I scaled Liquiproof from zero to 3,000+ global retailers in under six years. I've sat across the table from buyers at Selfridges, independent boutiques, and international distributors. I've seen brands pitch with beautiful decks and terrible margins. I've seen scrappy founders land national accounts their first time out because they came with the right data.
The gap between DTC brands that successfully cross into retail and those that get rejected, margin-crushed, or run out of cash is almost never about the product. It is almost always about how they approach the channel, in what order, and with what preparation.
Why Retail Feels Different (And Why Most DTC Founders Underestimate It)
In DTC, you control everything. The traffic, the page, the offer, the price, the customer data. You get paid within days. You can test, iterate, and respond to real-time signals.
Retail works almost entirely in reverse. You have a buyer sitting between you and the shopper who has their own P&L, their own promotional calendar, their own data, and their own rules about shelf placement and pricing. You ship product and wait 30 to 60 days for payment. You have no visibility into who is actually buying your product in store. And if your velocity drops, you get delisted, often without warning.
None of this means retail is the wrong move. For CPG, wellness, and food brands, getting on shelf is often the moment the brand becomes real to consumers. It builds credibility, drives DTC traffic, and compounds. But you have to go in knowing the rules.
Brands that treat retail as just another sales channel fail. Brands that treat it as a separate business model with its own unit economics, its own cash cycle, and its own growth mechanics tend to win.
The Retail Readiness Check: Before You Approach a Single Buyer
Most DTC founders approach retail too early. They have a working product, some DTC traction, and they start pitching national chains. That is the fast route to rejection or to a deal that destroys your margins.
Before you approach any buyer, work through this readiness check:
Do you have retail-viable margins?
Your wholesale price needs to be 45 to 60 percent of the shelf price, leaving 40 to 55 percent for the retailer. On top of that, budget 15 to 25 percent of retail sales for trade spend. If your current COGS doesn't allow for this, you're not ready. Trying to enter retail with margins built for DTC is the most common and most expensive mistake I see.
Can you fund 60 to 90 days of float?
Retailers pay on net-30 to net-60 terms. If you land a first order with Waitrose or Whole Foods and you can't fund production and hold that inventory for two months before you see a penny, the deal will hurt you. A brand at one million pounds DTC adding 50 percent wholesale typically needs 200,000 to 400,000 pounds of additional working capital just for the transition.
Do you have sell-through velocity data?
National buyers want to see proof that your product moves off shelf, not just that it sells online. If you haven't sold into at least a handful of local independents or a small regional chain, you have no velocity data. Build it before you pitch up. Buyers are focused on velocity per location above almost everything else in 2026.
Is your packaging retail-compliant?
Retail has different requirements than DTC: shelf-ready units, case configurations, barcodes, country-of-origin labelling, net weight in the right units, and allergen statements formatted to local regulations. In the UK, you also need to ensure compliance with HFSS rules if applicable. Getting packaging wrong after a buyer says yes is an expensive and embarrassing delay.
The Account Ladder: Where to Start and Why It Matters
One of the biggest strategic mistakes I see DTC brands make is trying to land a national chain before they've proven the model at a smaller scale. It almost always ends in one of two ways: rejection, or a deal they can't support operationally.
The account ladder is the framework I used at Liquiproof and now teach to every brand I work with. You build upward, using each tier as proof for the next.
Tier 1: Local independents and boutiques
Start here. Independent retailers are easy to get into, forgiving on terms, and incredibly useful for learning how your product performs on shelf. You can often get a conversation on the shop floor, place a small order, and get sell-through data within 30 days.
The goal at this tier is not revenue. It is proof of concept: does the product move without you there to sell it? What questions do shoppers ask? What display placement works? These signals are gold when you go up the ladder.
Tier 2: Regional chains and curated online retailers
Once you have sell-through data from five to ten independents, approach regional chains and premium online retailers. In the UK, that might mean ASOS Marketplace, Not On The High Street, or a regional health food chain. In the US, regional grocery and specialty chains are the right next step.
Buyers at this tier are more formal. You'll need a proper sell sheet, a clear margin structure, and a promotional support plan. But you're still dealing with buyers who have discretion and can move fast. A good meeting can turn into a purchase order within weeks.
Tier 3: National chains and multiples
Now you go to Boots, Whole Foods, Waitrose, Sainsbury's, or equivalent in your market. These buyers are sophisticated, data-led, and risk-averse. They want velocity data from existing retail accounts. They want to see your promotional support commitment in writing. They want to know you can supply consistently at scale.
The lead time from first meeting to first order at this tier is typically three to nine months. Build your pipeline accordingly and don't bet your cash flow on the deal closing on time.
What Retail Buyers Actually Want to See
Your pitch deck doesn't need to be beautiful. It needs to answer the four questions every buyer is asking in their head before they've said a word to you.
Will this sell?
Velocity data from existing accounts. Consumer reviews and social proof. Any press or earned media. DTC conversion data is useful context but not the headline number.
Can I make margin on it?
Show your SRP, wholesale cost, and the resulting retailer margin clearly. For UK grocery and premium retail, 40 to 50 percent margin to the retailer is standard. Show it. Don't make buyers calculate it themselves.
Will you support it?
What is your promotional support commitment? Are you willing to fund in-store sampling, a launch promotion, or a feature in their media network? Buyers are evaluating whether you're a brand that will pull its weight or just fill a shelf.
Can you supply it reliably?
Lead times, minimum order quantities, your production capacity, and your backup plan if your primary manufacturer has issues. One stockout at a major retailer and you're at serious risk of delisting.
Your sell sheet should be a single page with your UPC, case configuration, SRP, wholesale cost, and retailer margin at a glance. If a buyer has to hunt for those numbers, you've already created friction where you needed confidence.
The Margin Maths You Have to Know Before You Walk In
Most DTC brands set their retail price based on what feels right and then reverse-engineer the margin. That almost always produces a number that works in a spreadsheet and breaks in practice.
Here is the correct order of operations:
Start with your COGS
What does it actually cost to make and package one unit, including all allocated overhead? Be precise. Most brands undercount by 10 to 20 percent because they exclude packaging, quality control, and inbound freight.
Calculate your minimum viable wholesale price
Your wholesale price needs to cover COGS plus enough contribution margin on the wholesale channel to be viable. A rough benchmark: your wholesale price should be at least 2x COGS. Below that, retail becomes a cash drain.
Set your SRP from wholesale price
Your SRP should be your wholesale price divided by 0.5 (to give the retailer 50 percent margin). If that SRP is too high for the market, your COGS needs to come down, not your retail price.
Layer in trade spend
Budget 15 to 25 percent of retail sales for trade spend from day one. That includes promotional pricing, any slotting fees, product sampling, and retailer marketing contributions. Strip this out of your wholesale margin projections and recalculate. If the business still makes sense, you're ready.
Broker vs. Direct: When to Use Each
Every founder asks this question. The honest answer is that brokers are most useful after you already have traction, not before.
A broker's value is their buyer relationships and their ability to walk your product into a meeting you couldn't get on your own. But brokers work their established products harder than they work new ones. If you don't have velocity data and a compelling story, a broker will put you to the bottom of their portfolio.
For your first five to fifteen accounts, go direct. Cold outreach to buyers works better than most founders expect, especially at independent and regional level. A well-researched email that names the specific buyer, references their current range, and arrives with a compelling one-page sell sheet converts. Do it yourself. Learn the objections. Develop your pitch.
Once you have ten to twenty accounts, real velocity data, and you're ready to expand into a new region or a national chain you can't reach directly, that is when a broker earns their 5 to 8 percent. Not before.
Protecting Your DTC Brand While Growing Retail
The brands that struggle most are the ones that go wholesale and stop investing in DTC. Retail and DTC are not competing channels. They feed each other. A customer who discovers you in a Whole Foods and then buys from your website is worth significantly more than either touchpoint alone.
Research from emarsys shows 86 percent of CPG dollar sales involve shoppers who engage both online and in-store on their path to purchase. Retail does not replace DTC. It amplifies it, when the two channels are managed together.
A few specific practices that protect your DTC engine while growing retail:
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Keep your best SKUs and bundles available exclusively on DTC. Give retail the hero product, give your website the premium version or the multi-pack.
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Run your loyalty, subscription, and repeat purchase mechanics on DTC. These are the economics retail cannot replicate for you.
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Use retail visibility to drive email sign-ups. A QR code on packaging that drives to a gated offer is one of the most underused tactics in CPG.
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Don't match your DTC price to your SRP. Shoppers who buy DTC should get slightly better value through bundle pricing, loyalty rewards, or exclusive SKUs.
What This Looks Like in Practice
I worked with a UK wellness brand that had been doing well on DTC for two years. Around 80,000 pounds a month, a tightly segmented Klaviyo list, and a product that genuinely worked. A buyer at a premium London retailer had seen their Instagram and reached out.
They almost said yes immediately. We slowed them down. First: their COGS at current volume didn't leave enough margin for retail. We worked with their contract manufacturer to negotiate a lower rate at higher committed volume. Second: they had no sell-through data from any physical location. We placed product with six independent health food stores for 60 days and documented velocity by location. Third: we built a proper sell sheet and modelled out the trade spend requirements.
They went back to that buyer three months later with real data. They got the listing. And because we'd fixed the margins first, the retail channel was accretive to the business from month one, not a cash drain they were hoping would eventually work out.
Growth Audit
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Book Your AuditFrequently asked questions
How do DTC brands get into retail stores?
DTC brands get into retail by building a proven velocity track record first, usually at smaller regional chains or independent retailers, then using that sell-through data to approach national buyers. Buyers want to see velocity per location, repeat orders, and evidence the product moves. A strong direct pitch with a clean sell sheet, margin math, and promotional support plan gets you further than any broker relationship in the early stages.
What margin do retailers expect from CPG brands?
Most retailers expect 40 to 55 percent gross margin on retail price, meaning your wholesale price should be roughly 45 to 60 percent of the shelf price. On top of that, expect trade spend of 15 to 25 percent of retail sales for promotions, displays, and slotting. Your product needs to be priced at retail so that after those deductions, you still have a viable contribution margin on the wholesale channel.
Should DTC brands use a broker to get into retail?
Brokers make sense once you have traction to show them. Before that, they are hard to engage and even harder to motivate. For your first five to ten accounts, go direct. Build your own buyer relationships, learn the objections, and refine your pitch. Once you have velocity data and are ready to scale into a region or a national chain, that is when a well-connected broker earns their 5 to 8 percent.
How much working capital does a DTC brand need to enter retail?
More than founders expect. Retailers pay on net-30 to net-60 terms, which means you are funding inventory for two to three months before revenue arrives. A brand at one million pounds in DTC revenue adding 50 percent wholesale typically needs 200,000 to 400,000 pounds of additional working capital just to fund the transition, before any slotting fees or promotional spend.
What is the difference between wholesale and distribution for CPG brands?
Wholesale means you sell directly to the retailer. Distribution means a distributor buys from you and sells to retailers, adding another layer of margin compression (typically 20 to 30 percent) in exchange for logistics, relationships, and reach. For early-stage CPG brands, going direct to small accounts gives you better margins and faster feedback. Distributors make sense when geography or volume demands it.
About the author
Caner Veli built Liquiproof from zero to 3,000+ global retailers in under 6 years. He now helps DTC and CPG brands fix broken growth engines and scale 2x-15x in 90 days.