Athena Club becomes latest DTC razor brand to disrupt mass retail with Target launch
Personal care brand Athena Club is officially the latest DTC startup to disrupt the mass retail razor market.
On March 5, the Athena Club hair removal product line launched in 1,600 US Target stores and on Target’s website. The brand’s Target debut, formerly DTC, marks its first major retail partnership. The 3-year-old brand has secured $40 million in equity and debt financing to support its expansion. The launch is the latest example of formerly online-only razor startups making their way onto the big shelves and helping to decrease the market share of the industry giants in this category.
Products to be launched at Target include five different colors of shaving kits, replacement blades, shaving cream and wax strip sets, all offered in the women’s shaving category. In preparation for the launch, the brand chose less minimalistic packaging to stand out on the shelves, a trend among the DTC brands entering retail. Colorful boxes feature images of the brand’s design-led razors.
“We loved our DTC packaging, but for retail, you need to see what the product looks like,” said Maria Desmarais, co-founder and co-CEO of Athena Club.
Athena Club has seen 140% revenue growth over the last 12 months and is on track to grow another 250% by 2023, according to Maria Desmarais and co-founder and co-CEO Chris Desmarais. The customer return rate is 93% across all categories including razor blade refills.
While the brand offers both single order and refill subscriptions on its DTC website, retail is an important part of its distribution strategy due to consumer shopping habits. In a survey of its customers, Athena Club found that only 19% prefer to shop online only, while 16% prefer to shop only in-store and 65% like to shop both in-store and online.
While hip, design-led DTC startups in the CPG space are considered millennial-centric, Athena Club founders say the brand appeals to all ages.
“When we started the brand we weren’t sure what age group we were going to target and it was really an even split from 18 to 55+,” said Chris Desmarais. The co-founders also highlighted that the brand receives orders from 60% of US zip codes in both urban and rural areas.
When it comes to women’s razors, brands like Athena Club, Billie and Flamingo have turned the traditional marketing practices of giants like Gillette and Schick on their head. As well as introducing a new design aesthetic, they have tackled taboos surrounding hair removal such as B. Showing a razor shaving hair instead of showing smooth, bare skin in the marketing.
The Athena Club, for example, ran a campaign in October that “showed people shaving in different ways, whether it’s a pregnant person who can’t really see anything down there, or a couple exchanging razors,” Maria Desmarais said.
Razor startups have eroded conglomerate market share: Gillette’s market share in the razor category dropped to below 50% as of 2017, according to Euromonitor, after accounting for 70% a decade earlier. In the women’s shaving category, Target also carries Harry’s own flamingo. Billie, now owned by Edgewell, is sold at Walmart.
Athena Club’s $40 million funding round comes from a combination of existing investors and bank financing to “propel us to the next phase of growth,” Maria Desmarais said.
In the future, the brand hopes to expand its broader product range, which also includes tampons and personal care, into retail. The company launched in Canada last year and plans further international expansion, new retail partners and additional product categories over the next 24 months.