Episodes
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Former comedy writer Bette Bentley built Skimpies—the world’s first liner designed specifically for leggings—into a number one TikTok brand entirely through organic livestreams, bypassing paid ads by treating the platform like an interactive group chat. This innovative founder breaks down how she embraced raw authenticity to collapse the traditional sales funnel, handle extreme burnout, and turn a grueling six-month streaming schedule into a $60,000 warehouse livestream.
For more on Skimpies and show notes, click here.
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When Jing Gao launched Fly By Jing, she wasn’'t just selling chili crisp—she was challenging a century-old story about the value of Chinese food. Starting from an underground supper club and a scrappy Kickstarter, she built a brand now found in Target, Walmart, and Whole Foods that has inspired a generation of Asian food founders.
For more on Fly By Jin and show notes click here
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We brought together 14 founders across 13 businesses building on Shopify and asked every single one the same question: How do you know when it's time to pivot?
We've put together the playbook for the hardest decisions to make in business—the leap, the kill, the walk-away, and the quiet voice you almost ignored.
Featuring Catherine Goetze (Physical Phones), Melanie Bender (LORE), Jing Gao (Fly By Jing), AC Hampton (Supreme Ecom), Melissa Palmer (OSEA), Kevin and Jin Chon (Coop Sleep Goods), Aishwarya Iyer (Brightland), Matt Hassett (Loftie), Vy Nguyen (Avocado Green), Drew Scott (Lone Fox), Sean Reyes (Shock Surplus), Carmen Dianne and Kara Still (Prosperity Market), and Sara Sugarman (Lulu and Georgia).
For more: https://utm.io/upFkvSubscribe and watch Shopify Masters on YouTube!
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Trina Spear left Wall Street to build a billion dollar brand serving the 18 million health care workers no one else was designing for. Figs started out selling scrubs on sidewalks and grew into a NYSE-listed, direct-to-consumer powerhouse.
For more on Figs and show notes click here
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Arey founder Allison Conrad turned an overlooked beauty category into a science-backed business, with a clinical study to prove it. Hear how she built a defensible brand, from securing a patent to mapping a retail strategy designed around when customers are actually ready to buy.
For more on Arey and show notes click here
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Kevin and Jin Chon cut open a pillow, found carpet padding inside, and spent 13 years fixing it. They built Coop Sleep Goods into a nearly nine-figure brand by spending more on materials, staying focused on one product, and trusting that a better pillow would market itself.
For more on Coop Sleep Goods and show notes click here
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Krysten Kauder built Candier—a bold, irreverent candle brand with names like “Girl, You Need to Calm the F Down”—into a $14 million business stocked at Target, Whole Foods, and Ulta, and she did it without a PR firm, sales team, or single networking event.
For more on Candier and show notes click here
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Sign up for your FREE Shopify Trial here.
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Before the screen-time backlash hit the mainstream, Cat Goetze was already building an analog antidote. Her brand Physical Phones—Bluetooth landlines designed to replace smartphone habits—generated $800K in its first year and turned a personal frustration into a full-blown cultural movement.
For more on Physical Phones and show notes click here
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She built Virtue Labs into a $50M+ hair care brand. Now Melisse Shaban is CEO of Aramore — a biotech skincare company backed by peer-reviewed NAD+ research — and she's throwing out the beauty playbook.
No influencer deals. No aspirational campaigns. She's sending free product to Reddit strangers, asking for the honest truth, and betting that real science doesn't need hype to win.
In this episode:
Why she left a board seat to run one more brand How a 28-day Reddit trial beat any influencer campaign The products she cut from her own line — and why What 30 years at Aveda, the Body Shop, and Fekkai taught her about what's broken in beauty Why she hates the word "aging" and refuses to sell fearFor more on Aramore https://www.shopify.com/blog/aramore-reddit-skincare-science?utm_campaign=shopifymasters&utm_medium=youtube&utm_source=podcast
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The founders of Feel Goods built an eight-figure supplement brand with 100 million organic impressions and not a single product on a retail shelf. Their secret was radical transparency, founder-led content, and treating TikTok like a free testing lab before ever spending on paid ads.
For more on Feel Goods and show notes click here
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Sign up for your FREE Shopify Trial here.
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Twelve founders building on Shopify reveal exactly how they’re using AI right now—the tools, the tactics, and where to draw the line. Here’s the playbook being written in real time by the founders of Figs, Therabody, The Black Tux, Loftie, and more.
For more details on this episode and show notes click here
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Sign up for your FREE Shopify Trial here.
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Matthew Hassett noticed that smartphones were ruining sleep, so he built Loftie, a screen-free alarm clock, to fix it. Without venture capital or paid press, he grew the brand to more than 200,000 units sold, and earned Wirecutter’s top alarm clock pick six years in a row.
For more on Loftie and show notes click here
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She had 18 million followers, a product idea born from panic attacks, and zero paid ad spend on launch day. Within 24 hours, Hugz was sold out. Lexi Hensler built Give Hugz — a line of weighted stuffed animals designed to trigger deep pressure stimulation — by turning her own battle with anxiety into a brand now tripling sales year over year. But before Hugz existed, there was Lexi Llama: a merch line that launched a Christmas sweater one week before Christmas, promised worldwide delivery without knowing what international shipping cost, and ended with all four co-founders hand-signing apology cards at 2am. Every mistake became a blueprint.
In this episode, Lexi breaks down exactly how she built a brand that now stands on its own — where customers show up having never heard of Lexi Hensler:
Why she capped the Hugz launch at 3 SKUs — and how starting with 8 nearly sank her first brand The Goldilocks weight (4 pounds) and why glass beads won over rice and flaxseed (hint: mold, maggots, and microwaving) How vulnerability in content converts better than follower count — and what she told other creators who couldn't figure out why their merch wasn't selling Why all four co-founders took zero salary for years, and what that looked like day to day How she navigates the line between sharing and oversharing — including the engagement decision she almost posted and didn't Why their scrappy two-person phone shoots often outperform the ones with a full professional crewHugz donates 10% of every purchase to mental health charities — and Lexi has personally visited every partner organization they've worked with. This is the story of getting it wrong first, and building something that outlasts you because of it.
Start Your Free Shopify Trial: https://utm.io/yt_podcast_trialSUBSCRIBE to our Youtube channel for more video episodes: https://utm.io/uhw53
For more on Hugz: https://www.shopify.com/blog/hugz-creator-led-mental-health-brand?utm_campaign=shopifymasters&utm_medium=youtube&utm_source=podcastSubscribe and watch Shopify Masters on YouTube!
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Lone Fox’s Drew Scott on the vintage pivot that doubled revenue, building two million subscribers without ads, and why his business model can’t be copied.
For more on Lone Fox and show notes click here
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Sign up for your FREE Shopify Trial here.
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What happens when the product that made you famous starts holding you back?
Kevin Gould co-founded Glamnetic in 2019 with Ann McFerran, launching a magnetic eyelash brand that exploded from $1 million to $50 million in revenue in just one year — fueled by a great product, smart growth marketing, and the COVID-era boom in DIY beauty. But when the tailwinds reversed — iOS 14 updates sent acquisition costs soaring, the lash category contracted, and revenue dipped 25% — Kevin faced a make-or-break decision.
Rather than doubling down on what was declining, he pivoted the entire business into press-on nails, a category still in its infancy. Today, Glamnetic is one of the largest press-on nail brands in the world, doing over $100 million a year.
In this episode, Kevin gets real about the unglamorous side of hypergrowth: the cash flow crunches that come with scaling too fast, the inventory mistakes that haunt you, and the emotional toll of watching revenue fall when you expected it to double. He shares how he and his team navigated the pivot, why community and brand affinity will always outlast paid acquisition, and why the best advice he can give founders is: don't grow too fast.
You'll learn:
Why going from $1M to $50M overnight nearly broke the business How to manage cash flow and inventory when you're self-funded The marketing mix that built a real brand — not just an ad machine Why TikTok Shop is the biggest arbitrage opportunity right now How a 40,000-member Facebook community doubles as a product development engine The one hire every founder should prioritize early on What it really takes — personally and professionally — to turn a pivot into a $100M businessSubscribe and watch Shopify Masters on YouTube!
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Two recent college grads turned a dorm room pistachio recipe into a fast-growing food brand—by letting their community call the shots.
Nicola Buffo and Francine Voit, co-founders of Pistakio, share how they pivoted from pistachio mayo to a sweet pistachio spread one week before their first big grocery pitch, built a loyal following on social media because a college professor forced them to start posting, and turned customer DMs into their best-selling products—including their crunchy spread and date bark.
In this episode, Nico and Fran talk about:
How a last-minute product pivot landed them in Portland's biggest local retailer Why they said no to Shark Tank and Target before they were ready How community-led product development drove 10x growth Building a brand in public from day one (even with terrible dorm room lighting) The café tour strategy that gets customers to try the product risk-free Navigating a business partnership that's also a romantic relationship The $20,000 TikTok agency mistake and what they learned from it Why taste—not health trends—is their only non-negotiableWhether you're starting a food business, looking for community-driven marketing strategies, or figuring out when to say no to big opportunities, this episode is packed with real talk and actionable advice for ecommerce entrepreneurs.
For more on Pistakio and show notes click here: https://www.shopify.com/blog/pistakio-community-led-product-development?utm_campaign=shopifymasters&utm_medium=youtube&utm_source=podcast
SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel for more video episodes: https://utm.io/uhw53Subscribe and watch Shopify Masters on YouTube!
Sign up for your FREE Shopify Trial here.
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Flamingo Estate stayed true to its roots and built an eight-figure brand by saying no to almost every piece of outside advice.
For more on Flamingo Estate and show notes click here.
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Premier League soccer player Thomas Robson-Kanu turned a career-threatening injury into a mission—building The Turmeric Co., a raw functional beverage brand now reaching customers across 15,000 UK retail locations.
For more on The Turmeric Co and show notes click here
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Kimberly Kreuzberger, founder of Pivot Projects, shares her framework for finding influencers who actually convert, briefing them, and scaling strategically.
For more on Pivot Projects and show notes click here.
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Sign up for your FREE Shopify Trial here.
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