CTRL Achieved 78% Repeat Purchases with ParcelPanel Offering Shipment Visibility

Business Profile

CTRL is a fast-growing meal replacement brand "Catered to Real Life." It is committed to helping gamers and content creators to eat healthily, save time, and perform their best by offering tasty functional foods including meal shakes, protein cookies, on-the-go bars, etc. that contain all necessary nutrients.

Brand: Drink CTRL 

Industry: Food & Drink

Platform: Shopify Plus

Country: United States

Year Founded: 2019

Employees: 2 - 10

Usage: Since March 2022

Carriers: ＜10

Ships to: 10+ countries

Integration: N/A

In 2020, FaZe Clan, the world's most popular gaming organization, became a shareholder of CTRL, putting CTRL in focus on its massive audience, i.e., 230 million followers and devoted fans. Thanks to FaZe Clan's unrivaled marketing prowess, the startup's development sped up. By February 2022, CTRL had successfully sold over 1 million meals, and its products, which were popular among gamers, were available in over 750 stores across the United States. 

The challenge: Lack of shipment visibility & customer confidence

Although CTRL gained in popularity in the gaming world, by early March 2022, gamers who formed the majority of CTRL's customers still thought it a hassle to track the delivery of CTRL meal replacement products. More explicitly, they had to find the tracking number on the CTRL official website, copy it, and visit the corresponding courier website to get the latest updates. In some cases, they had to submit an inquiry and wait for a response in 24 ~ 48 hours. It seemed that CTRL had taken a nonchalant approach to post-purchase service, which upset gamers who would like to allocate every second on a quest or a fight.

As a consequence, CTRL suffered from low repeat purchase rates, and CTRL subscriptions launched in August 2020 were not as popular as expected. Meanwhile, CTRL's team was occupied with many business affairs, including funding, partnerships, and the upcoming product launch. Therefore, they wanted an automated order tracking solution to revamp the post-purchase experience and consolidate customer confidence.

Looking for an automated tracking solution

"As CTRL is designed to save people's time, we would like to have an easy-to-implement order tracking solution that could help us improve our post-purchase experience and build trust. Apart from the multi-courier tracking functionality, the solution should provide analytics features to save our time while enabling us to save money as our business develops."

Claire Sigmon, Vice President Operations & Business Development

In Claire's eye, the "must-haves" of an ideal tracking solution for CTRL are listed below:

• Quick Implementation: The tracking solution must be easy to use - the setup should be minimal so that the order tracking self-service can be launched in a day or two.
• Accurate Multi-Courier Tracking: The desired tracking solution should work seamlessly with CTRL's courier partners, including USPS, UPS, DHL, and FedEx. It must support end-to-end tracking for worldwide deliveries and offer accurate real-time tracking information.
• Custom CSS Codes: To ensure consistency in branding while featuring its product collections, CTRL's team wished to add custom CSS codes on the tracking page.
• Analytics & Reporting: With the tracking solution, it would be possible for CTRL's team to download detailed shipment reports and get actionable insights.
• Significant Cost Saving: The tracking solution ought not to incur huge costs. Furthermore, as CTRL's business grows, the expenditure on tracking automation should remain reasonably low.

After making clear what the company looked for in a tracking solution, the CTRL's operations team started the search immediately.

The solution: Deliver on-brand order tracking self-service with ParcelPanel

"Having compared the top order tracking solutions in the market, we were all impressed by ParcelPanel, and I even voted for it. The order tracking page it created was great. With the sample CSS codes provided by ParcelPanel, our technical team easily fine-tuned the elements on the page in accordance with our branding guidelines. Its seamless integration with Shopify and high tracking accuracy was also laudable - no configurations were required on our end."

Sundance DiGiovanni, Co-Founder

The results: 78% repeat purchases & another 4 million meals sold

"Since onboarding with ParcelPanel, we have sold 4 million more meals globally. We have successfully streamlined order processing and quickly expanded our lineup of products. What's more, we've gradually enhanced our cooperation with GNC. By June 2023, CTRL meal replacement shakes, protein cookies, and so on were readily available in 2,000 GNC stores across the United States. Most of our customers have chosen subscription packages on our official website."

Claire Sigmon, Vice President Operations & Business Development

• 82% Higher Tracking Efficiency: CTRL's team effectively reduced manual work associated with the use of Track & Trace tools across multiple courier partners. More importantly, their customers can get the latest shipment updates without leaving the CTRL official website - by using the branded tracking page and live chat integration with ParcelPanel.

• 25% Service Workload Reduced: With ParcelPanel to automate order tracking and reporting, CTRL's team has witnessed a significant drop in WISMO inquiries. They can truly focus on business development and diversify the product range. 

• 78% Repeat Purchases: CTRL managed to retain customers and boost loyalty with a hassle-free post-purchase experience. Plus, discounts for subscription packages increase the appeal. For these reasons, CTRL's repeat purchases soared, and another 4 million meals were sold. 

The future: Win European customers with top-notch post-purchase experiences

"We aim to provide gamers worldwide with healthy meal replacement products. By partnering with ParcelPanel, we've benefited a lot from enhanced shipment visibility and automated order tracking, greatly improving the supply chain operations in the US. The success has consolidated our confidence in the global market. Currently, CTRL ships to most regions in Canada and Europe. Even though international shipping is not comparable to domestic –much longer distances and more procedures are needed, we plan to continue using ParcelPanel to find the best courier partners and increase customer satisfaction in the post-purchase journey."

Skyler Johnson, Co-Founder