Quick question: How big can a dropshipping business get?
Answer: As big as you want!
Dropshipping isn’t just fantasy; it’s a real opportunity by taking the best of ecommerce and technology, all rolled into one. Dropship stores, if anything, only proves the immense potential of ecommerce for modern day entrepreneurs.
Here are a few examples of dropship success stories that we hope can inspire you to start off on your own:
Wayfair
Nothing epitomizes dropship success as much as Wayfair does. Little did Niraj Shah and Steve Conine know that their discovery of a little business would have a revolutionary impact on their lives, and the ecommerce industry as a whole. A simple business that did very well selling birdhouses, all without the deep pockets that pets.com and eToys had those days.
Then, they stumbled across many other similar businesses run by folks without much technical expertise. Yet, each of these businesses grew by an average of 25 to 35% YoY. What started as a smorgasbord of different online stores for various absurdly niche products, turned into CSN Stores, when then gave way to Wayfair.
Early on, both the founders realized that they needed a lot of inventory to sell and they couldn’t possibly use warehouses to meet that demand. Realizing that the home-goods market in the U.S alone was about $500 billion, they knew could do it without the merchandizing chops.
They decided to get dull, as explained by Kasey Wehrum of Inc. Although both Shah and Conine did try warehousing sometime in 2011, more than 90% of their products were shipped directly from their suppliers. Back in 2012, Wayfair had the biggest single-day sales in the company’s history by selling $4 million worth of items on Cyber Monday.
As Kasey writes,
“It’s a staggering feat of computing that is capable of coordinating the order flow and logistics of the more than 4,000 suppliers that ship out an average of 93,800 items each week.”
Today, the company is one of the world’s largest online destinations for home goods. Wayfair boasts of 8.3 million customers, growing by 54% each year. Source
Aloysius Chay and Galvin Bay
Aloysius Chay & Galvin Bay were two professional poker players in Macau, China’s very own Las Vegas. While they already had an extravagant lifestyle, they felt that playing poker day in and day out had something missing. When they decided to experiment with a dropship store as an experiment, they didn’t expect their results.
The duo had a friend who was already into dropshipping and they decided to gamble (pun intended). They realized that dropshipping gave them the drive and motivation they needed to pursue their new business with unprecedented passion.
After generating 7-figure revenues with multiple stores using the dropship model (pictured below) and also the regular ecommerce route, Bay and Chay now spend time consulting and helping other dropshippers and ecommerce retailers scale globally with Bay & Chay Solutions — a consulting and digital marketing firm.
Justin Wong
Justin knew that quitting his job to pursue his entrepreneurial dream was risky. He realized that he needed to replace his income somehow, and he stumbled upon drop shipping. What resulted is one of the simplest and most relatable stories of the market.
A Shopify guide on Dropshipping, a Shopify store, and an Oberlo account later, he was all set to go live with his store SoAesthetic.
Justin didn’t have a large marketing budget so he depending on social platforms like Instagram to not only get his first few sales but it also set him off on a journey to forge more than 100 partners to help grow his business.
His store is still online, selling thousands of items each month. The rest is history, and money in the bank.
Khuram Dhanani
Dhanani was no stranger to entrepreneurship. He started his first business at the age of 16 when his family moved from Atlanta to Houston. His parents were in the jewellery business.
He picked up of the best products from his parents’ store, put them up on Yahoo Auctions, and made his first few sales then.
Eventually, he sold the family business to Paul Winston Group and then moved on to create magic with ecommerce. Having gone back to a few European suppliers he did business with earlier (for his family business), he worked out a business model where he would give away a complete, turnkey ecommerce store for just about 99 cents provided that customers would agree to purchase hosting.
This business was later sold to a hosting company called Silver Gear in Kansas City. After that, Dhanani had his eyes on dropshipping by starting ZQ Network. He grew his drop shipping business to about 300 suppliers and more than 10,000 products.
Later, he’d consolidate the business by splitting up ZQ network into individual and multiple companies, further diversifying his revenue and completing his goals.
So there you have it. Real people. Real businesses. Ecommerce made simple. That’s dropshipping for you. Are you all kicked up to get started with Dropshipping? Tell us all about it — We’d love to chat!
The Dropaship team
