Insight
Later-stage investors struggle to view female founders as both visionaries and operators
“Recognizing how challenging it was to really get capital. Particularly later stage capital as a female founder to be seen as both visionary and a strong operator.”
Insight
In-person retail can scale subscription services better than digital advertising
“There's potential to really scale in-person selling subscriptions, because In person, someone can actually tell you what this is versus the two seconds we have to capture your attention on the internet.”
Insight
Consumers are more likely to use samples if they pay for them
“And we were economics majors and nerds, and we realized that if people paid for it, the actual chance of them using it would go up.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Birchbox's early beta achieved a massive 25% sample-to-purchase conversion rate
“It was like 25% of people were purchasing full-size.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Early YouTube vloggers drove Birchbox's growth purely organically without paid sponsorships
“These vloggers were looking for content, and this was once a month something that was content. So they were signing up themselves, paying for it. We really had no involvement.”
Insight
Founders can always raise venture capital when they don't actually need it
“You can always raise money when you don't need it. And I had to learn that the hard way. Whenever you really don't need money, there it is.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Birchbox's 2016 struggles stemmed from market shifts, not weak unit economics
“The unit economics were strong, but the market changed. I think that it was a Perfect storm of there being some formidable competition and having, not having access to capital that was limitless. All of a sudden, it was just this question around direct-to-cons…”
Insight
Childhood ambition often stems from a fundamental desire for control
“When you're very young, I think if you're attracted to success, or you think that that matters to you, I assume it just means you want control, you know. You want to be the one setting the rules, not the one just kind of living someone else's reality.”
Assertion Supported
In 2010, only about 2% of beauty products were sold online
“Basically, no beauty was sold on the internet, and it was almost 2010. It's like two percent, and that was almost like a jaw-dropping moment to us.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Beauty brands estimated most traditional free samples were never even opened
“Because one of the things we revealed when we started talking to brands in the early days was that they estimated most samples were never even being opened.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Beauchamp: Nearly every beauty CEO responded quickly to Birchbox cold emails
“Almost everybody got back quickly. It was over the holidays, and I remember being shocked because I was getting emails back on, like, the 26th of December”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Benefit Cosmetics became Birchbox's first brand partner for a 200-sample beta
“Well, the first call was with Benefit Cosmetics, who's owned by LVMH, and I remember that call so vividly. It was like pacing around, and it was so exhilarating and so exciting, and at the end of about what ended up being a 30 minute call, he was like, okay, I…”
Assertion Supported
Birchbox originally acquired its samples for free and sold full-size products
“No, they gave us the samples, and then we would purchase the full size, because it was from the very beginning, it was the full model, which was sampling as the appetizer, and then you can purchase anything you sampled directly from us.”
Assertion Supported
New competitors paying for samples destroyed Birchbox's zero-cost sourcing model
“Competitors that had launched in the market really changed the dynamic because they started offering money for samples, and brands could not just get the samples paid for, but they could make money on the samples, something that we had never done.”
Disclosure
Beauchamp signed Birchbox's Walgreens partnership agreement right before delivering her daughter
“And I actually signed the paperwork right before I went under to deliver my daughter.”
