Making Activewear Fun Margeret's journey of entrepreneurship has been an incredible one. Last year, within the first 18 months of launching BlissClub, the company achieved INR 100 crores in annual recurring revenue and it's been one of the fastest journeys for any brand in India.
By Priya Kapoor
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Minu Margeret, the founder and CEO, Blissclub has seen the digital and start-up ecosystem grow around her very closely- from mushrooming of a lot of large horizontal platforms to the brands that have shifted from offline to sell on these platforms. Margaret always felt that there is a large opportunity to build digital-first brands, but it was only in 2019, she quit her job and decided to do something about it and started a direct-to-consumer (D2C) women's activewear brand.
However, it took Margaret four months to explore the space and understand the market. "While this research was happening, we were a community before we had a product. So Blissclub as a community launched in March 2020, and the first product launched in December 2020. Between March and December, we co-created our first offering along with our community of women who love to move," says Margeret.
Margeret's journey of entrepreneurship has been an incredible one. Last year, within the first 18 months of launching BlissClub, the company achieved INR 100 crores in annual recurring revenue and it's been one of the fastest journeys for any brand in India. "We continued to grow from there over the last few months and have grown to over two lakh customers—two lakh women who have been a part of our journey. The company started off with one hero product—a single pair of black leggings called 'The Ultimate Leggings,' and now have more than 30 hero products in the portfolio," says this ISB alumni.
Besides its own platform, the company uses many external platforms for retailing including Amazon, Myntra, Nykaa, Ajio, etc., and works with partners such as WareIQ for logistics.
On overcoming various challenges like customer retention, cost of acquisition, and order fulfillment, Margaret says, "At the core of everything is what we are building - we are building products that are extremely differentiated. If there is no great product, there is no retention." Besides that, the company has also roped in influencers to help the brand grow, and build trust and education.
Presently, the company is focusing on expanding within the country and has also moved to offline presence. It launched its first flagship store under its office in Bangalore, followed by another store at Infiniti Mall in Mumbai.
"I think the excitement over offline is on three fronts. First is the product. The 'Aha' moment we offer our consumers about the product comes through the touch of the fabric and the fit of the product. Two, offline builds a lot of trust as a channel, and three it helps us interact with our community, and our consumers. We are also looking to launch our own app, which would integrate commerce and community," adds Margeret.
The company has so far raised $15 million in funding led by Eight Roads and Elevation Capital.
Factsheet:
Online platform that contributes maximum revenue: www.blissclub.com
Split between offline and online sales: Almost primarily online, offline is very insignificant given that we just launched 2 stores now but looking forward to growing offline as well in 2023.
