135: 750 Pillow Subscriptions Sold in 5 Days with Wilshire Collections

Building up excitement and creating FOMO is one way to market your offer. In this episode, my guest spent 3 months hyping up what was coming and sold 750 pillow subscriptions in only 5 days. The best part is she doesn't have to pack and ship a thing. Come join Stacy and I on this episode. Welcome to the Launch Your Box podcast with weekly tips, tricks, and strategies to start, launch, and grow your subscription inbox.

Now here's your host, Sarah Williams.

Welcome back to the Laundry Box Podcast. I'm so excited about this episode today because I have my very first 3-time guest on the podcast with us today. I have Stacy Collins from Wilshire Collections with me today, and this is the 3rd time that Stacy has been on the Launch Your Box podcast. And we were just talking about this before we got started, but I've never had a guest on for 3 times. And what's really cool is each time Stacy has been on, it has been for a different subscription. Now, when I first interviewed Stacy, it was when I first started my podcast in the spring of 2021, and Stacy had a great Decor at Your Door subscription. And we talked about that and how she built her audience and how she started that subscription. And then in 2022, I had Stacy on the podcast because she had this incredible launch of her printable club. And we were talking for the first time on the podcast about a digital subscription. And so that is episode number 82 if you want to go back and listen to that. But the printable club is her digital subscription. When I say digital, like, they get nothing physically in the mail from Stacy, and they get a digital bundle delivered to their email every single month. And she, at that time that we were doing the podcast, she was generating over $20,000 a month from a digital subscription. Like, can you imagine not having to pack and ship things and making $20 grand a month? Like, for me, that's like all of our e-commerce product-based business dreams. But I've got Stacy back because not only is the printable club thriving, but Stacy started a brand new subscription and we're going to talk about what sparked that for her, the journey that she's been on, some of the cool new things that she's doing and where we're at with her brand new subscription. So Stacy, welcome back.

Thank you. Thank you for having me. I feel so special and honored to be on here for the third time. So thank you.

This is so fun. I look at it as you just keep winning. So you just keep winning, girl, and I will have you back for a fourth time.

All right.

All right. For someone that may not have heard one of your previous episodes or know who you are, why don't you give a little introduction on who you are and what your business does?

Okay. Well, I'm Stacy Collins, owner of Wilshire Collections. I'm a DIY and decorating brand. So you will find me mostly on Facebook, even though I'm all the places and I'm usually going live doing something crafting related. Decorating related. And like Sarah said, I've done just kind of a bunch of different things. I've had my business for 10 years and it has looked a lot of different ways and has pivoted a lot over the years. But just over the past several years is when I've been really growing in the online space, growing my community, and just kind of doing all these things. So I'm excited to talk about the newest adventure today.

Yes. So let's take them back because we're in fall of 2023 as we're talking on this podcast right now. So let's go back to the spring and I want you just to talk about where this idea came from and then let's just talk them through fruition of the processes that you went through to actually get it going before we even launched. So let's go back to spring. We were on a one-on-one call.

Yes. And I looked it up today because I was like, when was that call? It was April 26th. So I couldn't remember exactly when that was. So this was back in April when this first kind of came to fruition.

So yeah. Stacy is one of my mastermind members, and I don't do one-on-one calls outside of my mastermind members. So we were on a one-on-one call talking through what she was working on. And just tell them the story, because you just literally sprinkled it without any big plan, right?

I know, I know. So what had happened was 2 weeks probably prior to this call with Sarah, I'm getting ready in my bathroom one morning, doing my hair and makeup, sometimes where I have my, my best thoughts, you know, and in my head I'm thinking about how much I love pillows because I do and I love pillows. And I've always kind of had this dream that one day people would be able to walk into a store and buy Wilshire branded pillows. Like, that's just one of these big dreams that I've always had. And I was thinking about that and I had this little fleeting thought like, why do I have to wait for a store to come to me and be like, Hey, we want to put your pillows in our store. Like, couldn't I figure out a way to create and curate my own pillows and just sell them myself? Like, I've got this online community. This is just this fleeting thought. And then I'm like, oh, it'd be even cooler if I could have this pillow cover club. But then I was like, no, Stacy, squash it, squash it. You don't need anything else on your plate. You don't need to do anything else. I just was kind of trying to like put it to the back. Flash forward to my call with Sarah and like she said, we're just chatting away. And at the very end of our call I said, well, maybe next year, you know, I'll I'll do this other idea I had. And she's like, well, what's your other idea? So I tell her, and immediately Sarah's like, no, no, no, we're doing this now. She's like, we're doing this now. I'm like, we are? She's like, yes, this is— and she knew because she knows me so well. She knows my brand, my community, and she knew this was perfect fit for me and a perfect fit for my audience. And so literally on that call, she was like helping me put things into place, like We're going to get you poly mailers. We're going to do this. I'm going to connect you with this person. And we just immediately started brainstorming how we could make this happen.

Let's back up just a little bit and let's talk about what this subscription is. So when you're talking about pillow covers, for those of us that are not interior decorator aficionados, tell us what this entails for you.

So a pillow that you would buy at a store is obviously usually stuffed with the fluffy stuff, right? And they're fun and they have all this texture. A pillow cover is just the exterior cover, which makes it thinner, easier to ship, easier to store. And then all you need is an insert, which is the fluffy part that would go inside the COVID So when I first had this idea, I envisioned covers that would arrive to people's homes for all the seasons and reasons. That would be something easy you could swap out because all you'd have to do is take that cover off. You're using the same insert and you're just swapping out that cover each month just to spruce up your home in an easy and quick way.

So, okay, so we— I convinced you that let's go. Why are we waiting on this? You have a giant audience, you've been nurturing them for years, there's no reason to sit on this. All we have to do is figure out the logistics of this, and that was manufacturing the pillows, that was quantities— what, what are we going to start with? We talked through that. That was fulfillment, because that was a challenge for you before when you had the quarterly box. And so I knew that was probably the biggest sticking point for you into getting this going was the fulfillment avenue of it. So once you got manufacturing, you know, you have connections, I have connections. You got right, you got on right away and started with the manufacturing process. And then I'm all like, this is just a poly mailer. It's like a t-shirt. You're going to throw it in a bag. And so we connected you with some packaging vendors. And then there was fulfillment. Yeah. And one of our previous episodes on the Launch Your Box podcast, I interviewed Ryan Culver from Lessgistics. and he's been in our Scale Your Box membership before. And what I love— and I would use this fulfillment center if I didn't have a Monogram subscription box because they can't monogram for me— um, is the fact that they could take all of every piece of what Stacy was afraid of and do it for her for a very minimal price. And so she could have the pillows manufactured, they could be shipped directly to the fulfillment center, the fulfillment fulfillment center is going to integrate with her software. So when orders come through, they hit the fulfillment center software. They are going to pack and fill her subscriptions every single month. She doesn't have to touch a physical product.

Yeah.

And that's the biggest thing that was holding her back.

Yeah.

Right? Would you say?

Yes. Absolutely.

Absolutely. You didn't know what this was going to look like, how this was going to happen. Could you do physically do this monthly? Did you have enough space to do this? How big could this grow? Because these were all things that you need to consider before you started this. And when you started to think about that, you're like, no, that's too much for me right now. I can't think about all of that.

Exactly. But once you removed those obstacles from the plan, the plan became a lot easier and it became, it's, it became doable and it became something I could actually visualize without it, without it feeling stressful about how am I going to scale this? Where are we going to ship these from? Those obstacles were removed, which was— has just been a blessing and a weight lifted. I mean, it truly has.

So during that conversation, we talked a little bit about the launch date. And so that was determined by our man— the manufacturer, not ours. Like, I'm a part of this.

I don't know.

It's not ours. You're doing more manufacturing.

Yeah.

I'm just an honorary part of this.

Yes, you are.

Absolutely. It was determined by your manufacturers because you wanted to make sure that you had no hiccups in this. So you wanted to make sure you had pillows in hand before you launched it, and that is super duper smart. And so it was, it was far out. We were looking about 6 months, 7 months out. And so you started to design your pillows.

Yes.

As they were working on getting you samples for your approval and manufacturing and all of that. And we talked about this. This was a big part of our call that day was How many should I have made? Let's talk about it.

Yeah. And, you know, it's so hard when you're starting something new. You have no past history, no data, no proof of how things are going to go. I know how other things have gone, but this is brand new. So in my head, I was thinking about some decor boxes that I've done kind of one-off, and I kind of know how many I sell of that. And I thought, you know, I don't know. I just didn't know exactly. But I remember talking to you and saying, Well, I feel like, you know, 500 is like the max that I would want to do. Like, 500 even made me a little nervous. Like, I didn't feel super confident about that. And that was another moment where Sarah kind of believed in me more than I believe in myself, which happens a lot when you have that self-doubt that creeps in. Can I do this? Am I going to be able to put this out in the universe and people are going to want it? And Sarah pushed me to go much bigger than that. She pushed me to double that number. I did.

I did. And, you know, I, I don't do that very often because that's a huge sense of responsibility for me. If I push you to order 1,000 pillows and you only sell 300 of them, I'm going to feel that burden of what I just put you through. And I also don't operate that way in my own business. Like, I don't— I'm not a gambler in my business. I think of things very strategically and very data-driven. But you're right, we didn't know. But here's what we did know about your business. Yeah, you have a huge following. Yes. Like how many hundreds of thousands of people follow you?

250,000 on Facebook and then more other places too.

We knew, we knew that you sold out of hundreds and hundreds, like 500, 600 boxes every time you would drop the decor box and you would sell out so quickly.

Yeah.

So in my mind, that's our historical data that you sell out 5 or 600 of these decor boxes every time you drop one, and that's literally gone in hours.

Yeah.

So why wouldn't this have the same effect? And if you can sell 500, 600 boxes in an hour, you're gonna sell— in hours, you're going to sell this many pillows in hours. So let's go a little bit further and let's push it and really build a nice campaign around it. And it was uncomfortable for you because your money was behind this, not my money.

I wasn't, I wasn't investing in all these pillows, and that was a scary scary thing to put money into something that you didn't know if the people were going to show up and buy. But yet I'm— I had already ordered the first 3 months of pillow covers before I even launched this, you know, 1,000 of each nonetheless. So it was scary. But I will say one thing that I know we talked about that did kind of help ease that, like, anxiety with me on that number is that even if I didn't hit that number the first month, I knew I would be able to sell those extra pillow covers on my site at a higher price than what the subscribers get, because that's the perk of being in the subscription. So I didn't necessarily have this fear of, oh my gosh, I'm going to get stuck with hundreds of pillows. I knew we would be able to offer them as upsells down the road or find creative ways to move those, which did kind of help.

So yeah, and it's just thinking through that worst case scenario, thinking through if this happens, what is my plan so that you don't get blindsided or you don't go into it blind. And that creates a lot of stress and anxiety for you. So we talk through all those scenarios. And you're like, okay, okay, this makes sense for me to do this. I feel good about this. It took a little while. It took a little while for you to feel comfortable with it, right? And so what I noticed when you made those decisions is now you have this long runway of about 6 months.

Yep.

To really put this into place, create FOMO, create excitement, tease it out, build your list. And you did all of those things. So let's talk talk through that a little bit because I would love to just kind of talk through— you had a 6-month kind of lead-in, right? And people that are starting right now and may not be able to start their subscription box for 6 months, like, what are some of those things that you did? Or people that already have a business like you, you already had an audience, right? You just kept it on the forefront and you kept building up that excitement for that long, and that was really important for your launch.

Yeah, it was. And I love a good buildup. I love the excitement. I love kind of teasing things. And so I started with, I've got a big surprise, and I would put posts out there making them guess like it has something to do with something I'm obsessed with. And of course, people are like, is it pillows? Is it something with pillows? Because they know, you know. So I did a lot of those kind of posts. I also did like I set a day that I was going to announce this, and then I would, I would tease that big announcement coming this day, big announcement. And then when the announcement came, I was obviously ready with the waitlist, and I had the waitlist ready to go. And by then you had so many people that were just invested and ready to know what is this surprise that she has, what is going to be coming. So there was a lot of excitement built up before they even knew what it was. And then I was able to tell them, and the excitement just kind of went crazy. And we built up the waitlist so quickly and so fast. Um, we ended up between the time— it was probably just a 2 or 3 months of the actual waitlist because I didn't even want to make the announcement until we were farther in the process with manufacturing. And I felt like, okay, this is actually happening, you know. So we built the waitlist to 2,200 people. But between, you know, when we announced it and the launch, and we also asked them on our waitlist because we knew just from talking to my community, one thing they asked for was would they have the option to order 2 pillows a month. And I'm like, I hadn't even thought about that, but for somebody that would want one on like each end of their couch. So on that waitlist we asked, are you interested in one pillow cover a month or two? So out of those 2,200 people, over half said they were interested in two pillows a month. So as soon as that waitlist grew, I was feeling much better about that quantity that I had ordered and just like, okay, I'm on to something and people are excited about this.

So, so we've done this great buildup campaign. You've got 2,200 names on that list. Over half of them wanted 2 pillows. So in reality, we could just call that like, what, 3,300 pillows on that list if we're thinking conversions.

Right.

And so now you get down to the launch and you plan the 5-day launch like we talk about in Launch Your Box, and you go through all the assets and do all the steps and you just bust that launch plan out and you go through it, right? Talk to me about the launch.

The launch was awesome. I did everything Sarah, you know, teaches and kind of followed that launch plan. We opened to the waitlist the first night. By the time I went live publicly on the page, you know, the next day, 24 hours later, we already had— we were, we were counting pillows, not people, you know, because that's kind of— we were— we had a goal of 1,000 pillows. So we were at around 400 pillows by morning. So it was a very, you know, very fast and strong start, which was so exciting. And I— and, you know, and it's funny because there's so many people that were ready that minute. You know, they knew that they were ready. They were ready to sign up. But then I still did the full 5-day launch. It did not sell out, you know, first night or anything like that because it did take a little bit of convincing for some people since, A, this is a mystery. I don't know if I mentioned that earlier, but it is a surprise pillow cover. So I didn't have much to show them except for a couple sneak peek pictures. So it was me going, hey, I'm starting this new thing. I promise it's cute. I promise the pillows are going to be cute. You have to to trust me. So that took a little bit more time for some people to really be able to lean in and trust me enough to say, okay, I want to get this, this mystery pillow that you've done. So, um, but we went on with the full 5-day launch, and at the end of the launch, we were at 560 subscribers and 750 pillows.

750 pillows? Yes. And let's just do some math on that. Let's just say, because day 1 you said you had 400 pillows.

Yes.

If we divide that into our 3,300 pillow waitlist, yeah, that is a 12% conversion in one day on our waitlist. And so I'm sure that converted over the next 5 days more. But when we think about converting at 12%, that's a huge number. And so for you to build that waitlist up the way that you did, it 100% contributed to the success of your launch.

Absolutely. Absolutely. For sure. And we will continue to build that waitlist, you know, as we add more spots and fill things up for sure.

Because that was the biggest amount of any single day during your launch that you had was on the waitlist day. And that was through one email, right?

Yes. One email.

One email drove over half of her pillows to being sold with one email just by doing the work that she did building up that waitlist, making sure every time she talked about it, she funneled people to the waitlist. So then she went through, you went through and did the rest of the launch. You went live, you did the social media posts, you sent the emails, you did all the things, right?

Post-it notes and had my little, I called it my pillow bestie wall and filled up the wall. I did all, all the things.

Yeah. And you sold another 350 pillows. Yes. In the next 4 days. Let's just give a little shout out to what you just did. You started something from scratch.

Yeah.

You build a very specific audience with a waitlist for this one thing. You generated excitement and buzz and you went all in with a 5-day launch and you starting your brand new subscription with 750 pillows sold.

Yeah.

Out of your 1,000.

You know what was like a pivotal moment for me was when I hit that $500 mark, because in my head that was the number I had told you that I was scared that I couldn't sell. And when I hit that, I was like, well, I have hit my first goal. Anything over this is just amazing, you know? So when I got to $750, I was just— I mean, it just— it was awesome. I don't even know how else I was. I was so proud. And it's not very often that I like own it. And I'm like, I'm so proud of myself. But I was so proud because this is something that seems like a pipe dream, and I made it come to fruition. And it's just, it's been awesome.

So you did a lot of work to make it actually happen, and then to actually sell that many, like, there was a lot of work that went in it. It's not just, oh, Stacy designed a pillow and her audience went gaga. No, you did every single thing. If you wouldn't have built that waitlist those months before your launch, you wouldn't have had the success that you did.

I could not have just showed up and been like, guess what, guys, surprise, I'm starting this Pillow Cover Club, sign up. I mean, it would not have had the same effect for sure without the buildup.

Let's talk a little bit about the fulfillment process because your first pillow just went out. So cute, it's a sunflower pillow. I know that you didn't get see the batch of stuff before it went, right? So I got to be a little nerve-wracking too. Like, it's— I'm just going to trust that the factory made it the way they should and that it's going to be received at the fulfillment center the way it should, right?

Yep. So of course I get samples, physical samples that I approve before they start the mass production. So I knew the product was good, but I also was nervous. Yes. About the shipping. And I was, you know, checking that tracking every day. Where is it? You know, But it's been awesome because the fulfillment center, they let me know when the packages arrive. They took pictures of, you know, the boxes, just kind of opening them to show me, hey, they sent the right product, you know, just that everything looked okay. They do like a quality check. And so that has been a little hard because I am a little bit of a control freak. So to not be able to be there digging through those boxes and seeing them, but I trust them so much that I know if there's a problem or issue, you know, they're going to let me know. And the second pillow, September Pillow, is out the door on the way to people now. And same process. Process with that. They let me know when they came, they let me know all looked good. So yes, it's different than being so hands-on, but it's also a very seamless process with the— they have great communication in place, so you're not feeling like you're sitting here not knowing what's going on with your business, you know.

So yeah, so if you were to do the fulfillment process over again, 100% you would do it the same way?

Oh yeah, I have no— because No regrets.

Here's what Stacy gets to do every month, whatever she wants, because she's not tied to packing and filling, um, 750 pillows every single—

exactly. And of course they do this, this is what they do. They have a huge warehouse, they have the people, and they literally texted the other day, they're like, all of the pillow covers for September are packaged and like ready to go. And I'm like, that would have taken me days to do that much, you know. So they've got it. And I learned early on in my business that shipping doesn't bring me joy, and that's okay. You know, like, it doesn't. I just learned that that's something that it brought a level of stress to me and to my business. And so to be able to pass that off, knowing that I can scale this and have it in the hands of someone who knows what they're doing and does this for a living, basically, it's just, it's been great. And I, yes, would do it all over again for sure.

Yeah. Okay, so now we're in month 2. And I know you had a few extra pillows from month 1. Tell me what you did before month 2.

So I did similar to what I know you do with your subscription box. Once I was able to reveal that first pillow, I went live on the page. I was able to finally show the sunflower pillow, which was just so exciting to finally be able to be like, this is, this is what I've been working on. And so at that time, we went ahead and we opened up more spots that's for September. And then we offered the sunflower pillow as basically an upsell on the back end. So if they wanted to go ahead and get in the subscription to lock in for the next month, they could. And then they had the option. So we've sold a lot of those sunflower pillows that way, just having them, you know, a bit— because once people saw them, there were more people that wanted them, of course. So in that— and that was just a— we did a quick 48-hour kind of flash— not sale, but flash opening. And we added almost 100 new subscribers during that— those 48 hours, which now has us at 900 pillows, which is only 100 away from that first goal. Yeah, so super exciting.

So exciting. And I know when you were at the mastermind last week, you— we got all the sneak peeks for the rest of the year, so we already know what they're going to look like, and they are so cute.

Yes, they are so cute. They, they truly just keep getting better and better. So I have no doubt when I'm able to review September and open up those last 100 spots, I think we'll definitely fill them up after that.

Yeah. And you've planned some more growth before the end of the year too, haven't you?

I have. I have.

Does that feel scary?

It feels scary-ish, but not really because I believe in this so much and I, I see how happy these ladies are after just one month of getting these pillows. And I know, I know I'm on to something with this and I know that there's there's more potential than just those first 1,000 pillows. So we are going to add some more spots for our November pillow, which I'm, I'm excited about because it's the holidays, you know. It's a great time. If I'm gonna do it, it's a great time to do it.

So, man, I can't wait to have you back on the fourth episode, see what you're gonna be up to next.

I don't need to do anything new for a little while, you know.

You have an amazing digital subscription called the Printable Club, which you send a printable bundle to them every single month month, and then you craft with them in your group, and you make a lot of great home decor with your printable club. How many members do you have in your digital subscription?

We are right over 2,000, I think around 2,100, 2,200 right now.

That's amazing.

Awesome. It's been holding steady for a while. And yep, they get the printable bundles each month. And, and it— and one thing real quick I'm doing to kind of tie these two together Every month there is a— they get 6 bundles a month in the printable club. So one of those bundles is going to coordinate with their pillow. They don't know which bundle it is because the pillow is a surprise. So that's been really fun too, because they're like, I wonder if it's the sunflower, the pumpkin. And then when they get their pillow, it's— so my whole, you know, thought is they're going to be able to craft and create some decor that is going to coordinate with their pillows each month. That's been a fun way to tie the two together a little bit.

And you're now getting double revenue from your existing audience because they're going to want the printable club, they're going to want the pillowcase subscription, or you might be grabbing new audience that just wants the decor, the pillows, that just wants the craft. So you're really broadening your audience, but you're keeping it super niche. And I love the way that you've tied this together. If you could give any advice on someone that is maybe wanting to start a subscription, maybe they already have an existing audience and they're like, you know, I really need some recurring revenue in my business to stabilize it, make things a lot easier for me. I've built this audience, but I don't know that I could do a subscription. What advice would you have for them?

I think for me it always goes back to fear and not letting fear stop you and hold you back. I had a lot of fear with this, not just because I thought, oh, can I add this to my plate? You know, do I need to be doing this? But also you have that— guess it's that imposter syndrome too. Like, who am I? I don't know how to make a pillow. I know how to shop for pillows, but I don't know how to design or curate one. Like, it just— it's a whole new process. I've never done this before. And if I would have let fear tell me, you can't figure this out, you can't do this, you just need to go keep, you know, keep shopping for pillows and don't do your own phone or whatever, I wouldn't be where I am right now. So I think you just— if there's something you love, you're passionate about, you know your audience also loves and it would resonate with them, you just have to do it scared. I've said that everything I've done in my business, I've done it scared. There's been nothing where I'm like, oh, I'm not scared, let's do this. There's always fear sitting on my shoulder, but you have to just go for it.

Yeah, I love that. If they need to be a part of this pillow club subscription of yours. Yes, yes. Where can they find that?

They can just go to pillowcoverclub.com. So you can go to that, or you can go to wilshirecollections.com, and it has all the things for all the subscriptions.

So if you need a little home inspiration, definitely go over and follow Wilshire Collections on Facebook and Instagram. Stacy's home is beautiful, and she decorates it for every season in the most beautiful way that you can imagine. So even if you're like me and you still have the Easter Bunny on your welcome board out front, you can just be inspired by Stacy's, um, decorating ability. Stacy, thank you so much for being my returning guest, the most returning guest ever. You keep killing it. I'm super proud of you, and I can't wait to see what the, the rest of the year brings for you.

Thank you, and thank you so much for your continuous support and belief in me. I just appreciate you so much. It's been a fun ride, and we're just getting started, which makes it—

we are just getting started. All right, all right, we'll be back next week with another great episode.