Subscription Box Business Plan
Over the past 20+ years, we have helped over 1,000 entrepreneurs and business owners create business plans to start and grow their subscription box businesses. On this page, we will first give you some background information with regards to the importance of business planning. We will then go through a subscription box business plan template step-by-step so you can create your plan today.
What is a Subscription Box Business Plan?
A business plan provides a snapshot of your subscription box business as it stands today, and lays out your growth plan for the next five years. It explains your business goals and your strategy for reaching them. It also includes market research to support your plans.
Why You Need a Business Plan for a Subscription Box Business
If you’re looking to start your own subscription box business, or grow your existing business, you need a business plan. A business plan will help you raise funding, if needed, and plan out the growth of your subscription box business in order to improve your chances of success. Your business plan is a living document that should be updated annually as your company grows and changes.
Sources of Funding for Subscription Box Businesses
With regards to funding, the main sources of funding for a subscription box business are personal savings, credit cards, bank loans and angel investors. With regards to bank loans, banks will want to review your business plan and gain confidence that you will be able to repay your loan and interest. To acquire this confidence, the loan officer will not only want to confirm that your financials are reasonable, but they will also want to see a professional plan. Such a plan will give them the confidence that you can successfully and professionally operate a business. Personal savings and bank loans are the most common funding paths for subscription box businesses.
How to Write a Business Plan for a Subscription Box Business
If you want to start your own subscription box company or expand your current one, you need a business plan. Below is a business plan outline of what should be included in each section of your subscription box business plan:
Executive Summary
Your executive summary provides an introduction to your business plan, but it is normally the last section you write because it provides a summary of each key section of your plan.
The goal of your Executive Summary is to quickly engage the reader. Explain to them the type of business you are operating and the status. For example, are you a startup, or do you have a business that you would like to grow?
Next, provide an overview of each of the subsequent sections of your plan. For example, give a brief overview of the subscription box industry. Discuss the type of subscription box business you are operating. Detail your direct competitors. Give an overview of your target market. Provide a snapshot of your marketing plan. Identify the key members of your team. And offer an overview of your financial plan.
Company Analysis
In your company analysis, you will detail the type of subscription box business you are operating.
For example, you might operate one of the following types of subscription box businesses:
- Personal Care Subscription Box: this type of subscription box business includes boxes which contain personal care items such as makeup, skin care products, shaving supplies, etc.
- Food/Beverage Subscription Box: this type of subscription box specializes in distributing groceries, snack foods, coffee, wine, etc.
- Clothing Subscription Box: this type of subscription box can include personally curated wardrobe items, or underwear, etc.
- Pet Subscription Box: this type of subscription can be either for pet necessities such as food and medicine, or for things such as toys and treats.
In addition to explaining the type of subscription box business you will operate, the Company Analysis section of your business plan needs to provide background on the business.
Include answers to question such as:
- When and why did you start the business?
- What is your business model?
- What milestones have you achieved to date? Milestones could include the number of active subscriptions, number of positive reviews, reaching X amount in sales, etc.
- Your legal structure. Are you incorporated as an S-Corp? An LLC? A sole proprietorship? Explain your legal business structure here.
Industry Analysis
In your industry analysis, you need to provide an overview of the subscription box industry.
While this may seem unnecessary, it serves multiple purposes.
First, researching the subscription box industry educates you. It helps you understand the market in which you are operating.
Secondly, market research can improve your strategy, particularly if your research identifies market trends.
The third reason for market research is to prove to readers that you are an expert in your industry. By conducting the research and presenting it in your plan, you achieve just that.
The following questions should be answered in the industry analysis section:
- How big is the subscription box industry (in dollars)?
- Is the market declining or increasing?
- Who are the key competitors in the market?
- Who are the key suppliers in the market?
- What trends are affecting the industry?
- What is the industry’s growth forecast over the next 5 – 10 years?
- What is the relevant market size? That is, how big is the potential market for your business? You can extrapolate such a figure by assessing the size of the market in the entire country and then applying that figure to your local population.
Customer Analysis
The customer analysis section must detail the customers you serve and/or expect to serve.
The following are examples of customer segments: Millennials, Gen X, and Baby Boomers.
As you can imagine, the customer segment(s) you choose will have a great impact on the type of business you operate. Clearly, Gen X would respond to different marketing promotions than Millennials, for example.
Try to break out your target market in terms of their demographic and psychographic profiles. With regards to demographics, include a discussion of the ages, genders, locations and income levels of the customers you seek to serve.
Psychographic profiles explain the wants and needs of your target market. The more you can understand and define these needs, the better you will do in attracting and retaining your customers.
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Competitive Analysis
Your competitive analysis should identify the indirect and direct competitors your business faces and then focus on the latter.
Direct competitors are other subscription box businesses.
Indirect competitors are other options that customers have to purchase from that aren’t direct competitors. This includes individuals who shop in physical stores for the items they want to purchase, or other ecommerce websites. You need to mention such competition as well.
With regards to direct competition, you want to describe the other subscription box businesses with which you compete. Most likely, your direct competitors will be subscription box businesses that offer the same types of goods.
For each such competitor, provide an overview of their businesses and document their strengths and weaknesses. Unless you once worked at your competitors’ businesses, it will be impossible to know everything about them. But you should be able to find out key things about them such as:
- What types of customers do they serve?
- What type of subscription box are they?
- What is their pricing (premium, low, etc.)?
- What are they good at?
- What are their weaknesses?
With regards to the last two questions, think about your answers from the customers’ perspective. And don’t be afraid to ask your competitors’ customers what they like most and least about them.
The final part of your competitive analysis section is to document your areas of competitive advantage. For example:
- Will you provide curated shipments?
- Will you provide products that your competitors don’t offer?
- Will you provide better customer service?
- Will you offer better pricing?
Think about ways you will outperform your competition and document them in this section of your plan.
Marketing Plan
Traditionally, a marketing plan includes the four P’s: Product, Price, Place, and Promotion. For a subscription box business, your marketing plan should include the following:
Product: In the product section, you should reiterate the type of subscription box company that you documented in your Company Analysis. Then, detail the specific products you will be offering. For example, in addition to a meal subscription box, will you provide wine add-ons or any other services?
Price: Document the prices you will offer and how they compare to your competitors. Essentially in the product and price sub-sections of your marketing plan, you are presenting the services you offer and their prices.
Place: Place refers to the location of your subscription box company. Document your location and mention how the location will impact your success. For example, can customers access your subscription box on your website alone, or do you have affiliates who also subscribe customers for you, etc.? Discuss how your location might be the ideal location for your customers.
Promotions: The final part of your subscription box marketing plan is the promotions section. Here you will document how you will drive customers to your location(s). The following are some promotional methods you might consider:
- Reaching out to bloggers and other websites
- Flyers
- Social media marketing
- Radio advertising
- TV advertising
Operations Plan
While the earlier sections of your business plan explained your goals, your operations plan describes how you will meet them. Your operations plan should have two distinct sections as follows.
Everyday short-term processes include all of the tasks involved in running your business, including procuring and curating products, administrative tasks related to subscriptions, packaging and shipping products, customer service, etc.
Long-term goals are the milestones you hope to achieve. These could include the dates when you expect to win your Xth subscription, or when you hope to reach $X in revenue. It could also be when you expect to expand your business to a new product category.
Management Team
To demonstrate your subscription box company’s ability to succeed, a strong management team is essential. Highlight your key players’ backgrounds, emphasizing those skills and experiences that prove their ability to grow a company.
Ideally you and/or your team members have direct experience in managing subscription box businesses. If so, highlight this experience and expertise. But also highlight any experience that you think will help your business succeed.
If your team is lacking, consider assembling an advisory board. An advisory board would include 2 to 8 individuals who would act like mentors to your business. They would help answer questions and provide strategic guidance. If needed, look for advisory board members with experience in managing an ecommerce business or successfully managing a customer support team.
Financial Plan
Your financial plan should include your 5-year financial statement broken out both monthly or quarterly for the first year and then annually. Your financial statements include your income statement, balance sheet and cash flow statements.
Income Statement
An income statement is more commonly called a Profit and Loss statement or P&L. It shows your revenues and then subtracts your costs to show whether you turned a profit or not.
In developing your income statement, you need to devise assumptions. For example, will you offer a variety of box options, and will you plan for 250 monthly subscribers or 1,000? And will sales grow by 2% or 10% per year? As you can imagine, your choice of assumptions will greatly impact the financial forecasts for your business. As much as possible, conduct research to try to root your assumptions in reality.
Balance Sheets
Balance sheets show your assets and liabilities. While balance sheets can include much information, try to simplify them to the key items you need to know about. For instance, if you spend $50,000 on building out your business, this will not give you immediate profits. Rather it is an asset that will hopefully help you generate profits for years to come. Likewise, if a bank writes you a check for $50,000, you don’t need to pay it back immediately. Rather, that is a liability you will pay back over time.
Cash Flow Statement
Your cash flow statement will help determine how much money you need to start or grow your business and make sure you never run out of money. What most entrepreneurs and business owners don’t realize is that you can turn a profit but run out of money and go bankrupt.
In developing your Income Statement and Balance Sheets be sure to include several of the key costs needed in starting or growing a subscription box business:
- Cost of computer software.
- Cost of equipment and supplies
- Cost of products
- Payroll or salaries paid to staff
- Business insurance
- Taxes and permits
- Legal expenses
Appendix
Attach your full financial projections in the appendix of your plan along with any supporting documents that make your plan more compelling. For example, you might include your warehouse location lease or your subscription growth history.
Summary
Putting together a business plan for your subscription box business is a worthwhile endeavor. If you follow the template above, by the time you are done, you will truly be an expert. You will really understand the subscription box industry, your competition, and your customers. You will have developed a marketing plan and will really understand what it takes to launch and grow a successful subscription box business.
Finish Your Subscription Box Business Plan in 1 Day!
Don’t you wish there was a faster, easier way to finish your Subscription Box business plan?
With Growthink’s Ultimate Business Plan Template you can finish your plan in just 8 hours or less!
OR, Let Us Develop Your Plan For You
Since 1999, Growthink has developed business plans for thousands of companies who have gone on to achieve tremendous success.
See how Growthink’s business plan advisors can give help you in writing a winning business plan.
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