In 2017, &Collar launched on Shopify with the goal of producing affordable apparel with premium levels of comfort. Fast forward six years and they’re a multimillion-dollar brand using Shopify Plus to launch new sub-brands and continue scaling.
Since moving to Shopify Plus, &Collar successfully:
- Grew sales by an average of 3,144% year-over-year
- Launched a sub-brand that accomplished $1M in net sales in less than 12 months
- Increased wholesale revenue by 418% through B2B on Shopify
The Challenge: Growing an SMB into an eight-figure tour de force
2019–2021 was an important growth period for &Collar. With the company poised to make their first million in net revenue, CEO and Founder Ben Perkins fixated on future scalability. With his sights set on achieving 9-figures in revenue in the years to come, the question on his mind was: “How do we become an enterprise brand using the Shopify toolkit?
Climbing to new heights required two main things:
Capital to support rapid growth – Even though &Collar was a great business (achieving 10X revenue growth since launch!), traditional lenders had cold feet. The company struggled to keep pace with growth from a cash perspective.
More powerful platform functionality – Ben’s ambitions included building out a deeper on-site experience, launching a wholesale option, and even spinning up storefronts for sub-brands. He built &Collar on Shopify. Now he’d scale his business with Shopify Plus.
The Solution: Partnering with Shopify to accelerate growth
The move to Shopify Plus gave &Collar the flexibility and customizability they needed to explore new opportunities. For example, in 2020, &Collar grew the B2B side of their business by launching a wholesale option using the B2B/Wholesale Solution, a third-party app built for seamless Shopify integration.
Then, in 2022, the company launched a storefront for their new sub-brand, Flight, which &Collar created to meet the growing demand from airline personnel for custom shirts with epaulets and double-breasted pockets. Flight brought pilot athleisure wear to life as a standard purchase option. And the process was “literally zero lift other than changing some copy and some imagery,” Ben says.
In 2023, &Collar started looking at how Shopify Markets could help bring stretchy dress shirts and comfortable menswear to countries beyond the United States while keeping costs under control. Ben also started using Shopify Audiences, which enabled &Collar to scale their digital marketing and acquisition efforts by getting more ads in front of the most interested buyers across the largest-reach channels.
With funding through Shopify Capital, &Collar was able to invest in their product and marketing efforts at the same time. As a result, they scaled so quickly that it paid off each cash advance within a few months.
“Candidly speaking, if we hadn't had Shopify Capital as an option for funding, we would be two, three, or maybe four years behind where we are today. We wouldn't have been able to keep up with demand, both from an inventory perspective and then finding new eyeballs,” Ben says.
We looked at third parties for different parts of the business but it requires so much migration just to onboard and then you're taking your time from growing the business. Whereas Shopify Plus is plug-and-play. It allows us to not segment the business—we can look at it under different purviews and from different perspectives, but all under the same roof.
The Results: ROI dressed to the nines
&Collar’s board is green since moving to Shopify Plus: conversions are up 37%, the average order value is up 24%, and the returning customer rate is up 111%.
Sales growth continues to climb by an average of 3,144% per year—and net revenue grew to $13 million in 2023. The new channels are a big part of that success. Wholesale now accounts for 20% of revenue and the new sub-brand, Flight, did seven figures in its first 12 months.
“Since we launched in 2017, we’ve averaged over 3,000% year-over-year revenue growth. There’s no reason to migrate because Shopify will continue to grow with us,” Ben says.
&Collar isn’t slowing down—and they don’t have to. Now they have the capital to keep up with growth and the ability to efficiently manage their inventory and quickly satisfy consumer demand.
“Without a doubt, the one recommendation I would pass on to other people about to start a business is to launch on Shopify. Shopify has grown with us every single step of the way.
Results may vary for every merchant. All loans through Shopify Capital in the United States are issued by WebBank.
