Repeat, a California-based Software as a Service platform (SaaS), just raised $6 million in Series A funding led by Battery Ventures. Through analyzing consumer behavior, Repeat helps consumer packaged goods (CPG) brands leverage a faster, personalized replenishment system.
The company’s smart replenishment software supports CPG brands in turning one-time buyers into repeat customers by tailoring the reordering experience to their needs – all without formal subscriptions.
Read on to learn more about Repeat’s innovative approach to seamless replenishment processes and how it’s tailoring the subscription business model to customers’ needs to drive revenue growth.
Repeat’s Personalized Replenishment System
Unlike other replenishment systems that simply look at purchasing trends to fill gaps in inventory, Repeat’s replenishment software studies the consumption habits of its users and their cadence to buying products in order to create a more personalized customer experience.
The collected data is then leveraged by CPG brands to help drive their sales through personalized reminders, automation, and an online cart designed for reordering.
Repeat’s services analyze a CPG company’s à la carte purchases to understand its customers’ replenishment cadences. “It then leverages that logic to nudge customers when it’s time to reorder by sending an email or text with a link to what Repeat calls its ‘replenishment cart.’ The customer can choose to snooze the reminder or they can click through to checkout,” according to TechCrunch.
Then, the online cart is attached to previous purchases made by the consumer, delivering easy one-click replenishment options. Repeat’s carts also offer new merchandise discovery from the CPG brands, further growing sales numbers.
Repeat uses two communication methods to “nudge” CPG brand consumers:
Repeat’s revenue is a combination of a SaaS fee and a percentage of brand sales, according to TechCrunch. The company charges $99/month plus 5% of the brand’s value if a CPG brand delivers less than 2,000 à la carte, non-subscription orders a month. For brands that exceed $10,000 per month in non-subscription orders, Repeat charges $499/month plus 5% of the brand’s revenue.
Enhancing the Replenishment Experience
Repeat is growing rapidly. It began the year with three employees and added eight new faces since. The company has designed its engineering, product, sales, marketing, and growth divisions for employee-expansion opportunities.
Repeat plans to use the Series A funds to expand its group to 15 to 20 people by the end of 2021.
As part of its growth, Repeat aims to create a replenishment system where customers can reorder products across their favorite CPG brands in one place.
Together, with internal growth opportunities, the company will also use part of the $6 million to optimize additional business initiatives, like its most recent QR code system. The QR codes were launched as a way to supply a trouble-free replenishment system.
“Our QR codes are linked to Repeat carts that are pre-populated with items due for replenishment, allowing for one-click checkout and an effortless merchandising section,” according to Repeat’s website.
Through employee expansion, scaling, and tech-enabled features, Repeat is growing its company to increase customer satisfaction and loyalty between CPG brands and their customers while also driving revenue growth.
Analyzing & Leveraging Consumer Buying Habits
Repeat Co-Founders Kim Stiefel and Sarah Wissel started out their entrepreneurial journeys with a quarterly T-shirt subscription. However, they soon ran into issues trying to acquire committed customers who would stick around for more than just a few shipments.
Based on customer feedback, Stiefel and Wissel learned that, for most consumers, reordering household products on an anchored schedule isn’t a pleasant experience. Depending on the speed of use of the product, a customer might receive replenishment too early, or too late.
“The problem with subscription today is that it’s fixed, and time-based and rigid, and not rooted in any kind of real consumption cadence,” Stiefel, Repeat’s CEO, told TechCrunch.
Instead of forcing their customers to a subscription that didn’t fit their lifestyle, Stiefel and Wissel developed a replenishment system that only “nudged” CPG brand customers to reorder based on their purchasing history. The more a customer interacts with Repeat’s replenishment cart, the more the software learns about their reordering intervals.
As Repeat continues to grow, its replenishment approach will build customer loyalty and trusted relationships. Subscription businesses who pay attention to a consumer’s needs and create an experience surrounding that can provide great value and nurture deeper relationships with subscribers.
“Because Repeat focuses on that à la carte reordering experience, and because we’re looking at repeat behavior across individual product SKUs (Stock Keeping Unit), we actually know a tremendous amount about consumption behavior across every category of CPG,” Stiefel says. “What you’ll see from us in the future is being able to leverage that data to offer more flexible dynamic subscription experiences.”
Key Takeaways:
- Repeat is a SaaS platform that analyzes CPG brands’ à la carte purchasing behaviors to understand a consumer’s replenishment cadence.
- Repeat raised $6 million in Series A funding and will use it to expand its team, scale its business, and add more tech-enabled features.
- Subscription businesses must pay attention to consumers’ needs and create an experience surrounding that to produce great value and nurture deeper relationships.