Life After Our Amazon Suspension
The Silver Lining in Our Amazon Shutdown (Plus My New "Career" in Label Application)
Deacon here with some encouraging updates from the Dr. Barry's adventure.
Remember that Amazon shutdown I told you about? Well, turns out getting kicked off our main platform might have been exactly what we needed. Here's why...
First, the numbers that kept me up at night: We need about $2,500 monthly to cover debt payments and operating expenses. My biggest fear was not hitting that baseline with Amazon gone.
But here's what actually happened:
1. Our other product, Hiatal Health, is steadily bringing in $1,200/week ($800 profit) on Amazon
2. We've added 17 new subscription orders on Shopify in just one week
3. We're averaging $390/day in total sales
4. The wild part? Our profit is the same as before because we're not burning $600-700 daily on ads
The most interesting lesson? We had an "Amazon-only" business, which meant we were basically just really good at running Amazon ads. No real marketing. No clear avatars. Not even a solid sales pitch. Just "Hey, want to buy our thing?"
And yet... people are still buying. Even with only 4 reviews on Shopify, we're converting at 2.65%. Every 100 visitors = roughly 3 sales.
Speaking of new things I'm learning...
I just got 1,000 fresh, Amazon-compliant labels delivered to my house. My new label application machine arrives tomorrow.
Weekend plans? Figuring out if this is actually a job I can delegate to my 12-year-old. (Parent of the year award incoming!)
The new labels look sharp though - we added Dr. Barry's face and removed some problematic language.
Which leads me to the most fascinating thing I learned this week…
There's a huge difference between saying a supplement is "for healthy eyes" versus saying it "supports eye health." One's legal, one isn't. Who knew?
(Travis knew. Travis definitely knew.)
Want to hear us work through all this in real-time? Check out Episode 11 of the We Bought A Brand podcast. You'll hear about our pivot to building a real direct-to-consumer brand and my new career in label application.
Until next time,
Deacon
P.S. We're learning so much about FDA compliance and supplement regulations... turns out about 99% of brands out there are just "letting it rip" with their claims. No wonder finding clean deals in this space is tough! But hey, we're still looking. đŸ˜‰