We're Adjusting Our Prices... Can We Tell You Why?

If you're familiar with O’Douds, you've probably learned that we are a value-based company dedicated to quality without compromise. We pride ourselves on making products that are good for you and good for the Earth, and that's not just a marketing tag line for us. We work diligently to formulate our products with the most helpful and high-quality ingredients we can find.  We want to give you the peace of mind that comes with knowing you are using all-natural and sustainably-sourced products.  Because this can't be (truthfully) claimed by most other grooming and personal care brands, we know that we occupy a small corner of the marketplace. 

With that said, staying on the cutting edge of product innovation and providing the high level of service for our customers that we are committed to comes with its own set of challenges. We've realized that we can only go so far until we address an essential need that every growing business has to deal with at some point: correcting our profit margins. 

As of July 1, 2019, O'Douds will be adjusting the prices on many of our products. 

We've included a simple graphic with the adjusted prices at the bottom of this post. Because transparency is important to us, we wanted to let you know what we are doing and why we are doing it. 

To that end, we'd like to offer some perspective on a few factors we've considered when making this decision. This isn't an exhaustive look at every nuance, but hopefully it provides you enough insight to understand why a price adjustment has become necessary.

Adjusting to Increased Production Costs

From the cost of shipping to packaging and ingredients, prices have increased over the past five years, and as much as we'd like to stop inflation from eating into our margins, at some point, we needed to take a hard look at our costs and pricing. Sustainably-sourced ingredients are in high demand, and we couldn't be happier about that, but ingredient manufacturers have been slow to change their quality standards to meet this change.  That means higher demand for quality ingredients, and of course, higher costs. Because we refuse to use synthetic or poorly-sourced ingredients, yet we want to keep the price of our products reasonable, we have absorbed this increase for as long as possible.

Providing an Enhanced Customer Experience

As we've grown, we've learned the value of direct and open communication with our customers. For a long time, our team was no more than one to three people, and it was challenging to offer the kind of experience we'd like for every customer to have. Over the past couple of years, we've slowly been adding more staff with the hope to provide better customer support. We want to help you have the best possible experience with O'Douds, which means we've had to expand our team to accommodate our growing number of customers.

Improving Quality Control

Just under a year ago, we moved into a new facility in Brooklyn that's three times larger than our previous one. The move allowed us to correct the most common quality control issues we experienced when having to outsource a portion of our production. We've been able to take 100% of our manufacturing and shipping back into our control, and are now able to offer immediate and ongoing improvement. Not only has the consistency of our products improved, but we've also been able to correct issues much faster when brought to our attention. Most recently, we were able to respond to your suggestions and refine the formulation and production of our Matte Paste. We've also got some more exciting improvements coming soon. The new facility and equipment are much of the reason for this, but again, it has come at an increased cost to us.

Maintaining Free US Shipping

It's easy for online customers to overlook the fact that we offer free US shipping, but that won't deter us from keeping our commitment to it. The cost of shipping doesn't often get factored into how much consumers end up paying to have their goods arrive on their front doorstep, but it can get expensive. Although it seems to be more in line with the industry standard, we don't require minimum purchases to receive free shipping. We do this because we care about the accessibility of our goods for all types of budgets. However, when shipping companies raise their prices, we must adjust our pricing. 

Offering Helpful & Insightful Digital Content

Offering more and better content has been a significant focus in 2019. We know how vital it is for you to get the most out of your experience with our products, which is why we've been giving more attention to our blog and creating helpful and insightful videos on our Youtube channel. Crafting and curating this content requires an investment of our time and resources. Although we never intend to ask you to pay for access to enhanced brand content, we do intend to increase the quality and consistency of what we produce. 

We Want To Hear From You

If you have any questions or concerns about this decision, we'd love to hear from you. Please feel free to email us at info@odouds.us. We'll get back with you as quickly as we can. 

Thank you for supporting O'Douds in our mission to promote Sensible Grooming for Sensible Humans. We're grateful for your business.

Sincerely,

Clayton Douds
Founder / CEO