DTC Benchmarks

What is this data?

The public company data above is the first component of a broader set of benchmarks we’re building to help DTC founders, investors, analysts, and press get a better handle on the market and competition.The index is made up of a group of public companies intended to serve as a representative sample of the (more mature) business models commonly associated with DTC eCommerce.

While many of them also have a wholesale business, we’ve filtered for businesses that we believe are fundamentally “DTC-first.” As of January 2021, the median percentage of direct-to-consumer revenue for companies in the Bainbridge Index was 70%.

We welcome your feedback on which metrics to include – see the links below for ways to join the conversation. Data for the above tables is sourced from a combination of Finviz, Koyfin, and individual company filings. We plan to add additional data from more sources soon.

Why does this exist?

Since many investment decisions are made on a relative basis, it’s mission-critical for founders and investors to have access to shared data sets that can help strengthen alignment and improve outcomes.

While the conversation about DTC valuations has benefitted from prominent voices in the community (see here, here and here), we saw the need for a more comprehensive, evergreen resource. There are good reasons why this hasn’t previously existed. Creating a single set of useful benchmarks is difficult in a space primarily occupied by private companies. Data is scarce, numbers are difficult to trust, and it’s unlikely that any single data set can be applied universally across companies with varying categories, price points, and business models. But it’s important to start somewhere, and with your support and feedback, we hope this resource can continue to grow in valuable for all those involved in the DTC community.

Why are you planning to add?

Great question. Here's what's on the roadmap:

Community benchmarks, crowdsourced by you: the founders, operating partners, investors and others that make up the DTC eComm community. Periodically, we send out a request for benchmarks and facilitate discussion on a single metric (gross margin, for example). All members that contribute at least one data point then receive access to the full (anonymized) data set. Once we’ve reached data sufficiency, we’ll publish an abridged version of the data here for public use.

Additional benchmark studies in partnership with other organizations in the DTC community to further augment the data set. Interested in partnering with us on additional research? Please let us know.

More granularity, more metrics. We know that benchmarks that blend data across brands and categories have significant limitations. As our dataset grows, we’ll add additional layers of granularity, starting with showing our chosen metrics broken out by category and company life stage.We also plan to include additional metrics with an emphasis on unit economics, and various measures of CAC and LTV. Other suggestions? Send us an email.

Thanks for stopping by!

With your help, we hope to make this page an invaluable resource for founders, investors and operators in the DTC and eCommerce community. Please follow us on Twitter for more benchmarks content and other resources.

Best,

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