Now we are a hundred million dollar business, which is remarkable.

0:29Hey, what's happening? I'm Benjamin Gottlieb back with Shopify Masters. It's your companion for starting and building a business. It is one thing to achieve financial success in business. It's another thing entirely to maintain it. And that's why I am so thrilled to have Grace Lee Chen back with us two years later in Los Angeles. Most recently, we were featured on SNL. Sabrina Carpenter was wearing one of our bridesmaids dresses, and that was a huge moment for us. She is the founder of the fashion brand, Birdie Gray, the brand made popular by its bridesmaid dresses under$100. Bridesmaids dresses were expensive for no reason, and it's because no one had really bothered to innovate or bring down that price point She's here to chat about product diversification and sustained growth.

1:10Grace, good to see you again. Thank you for being here. Thank you so much for having me. So, Grace, the bridesmaid dress, my goodness, that is a much maligned piece of clothing. It never fits. You've got to buy a new one all the time. They cost a ton. There are so many problems, and you've solved them with your brand, Birdie Gray. Yeah, for sure. I mean, the brand was truly born out of my own experience as being a bridesmaid. Prior to launching Birdie Gray, I had been a bridesmaid six times myself, and I realized that the shopping experience every single time was kind of painful, expensive, took a long time, very strict and unflexible.

1:45And so I launched Birdie Gray to sort of fill that void. Well, and clearly you have. You've been incredibly successful in this space. You passed the$100 million mark, which is amazing. Thank you. And here we are a couple of years later, and you're not just doing the same thing. It wasn't enough for you just to stay in that space. You've expanded. Yeah. So, I mean, our vision has always been to be a one-stop shop for all of your wedding party needs. We started with bridesmaids' dresses. We stayed hyper-focused on bridesmaids' dresses for a really long time. We've expanded into other categories.

2:20And now we are tackling groomsmen. Well, and as you know, this program is for the current and aspiring entrepreneur. and I don't know, from where I'm sitting, that's a big change from a bridesmaid dress to groomsmen, to suits, to ties, everything else that goes along with that. How did you determine what category to go into? So it's interesting. It happened very organically. You know, first and foremost, I think it's really important for any aspiring entrepreneur to really focus on their core product, work at it, become famous for it, really become sort of, you know, the owner of that product and then start expanding into other categories.

2:58And so for a very long time, you know, we're seven and a half years in, and we're now just starting to sort of really expand into groomsmen. But it happened organically. We were approached by a partner to drop ship suits a couple years ago. And we said, why not? I mean, it really makes sense because you have the bride who is the primary decision maker on not only the bridesmaid's dresses, but has heavy influence over the color of the groomsmen suits. I would say more than heavy influence. Yeah, exactly, exactly. You know, sequentially, the decision is made where she chooses the bridesmaid's dresses first and then the Grimsman suits.

3:30And so we shot suits next to our bridesmaid's dresses and a lot of brides found it to be really helpful. And, you know, when you're a bride planning your wedding, you have so many decisions to make. It's very, very stressful. And so we wanted to take the stress out of it and make it really easy for her to find everything for her wedding party in one destination. And so we're launching Bertie Gray Suits this spring. And I'm so excited and so proud. Like I said, we were dropshipping suits and the business really took off. And so it made sense for us to really, you know, launch our online. Which is remarkable.

4:00And you're doing that with us on Shopify, which I think is also rather cool. I mean, what is it about Shopify that allows your business not only to facilitate that growth, but also to expand beyond, as you mentioned, your bread and butter, the product that really set you apart from your competitors? Yeah, Shopify is so great. seven and a half years ago, I was sitting in my living room by myself, building a website and launching a brand. And, you know, fast forward to now, we are a hundred million dollar business, which is remarkable. The suits business will also launch on Shopify and it'll be a very seamless sort of UX experience where you can toggle between both the core site and the suit site.

4:38So, you know, going back to the bride being the decision maker, she's really thinking about the colors and, you know, coordinating the bridal party, but it's really groomsmen who are coming by to actually purchase the suits. And so we knew that we had to tailor the experience to both the bride who's making the decision and to the groom's men who are the end sort of purchaser. And so the site experience feels very seamless, but if you're shopping dresses on our site, it's very tailored to a dress experience. The groom's experience is completely different. We have a heavy focus on like all the tailoring touches, you know, what makes the suit so great?

5:10What makes it so versatile? Guys prefer a really easy shopping experience, like the less noise the better. So we really pulled back. It's very clean and it's very easy. Maybe perhaps folks who are listening or watching right now haven't thought about it in that way, like how you have to tailor your sites based off of your customer base, right? Absolutely. Are you doing the same thing with your marketing? Yes. So from a marketing perspective, we are acquiring the same person who's the decision maker, the bride. When we think about it from a marketing perspective, we're acquiring our brides to choose their bridesmaid's dresses.

5:41And then, you know, the groomsman business is just building her basket or growing that AOV. It's still the bride that is the primary customer. She is the primary decision maker. Decision maker, okay. Yes. What's great about our marketing model is that it's a one-to-many. You know, in traditional retail, it's one-to-one. You acquire a customer and she comes back, you know, makes multiple purchases. For us, we think about the LTV of a bridal party. And so, you know, expanding into groomsmen, knowing that the bride who we've already acquired as a decision maker made sense. And for our audience, LTV, lifetime value is what you're referring to.

6:12Let's get back now to diversification and your advice as someone who's done this successfully. What would you say to someone who has a hero product, they're looking to diversify, how should they determine which product to choose specifically in clothing? Yeah, that's a really great question. You have to really understand the shopping journey of your customers. So for us, brides are who we acquire, bridesmaids are who are purchasing. And so when we think about category expansion, we think about, okay, what else can we sell the bride? And for us, that's bridesmaids gifts that she's buying in not one-to-one, but sets of one-to-five, right?

6:49Five gifts for every bridal party. The average bridal party size is about five people. So what else can we sell the bride? And then we have, you know, complete the look sort of accessories for bridesmaids. So, you know, what can we cross sell with her bridesmaids dress? That means shapewear to wear underneath, shoes, jewelry. For the bride, gifting is really big. So we have a really large getting ready category. We have jewelry that she buys 50 % of the time as gifts and then little white dresses that she can purchase for her various bridal events, whether it's the bridal shower, the bachelorette party, or, you know, like a third look for the wedding reception.

7:24Or when you're dancing later that evening, right? Exactly, exactly. And so for groomsmen, it's the same thing. You know, we have suits that we're launching, but we also have accessories that he'll need to complete the look, especially with a tuxedo. We have an incredibly sharp tuxedo that we're launching. We also have suspenders to cross-sell, cufflinks, you know, the shirt, all of it. What is so remarkable about your brand is how you've kept the promise of this low-cost bridal ensemble. I'm curious about that because we know that the cost of things keeps rising, right? With inflation, materials are more.

7:57How have you been able to keep your costs the same for your customers? Because we've been growing so rapidly year over year, we're able to get price breaks when you order at scale. So we've been able to keep our costs down. Our suits, the starting price point is$199. For a jacket and pant, the tuxedo will be$249. And then you can add other products like a vest or a shirt. It's really about creating really beautiful, thoughtfully designed products that are accessible. I think that's what was missing in the marketplace when we first launched was bridesmaids dresses were expensive for no reason. And it's because no one had really bothered to innovate or bring down that price point.

8:31A lot of it was also, you know, wholesale retail where there was that retail markup, but we were direct to consumer. So we were able to offer at a lower price point. So that's kind of where we are. And inflation is real. We have since broken the$99 price point, although our opening price point is 89 and a majority of our dresses are still under 100. But we've been playing around with pricing and, you know, everything is still under$129. So you can still find an affordable, beautiful dress. But to go back to that, you've been able to keep that rate, keep that kind of general cost because of scaling.

9:04Yeah. Which seems somewhat counterintuitive that making more, you know, you wouldn't incur additional costs. But that's actually been a break for you. Yeah. You know, when we first started, we were barely ordering the MOQs, which is minimum order quantities, right? At the time, I think it was 100 MOQ or 300 MOQ, depending on the factory. Now we're able to order a lot more. And so you get those price breaks. I mentioned earlier that you passed the$100 million mark, which is incredible in seven years. That is something that I think most folks who are watching, sitting at home right now, they're like, man, I wish I could do that.

9:38That's what I would love to achieve with my brand or my idea. When you reflect on that milestone, how do you make sense of that? It blows my mind if I'm being honest. Truly, when I set out to launch Birdie Gray in my first year, I remember thinking, oh God, if I can scale this to be$5 million a year, I'd be so happy. We grew so quickly and I can't believe we've broken a hundred million in a really short amount of time. I'm so proud of that. I never could have ever dreamed that we would hit this milestone. I know a lot of startups never achieved this milestone. The fact that we've done it quickly and profitably, we've been profitable every single year since we've launched with the exception of 2020, which was COVID, where no events-driven business was profitable.

10:23So I'm really proud of that. What has been key, though, to that profitability? I mean, you've had on average, I think it's like 60 % year-over-year growth. Yeah. How have you unlocked that? What would you say are the major contributing factors? Our marketing is really efficient because, again, it's not one-to-one. And I feel like a lot of DTC brands will spend a lot to acquire a customer. For us, it's a one-to-money model. Acquire one bride, she brings back five bridesmaids who are buying those dresses and hopefully five groomsmen who are also buying their suits. So marketing has been really efficient.

10:54I think that there was just a lot of white space. I think we have a really precious brand that resonates with our core customer. When we first launched, it was catering to millennial women. Now it's Gen Z women, and we've been able to evolve with our customer. I'm interested to hear you say that you've been targeting a younger demographic. Yeah. How are you targeting them? The average age from when we launched to now has always been 28 years old. It's a revolving door of 28-year-old, you know, bridal parties shopping with us. And so that's just the marrying age. We have no choice but to evolve with our customer.

11:28And our customer loves to give us feedback. And so, you know, whether it's color, silhouettes, fabrics, wedding vibes, whatever it is, they're not afraid to reach out and tell us what they want. We are very, very receptive to customer feedback. We've built a whole customer feedback loop through, you know, really tracking NPS feedback, CSAT feedback, you know, things that are written on third-party wedding sites, things that are written in our own product reviews. We really analyze feedback so that we can serve the customer. And when you're reaching out to those customers directly, are you doing this mostly with your social media platforms?

12:00Are you doing this in other ways? I mean, what is your direct communication with those customers like? Yeah. So definitely on social media, we'll do Instagram polls on Insta stories. We now have an Instagram broadcast channel where we get direct feedback from brides. We have a bride Facebook group that we lean on. People will DM us or leave comments like, hey, I love this dress. Can you please launch it in seafoam green? You know, whatever it is. And then we also do a lot of customer surveys where we survey our own customers. And then we do gen pop surveys. So, and then again, we get a lot of feedback through product reviews and NPS.

12:36Is there anything from some of those surveys that you were, I don't know, surprised by that you learned, especially when it comes to some of these newer products? You know, it's really interesting to see different fabrics trend up or trend down year over year. The trend cycle is a little slower in bridal because the planning period is so much longer than, you know, your regular fashion cycle. but it is interesting to see, you know, an example is for a very long time, chiffon was our number one fabric and satin was kind of on the rise slowly, but surely. But now satin is the most popular fabric.

13:07Chiffon is still really popular too, but it's interesting to see those shifts in trend. Those are just coming out from your surveys or you're just seeing from your customer data, from purchase data? Customer data, but also surveys. So surveys are a really early indicator for what the bride wants because oftentimes when we hit her with a survey, it's about six months to a year before her actual wedding. So now that you've become basically, I think I'm safe, it's safe to say this, more of an established known quantity in this space. I would imagine you're also seeing some of your competitors off the sides of your shoulders, looking at what you're doing, trying to emulate your model, trying to maybe make that dress a little bit cheaper.

13:43How do you and your team strategize for kind of defending against some of this rising competition? Yeah, that's a good question. We are hyper-focused on competition. One, we think about what is defensible and unique to Birdie Gray. I think a big thing is our brand story. So, you know, being a female-founded brand, female-led, my co-founder, she's my best friend. She was my maid of honor in my wedding. We've been in wedding as bridesmaids together many times before. And so we have a very authentic story that we really try to bring to life through our content strategy, whether it's social, online, or through email.

14:19And also, I think we do have first-mover advantage. We kind of became famous for our$99 Bridesmaids dresses. And so we are first to come to mind when you think about Bridesmaids dresses that are affordable online. And we just keep a really close pulse on competition. I think it's really important. But I do think we have a brand that's very unique and precious and sets us apart from competition. So the authenticity, the way that it's represented in your content, but also I think you're being maybe a bit modest in the sense that you're not just paying attention to what your competitors are doing.

14:48You're making sure that your products are better. Exactly. Yeah. We take a very thoughtful approach to our product development process. I'll give you a couple examples. Some of our best-selling styles are convertibles. So one of our best-selling styles is our Grace Convertible Dress. It's a strapless dress with two very long front straps that you can tie the neckline 15 different ways. Another bestseller is a dress called the Mia that comes with detachable off-the-shoulder sleeves. So you can wear her as like an off-the-shoulder dress or as a strapless or with optional straps. With our groomsmen suits, there's so much detail baked into it.

15:22My favorite is a stretch waistband because we know that groomsmen are going to be hitting the dance floor and they want to be comfortable and they don't want to feel uncomfortable in their suit. For a lot of Gen Z men, this is the first time they're going to need to buy a suit, right? And so we wanted to make sure that it was comfortable. The suits have a touch of stretch. So we're very, like, mindful about the details in the construction. And I think, you know, people appreciate that and it resonates with our customer. You have been an early adopter of influencer marketing. That's something that you definitely leaned into and I would imagine continue to to this day.

15:53I'm curious, are you still relying on the same folks to help you when you're launching new products? Are you finding other influencers? I mean, what is the process for finding the right conduit by which you express to your newer or existing customers these new products? Yeah. So we actually don't have a set of influencers that we always work with. We work with influencers who are brides. And so it's also a revolving door of influencers who are at that life stage. And so we're always working with influencers. We've partnered with mega influencers. We often partner with micro influencers. We've done paid campaigns.

16:27We've done trade campaigns. We do a lot. But it's great because I really do think that our brand resonates with a lot of influencers and their communities, right? And so they are happy to partner with us because I think that our product resonates. Well, speaking of those influencers and what you're doing on social, it's really innovative. you're keeping an audience well beyond their wedding. And your social, especially on Instagram, for example, they're very fun, they're engaging. What is the strategy there? And how are you finding that you're keeping some of these brides with you well beyond their wedding?

17:01Yeah, I'm so proud of our social media team and the content that they pump out day in, day out. We are a social first brand. I launched the brand on Instagram, spending$10 a day on Instagram ads. And so, you know, social media has very much been a part of our growth journey. And we've been able to connect so deeply with our social community, whether it's Instagram, TikTok, you know, even our Facebook brides community. So social has been really important. Our content, I feel like, is fresh. So we obviously have real weddings. There's a piece in our content strategy where we, you know, give a lot of wedding tips and wedding advice.

17:36But we have a lot of really fun and interesting influencer partnerships. And I think people really engage with that. And then we also, you know, highlight celebrity weddings, which really have high engagement for us. You know, most recently we were featured on SNL in one of the Domingo sketches where Sabrina Carpenter was wearing one of our bridesmaids dresses. And that was a huge moment for us. And that video got so much engagement. And so it's been great. You know, our team really leads into edutainment. And so, you know, that's been resonating with brides long after the wedding. We see very low attrition or people unfollowing us after the wedding.

18:10And so is that something that you would recommend for other founders to do is to adopt that sort of strategy with their socials? Absolutely. Absolutely. That is how you grow. That is how you grow brand awareness. I love content. My background is in editorial. I started out my career at InStyle Magazine. And so I love storytelling. I love connecting. I love that social media really enables you to connect directly with your customer. So yeah. So your suits line is coming out very soon. How will you measure whether that's been successful and how might that inform future products that you might develop as well?

18:43I feel really confident going into Suits because we had about three years of sales data and, you know, it was surprisingly successful. And so I have high hopes for the business. We are hoping it'll do about 10 % of revenue in our first year. We were launching mid-year, so maybe 2025, 2026, and we're hoping to grow it to be about 25 % of the company. I wish you the best with that. Just some closing thoughts. Anything for entrepreneurs who are watching, who are thinking about expanding beyond that initial product, what might you say to them if you could pull them aside before they do so? And what sort of advice might you give?

19:23Yeah, like I mentioned before, I think before you start expanding into other categories, really focus on your core product, perfect your core product, become famous for your core product, and then start to expand. when you do expand, test and learn before going all in. I think we've made mistakes in the past where we're like, oh, this is a great category for us to go and let's invest in all this inventory. Where in hindsight, I'm like, oh man, we should have tested it through partnerships or drop ship before. And then other categories like suits where we had a lot of learnings going in. And so we were much better equipped than going in blind.

19:57So I would say focus on core and then test and learn carefully before going all in. Focus on core, but again, don't be afraid to expand And some of these other places where you know that you have an established audience and you could win, right? Exactly. Well, Grace, it's been so much fun. Thank you so much for joining us today on Shopify Masters. Thanks for having me. You're so welcome. That's Grace Lee Chen, the founder of Birdie Gray. And thank you for watching this episode of Shopify Masters. I'm Benjamin Gottlieb. I'll see you next time.