eCommerce Success Story: Gymshark

We all love stories of entrepreneurs who start in a garage, but they are not always quite as they are told.

 

Certainly, that is not the case with Gymshark. Its founders can boast of becoming a reference in the sportswear niche, starting from scratch.

 

However, and as an example, it is often said that Amazon began in Jeff Bezos's parents' garage. What is not usually mentioned is that Mr. and Mrs. Bezos, in addition to providing the space, invested over $50,000 to fund their son's venture.

Let's take a moment to delve into the brand's story, which always helps us better understand its values, growth, and strategy.

 

As we said, this eCommerce success story begins in a garage located in a neighborhood in Birmingham, United Kingdom.

 

There, two very young students (Ben Francis and Lewis Morgan), decided to invest what they earned from delivering pizzas into a small business that combined their passion for training and an ever-growing interest in the world of e-commerce.

 

The product they chose to start their journey was dietary supplements for athletes, and as a business model, they opted for dropshipping. This way, they contained the risk to a minimum while keeping the investment low.

This pair of friends had an enormous understanding of their target audience, their motivations, and their hindrances. In other words: they knew what was in demand. At the same time, they realized that the margins left by their product were not enough to turn that venture into a profitable business.

 

They decided to forget about buying products from third parties to resell and went to the other extreme: they became producers. In a very artisanal way, they sewed and labeled gym clothes. In their own words, they created: "the clothes they themselves would want to use for training."

Like many other companies, behind the brand, there is a manifesto, values that summarize the mission and vision of the company. In this case, there are 5 principles that, in their own words, are always maintained because "if we lose them, we lose everything."

 

In their own words, their principles are:

Although the essence of the brand is still present in many things, the truth is that the company has grown exponentially since its foundation in 2012.

 

Its line of sportswear is extraordinarily popular; in this long period, its team has grown from 2 people with a sewing machine to 900 workers spread across 5 headquarters (maintaining one in their native Birmingham).

 

These workers service the 14 regional eCommerce platforms and the physical stores and pop-ups that open occasionally in Europe and the United States.

 

Much of that success lies in remaining faithful to the foundational values and a strategy that combines design, quality, functionality, and personalization. This has led them to have an immense community behind them that counts with 18 million followers across all their networks.

Primarily an online store, because of their garage origins, they have always shown great interest in working guerilla and digital channels, especially social platforms.

 

Something they have done very smartly is to adapt their content to each of them. For example:

 

As we have seen, their mix of networks is very good, but we can discuss a specific campaign that has been recurring and has become emblematic of the brand.

 

If we enter any of their social platforms, we will frequently see the hashtag #Gymshark66. This tag identifies all the members of the community who have joined a healthy challenge.

 

As they explain, it takes 66 days to build a habit. Gymshark has created a mobile application that allows users to set up workout, nutrition, or meditation routines, and then monitor and track progress.