Discover how fast-growing personal care brand Boie partnered with ShipBob to scale fulfilment of their eco-friendly products to meet customer expectations.
Customer Profile
Boie is reimagining personal care. From toothbrushes to body scrubbers, their eco-friendly and antibacterial products are crafted with modern ergonomic design for even better performance than disposable options. Based in New York City, all products are designed and manufactured in the USA, keeping the impact of shipping and transportation to a minimum and jobs at home.
Key metrics:
- 2016: when they first started with ShipBob
- 4,033 crowdfunding backers
- $93,633 raised on Kickstarter
- 9.36x more funds raised than original crowdfunding goal
- 216,556 orders shipped with ShipBob so far
Personal care brand Boie (pronounced ‘boo-e’) aims to reduce the personal and environmental costs of disposable toothbrushes. The average person replaces their toothbrush every three months, contributing to about 50 million pounds of waste annually.
Boie cofounders noticed this firsthand when they were traveling a lot for work, accumulating toothbrushes from various hotels.
You can’t recycle a normal toothbrush, given the plastics and other materials that are glued together. Similarly, bamboo bristles aren’t always biodegradable or compostable. They wanted something that lasted longer and was more durable against incumbents.
In 2015, they set out to create a more sustainable toothbrush. After much research and discovery, Boie’s sanitary toothbrush was born.
Made with a high-tech, BPA-free material that lasts twice as long as traditional options and is softer on the gums, Boie’s brushes are 100% recyclable and come with a replaceable brush head, further cutting down on waste.
Boie has since expanded into other product lines (including face and body scrubbers), all of which are made in the US.
Boie’s goal is to leave behind the smallest trace possible. This means reduced costs for the consumer and the environment. From skincare to oral care, Boie is disrupting old-fashioned products.
We sat down with Manuel de la Cruz, CEO at Boie, to learn more about their unique offerings.
Launching a successful crowdfunding campaign
As told to ShipBob by Manuel de la Cruz, CEO at Boie.
In the summer of 2016, we launched a Kickstarter campaign for our “toothbrush of the future.”
At this point, we were extremely fortunate to have been able to bootstrap to where we already developed production-ready samples.
With the molds built, we used our crowdfunding campaign to get production up and running so we could put in the first orders from the factory.
To do this, we had a goal to raise $10,000. Within a few weeks we had 4,033 backers pledge $93,633 to help bring our project to life — almost 10x our original funding goal.
With this overwhelming demand, we knew we didn’t want to handle fulfilment and shipping on our own. We researched 3PLs, went through Y Combinator, and found ShipBob.
Growing a sustainable ecommerce brand
After completing our crowdfunding journey, we transitioned our single-product business into a full-blown ecommerce brand. With this came launching additional eco-friendly alternatives to traditional personal care products.
One popular product is our body scrubbers. Compared to a loofah, which harbors a lot of bacteria, our body and face scrubbers are antibacterial and offer a gentle exfoliation.
We sell bundles of our frequently ordered together products and gift sets, which increases our average order value. We also offer free shipping on orders over $20. Because our products are low-cost, it’s also important that shipping costs are low.
We started in ShipBob’s east coast fulfilment centre, which was local for us. We have since moved to a more central fulfilment centre location in Chicago to improve transit times and shipping costs.
“ShipBob has been with us since day one and has since fulfiled nearly a quarter of a million orders for us.”
Manuel de la Cruz, CEO at Boie
Having a partner to keep up with demand
ShipBob offers fast order processing, which is important when we’re getting hundreds of orders each day. We wouldn’t be able to fulfil the volume we’ve seen — up to nearly 13,000 orders per month — on our own.
We’ve had three holiday cycles with ShipBob, and the most recent Q4 was our smoothest yet. There will always be bumps in the road with logistics, but it’s how your 3PL responds that counts. Our Account Manager is really on top of it. She’s very responsive and a big part of our success with ShipBob.
“ShipBob’s customer service continues to improve with direct contacts that know our account, real-time follow through, and a better customer delivery experience. They are a fulfilment partner that is truly an extension of our brand.”
Manuel de la Cruz, CEO at Boie
Our tech stack consists of ShipBob and several of their partners including Klaviyo, Recharge, CrazyEgg, and our Shopify Plus site. These tools offer us sophisticated flows to drive revenue and maintain great relationships with our customers.
We also use noissue for our eco-friendly mailers that are 100% compostable, and ShipBob ships orders out for us in our custom branded packaging.
Our subscription option has become popular among customers, where they subscribe and save money. We rely on a great post-purchase experience for this.
We monitor the ShipBob dashboard on a daily basis, can view our fulfilment metrics at any time, and see if orders are fulfiled accurately.
What’s next for Boie?
We want to continue to become a more multichannel brand and work with bigger retailers. We’ve done some B2B orders with ShipBob, including Urban Outfitters, and now we’re in talks with some larger wholesale accounts. We’re also testing subscription box partnerships.
Boie will introduce new product lines, expanding into accessories and complementary items made of old Boie products to recycle back.
Through this next phase of growth, we want to keep working with ShipBob. We have opportunities to move into additional fulfilment centres through ShipBob — from other corners of the United States to international hub expansions. We are excited for what the future holds.
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