Focusing on one thing can transform your brand

That one thing we reference in the subject line is what we, at Founder Fives, call: your secret sauce. ✋ ​

From owning and operating our retail incubator, what we saw firsthand is that a lot of the high performing brands had something in common: they had a super specific focus. ​

Often times just ONE product (or variations thereof). When you focus on one thing, and you talk about it over and over and over again, people take notice:

“Oh, that’s the fashionable fleece company.”
“Oh, that’s the fun hat company.”
“Oh, that’s the amazing blanket company.”

​ChappyWrap​, a brand we worked with for years, is a perfect example. They’ve been focusing on making blankets - the best blankets - for years. And people buy a ton of them. (Between Katharine and me, we probably own nine of them. A sickness? Maybe.)

Not sure what your secret sauce is? You definitely have one, you might just not know it yet. Start by asking:

• What products do people buy again and again? (Pull a sales report if you're not sure!)

• What do they rave about when you’re not in the room?

That’s the kind of clarity we help brands uncover inside ​The Wholesale Growth Lab​, along with strategies to build your product line, messaging, and retail approach around it.

👉 Curious to see how it could work for your brand? ​Check out the Wholesale Growth Lab​ and see what’s inside. We’d love to help you find your secret sauce.

If store owners aren’t responding to your emails…

We know a lot of founders get frustrated from not hearing back from store owners. And we understand! If you’ve sent emails to buyers and gotten zero response, it’s not just you.

Store owners are busy. Their inboxes are full, and they’re rarely sitting at a desk.

So if your email doesn’t stand out (or doesn’t have what they’re actually looking for), it’s easy for it to get skipped… even if your product is amazing. Here are a few things to ask yourself:

• Your product line: Could you simplify or clarify the offering?

• Your messaging: Is your brand telling a clear, cohesive story?

• Your photography: Are you showcasing your product in a way that’s buyer-ready?

• Your outreach: Do you have a consistent process in place?

These details can make or break whether a store owner responds. Inside ​The Wholesale Growth Lab​, we dig into exactly this:

✔️ What buyers actually want to see
✔️ How to make changes that get noticed
✔️ A repeatable plan to boost responses

We’ve reviewed 1,000+ brand pitches, and we’re breaking down what works (and what gets ignored) inside the course.

👉 If you’re ready to take the guesswork out of pitching stores, you can learn more about the course ​here​.

Pillow talk about wholesale margins

Today we wanted to chat about something we really love: wholesale margins. Sexy, we know. (We promise it’s more fun than it sounds.)

But it's an intimate important topic that trips a lot of founders up. We’ve heard so many product-based brands say things like:

• “I can’t afford to give up that much margin.”

• “It feels like lost revenue.”

• “Is wholesale even worth it?”

We get it. But here’s what we’ve learned from years of working with brands and being retailers ourselves: ​ ​That margin is not lost. It’s just playing a different role.​ ​

Wholesale is one of the most efficient ways to grow your brand. It gets your products into new hands, boosts visibility, builds buyer trust, and saves you from doing all the heavy lifting alone. You can check out one of our IG videos on this topic ​here​.

Inside ​The Wholesale Growth Lab​, our self-paced course, we go deeper into things like:

• Understand what healthy wholesale margins really look like

• Price your products strategically

• And grow your brand through partnerships that scale

If wholesale margins are something you’ve been wrestling with, you can check out the course ​HERE​. And as always, hit us up if you have questions. We love hearing from you!

The secret ingredient for a standout brand

Have you ever wondered why some brands have “it” and some don’t? Why some brands really seem to take off when others remain stagnant for years. Of course there are many reasons why brands succeed: product, quality, customer service, hard work, strong operations - the list goes on.

However, there is one thing that we (Kaity and Katharine) saw through our time at For Now, working with over 250 emerging brands. This one thing that was noticeable but not always talked about overtly. We had never heard it be talked about as an actual strategy, more so something that just “happened.”

This secret ingredient that most standout brands had in common that we worked with (and quite frankly that we just witness as consumers) is called The Founder-Market Fit.

We coined this term because it came to a point that we almost had to. We kept seeing it over and over again and needed to come up with a way to reference it. The Founder-Market Fit became something we discussed when vetting brands: did they have it or did they not?

So what is a Founder-Market Fit?

Thanks to social media, we know more about brands than we ever did. Brands now have an opportunity to tell their story more in depth than they ever did before. It’s not just about what type of clothing they make or what price points they have or where they manufacture.

It’s also about their company values, their thoughtful approaches, their personality, AND the person that started the company. Founders are so intertwined with brand stories now for a reason: people buy from people. It’s not a new concept, but one that is applicable a lot more broadly now.

When a founder shows, through brand communication, how intertwined they are with their brand - when it’s hard to differentiate where one ends and the other begins - we have seen some magic happen.

You might be wondering, does this need to be the case? Does a founder need to put themself close to the center of their brand? Yes, we think so.

We’ve witnessed times when entrepreneurs start a brand because they think it’s interesting or they see an opportunity but they don’t necessarily have a passion for the business or it’s purpose. They don’t really relate to the target audience and they aren’t solving a problem that they themselves have faced. AND YOU CAN TELL.

If a founder isn’t showing how much passion they have for their business or their customers can’t relate to them - why should customers care enough to buy?

Consumers are so inundated - we all know this. If you’re not pushing your unique story, it’s almost impossible to cut through the clutter. And not just consumers - wholesale buyers and store owners too.

As we mentioned above, the brand quality of Founder-Market Fit was something we discussed when vetting brands for For Now because we knew it would help the brand stand out and in turn, sell more units. We know we’re not alone.

Some brands that have done really well with communicating their Founder-Market Fit are Sh*t That I Knit, Dudley Stephens, Jill Rosenwald, Favorite Daughter, Ursa Major (this was a shift for them), Alice Walk and Faherty to name a few. What brands have you noticed that do this well?

In closing: we’ve referenced founders “showing” a couple times in this post and you might be wondering what we mean. We do not necessarily mean you need to show your face on communications (social, email, website, etc) all the time (but we recommend getting comfortable with it!).

It does mean, though, that you need to show your “secret sauce.” What you contribute to this brand that no one else could be bringing to the table; what the most important and unique things are about you that make this brand one of a kind, relatable and successful.

So here’s something to think about: What is the most important and unique thing about you, as the founder, that makes your business relatable and successful (get comfortable boasting). Ex: My artistic talent makes this brand different from any other. It is my secret sauce. I need to show this. (Joy Street Kids inspired this example - who does a great job at this as well.)

If you want some counsel/advice from us as to how you could effectively enhance your founder-market fit, DM us!