For many online retailers based in the UK, the implications of Brexit have been a real headache, especially if they have ambitious growth plans for the EU. This was also the case for Absolute Collagen, a leading collagen-based beauty brand. With the help of byrd’s pan-European fulfilment network to store and ship their products from France, they were able to keep their growth plans in Europe on track. Let’s take a look at their success story.
Absolute Collagen, a real family success story
Absolute Collagen is the UK’s original collagen specialist brand. It was co-founded by leading beauty entrepreneur and CEO, Maxine Laceby, and her daughter Darcy. Absolute Collagen launched in 2017 with a single product: an anti-ageing daily liquid collagen supplement. Maxine started the business from her kitchen and turned Absolute Collagen into a multi-million-pound success story in just a few years.
Today, Absolute Collagen offers a wider portfolio of collagen-based beauty products across Europe, including serums, supplements, skincare, and shampoo, with award-winning products and one of the highest collagen concentrations on the market.
Fulfilling cosmetics and subscription-based products
Subscription-based business models have seen strong growth across the e-commerce sector in recent years. This is particularly true in categories such as cosmetics and everyday skincare.
The British brand embraced this opportunity from the outset by selling its collagen products through a subscription model: “For the best results, we recommend taking a daily dose of Absolute Collagen on an ongoing basis”. This creates benefits for the business in terms of cost efficiency and growth, while also offering convenience to customers and supporting the product’s effectiveness.
However, for a fast-growing company, the logistics behind shipping subscription-based products and managing the efficient fulfilment of cosmetics can become highly complex. Among other things, online brands like Absolute Collagen may need to manage, or work with a solution that can manage:
- Batch and expiry date tracking
- Product bundles and subscription boxes
- Short delivery times
- Certificates (e.g. organic certification, HACCP, etc.)
- Specific product storage requirements
By partnering with a 3PL provider like byrd, Absolute Collagen was able to tick all the boxes for selling and delivering its products successfully.
Overcoming Brexit with byrd’s pan-European fulfilment network
We had a solution in the UK, but we turned to byrd because we were looking for a warehouse based in France and a partner that could allow us to open warehouses where we want to expand to.
Before Brexit, Absolute Collagen relied solely on its warehouse in Ireland to ship to the UK and Europe. But afterwards, for several obvious reasons such as costs, customs, and delivery delays, they needed a European solution, particularly because many of their customers are based in France.
With byrd’s fulfilment centre in France, Absolute Collagen was able to overcome the challenges of Brexit and better meet customer expectations. It also marked the first step in a broader European growth strategy.
Cutting delivery times and getting closer to customers
To be competitive in France, fast service is really important for us. Our customers receive their parcels in 48 hours, which is amazing! We’ve also seen our lost parcel number decrease drastically which helps increase the overall customer satisfaction.
Before working with byrd’s fulfilment centre in France, delivery times for customers in France were up to 5-7 days. Fast service was especially important to the brand, as these are subscription-based products and reliable delivery is essential. The goal was to get parcels delivered within 48 hours, which was made possible through byrd’s solution.
On top of that, Absolute Collagen was also dealing with issues around lost parcels. By using byrd’s fulfilment warehouse together with the all-in-one logistics software to track every stage of order processing, they were able to reduce the number of lost parcels significantly, which had a noticeable impact on overall customer satisfaction.
A partnership that goes beyond warehousing
When you work with a 3PL provider, you expect strong service level agreements when it comes to the logistics services being provided. But in the case of Absolute Collagen’s collaboration with byrd, they also point to three major benefits:
- Working with a local, people-focused company: byrd offers the opportunity to work with a local warehouse while also providing proprietary technology. That combination has proven to be quite unique and aligns perfectly with Absolute Collagen’s DNA.
- Seamless tech-driven solution: Absolute Collagen sells its products on Shopify and is very happy with how quickly Shopify connects with the byrd platform. They also appreciate the option to delay order transmission, allowing the customer service team to amend customer requests before they appear on the byrd dashboard and are fulfilled.
- A strong relationship with their Account Manager: part of byrd’s commitment to its customers is providing the best support possible. When you choose byrd, you not only benefit from a smooth onboarding process with a dedicated contact person, but you also get a dedicated Account Manager who knows your setup, your needs and your challenges.
Mainly the quality of service and the peace of mind of knowing that our orders are in good hands. The fact that our Account Manager is very responsive, transparent, and always lets us know if a problem arises is giving us confidence in the success of our partnership and the delivery of our orders.
Supporting ambitious growth across Europe
Today, Absolute Collagen is not only using byrd’s all-in-one logistics software and fulfilment centre for its Shopify shop, but has also expanded its online business to Amazon and used byrd’s knowledge and resources for Amazon pre-FBA shipments.
The next steps are to continue expanding across the European market by opening new warehouse locations in Europe within byrd’s fulfilment network. One of the next target countries will be Germany. This will allow them to grow the business, increase market share in the beauty and cosmetics category, and launch new products in the future.
If we want, tomorrow we could open a new warehouse in Germany, allowing us to develop ourselves and grow with a qualitative partner we can trust with our product.
Visit their online shop: https://www.absolutecollagen.com