How top subscription brands sell with Shopify
Selling using subscription tools on Shopify is a business model that charges customers a recurring fee to access a product or service, typically on a monthly or yearly basis. Shopify subscription providers usually allow brands to offer multiple choices over recurring periods. Offering a subscription-based model to your customers offers your brand the opportunity to build strong customer relationships with a purpose and create a meaningful community of repeat customers.
Subscriptions mean that customers are making a commitment to your brand and maximise the exposure and touchpoints that you have with a customer. On average, acquiring new customers can cost considerably more (5-10 times) than retaining your existing customer base. Subscriptions are a great way to maximise the life-time-value (LTV) that a customer can bring to your business.
When selling subscriptions with Shopify it's vital to continually review the data of the rate of churn, and key milestones that you are most likely to lose customers to manage how you communicate with them at this phase. Some key considerations should be - leaving customers in control, allowing customers to skip, pause or even gift their subscriptions and maximise LTV.
Our top pick of 25 subscription brands on Shopify & Shopify Plus
Huel (Human + Fuel) is nutritionally complete food. This means every Huel meal contains a balance of all 26 essential vitamins and minerals, protein, essential fats, carbs, fibre and phytonutrients in a single product. The brand chose Shopify to deliver an ultimate subscription driven business of meal replacement products and merchandise.
Wilkinson Sword is a formerly British brand for razors and other personal care products sold in Europe, owned by the US company Edgewell Personal Care. The company was founded as a manufacturer of guns made in Shotley Bridge in County Durham, by Henry Nock in London in 1772. Wilkinson launched a razorblade subscription offering, to allow a hassle free recurring purchase experience for their customers.
Grind is a coffee company that lives in London. Since opening in Shoreditch in 2011, Grind has grown across London with cafés and a state-of-the-art coffee roastery. Grind also makes home-compostable coffee pods for Nespresso machines, which break down in your compost or food waste bin faster than a banana peel. All of the coffee in them is organic and ethically sourced from sustainable farms around the world. Today, Grind make more than two million cups of coffee a year across our London cafés, and twelve million more are made at home, and by their friends at Soho House. That's one every three seconds.
Award Winning, Junk-Free Health Food For Dogs. Pooch & Mutt offer an immersive ecommerce experience that leverages Shopify, and a subscription plan and a subscription customer portal admin giving brands ultimate control over recurring orders for invoicess,transactions, money, billing and also updating their subscription plans. You can even incentivise purchases with a powerful loyalty scheme to offer rewards for continued purchase commitment. The brand even incentivises customers with subscribe & save discounts too! We believe Pooch & Mutt are a great example of how to achieve success with subscription options and deliver a subscription business.
Heights was founded to help people do more of what they want by investing in braincare: the simple act of looking after your brain—no buzzwords, no fluff. Just one simple idea that brings neurological, emotional, and physical well-being together. Heights chose Shopify and Skio to power an easy to use and seamless subscription experience for their customers.
Single-use plastic stinks so Wild created a reusable deodorant applicator made from aluminium that will last it's customers a lifetime. Forget waste, you can refill your case again and again with their bamboo pulp deodorant refills which customers can subscribe to with ease. Every time you refill a case, you’ll save 30 grams of plastic going to landfill. Wild chosen Shopify to power their ecommerce powerhouse.
Founded by Jamie Laing & Ed Williams, Candy Kittens claim to be the best vegan sweets for you and the planet! Blending big flavours and honest ingredients. The brand uses the power of Shopify and ReCharge Payments to offer a seamless and sweet subsription experience. The also leverages the power of loyalty to incentivise purchases for their customers. Candy Kittens also choose Charle to support & grow their ecommerce store, see the case study
here.
Bio&Me believe that people and microbes thrive on variety and deliciously good food. That's why they've packed their granolas, porridges and mueslis with 17+ different types of plant goodness and our Prebiotic* yoghurts with 18 different live and active cultures (totalling over 700 billion cultures per pot). Bio&Me chose Charle to design, develop and launch an entirely bespoke Shopify store that leverages subscriptions and even packaging personalisation too. See the full case study
here.
YuMOVE boast their origins of science and heart combined. They state that they could have something that they know is clinically sound, but if it’s not the right thing for pets, they go back to the drawing board. By linking the science with their love for animals, they know we can deliver with confidence, and their supplement products do what they say and what they’ve promised. YuMOVE use Shopify to power their ecommerce and subscription offering.
HelloFresh is a publicly traded meal kit company based in Berlin, Germany. It is the largest meal-kit provider in the United States, and also has operations in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Europe. HelloFresh chose a custom Shopify Plus solution to power their subscription offering.
Inspired by Sherpa Tenzing, TENZING Natural Energy is plant-based energising drink with a triple hit of natural caffeine, vitamin C and electrolytes. Tenzing' direct to consumer online store leverages Shopify to offer an on-brand ecommerce experience and the option for customers to subscribe at regular intervals to receive Tenzing energy drinks.
Surreal is a high-protein, zero sugar, keto-friendly gluten-free, and plant-based cereal. Available in Cocoa, Cinnamon,Frosted and Peanut Butter. The brand has a bright and engaging on-site experience. Surreal launched with a strong markeitng campaign to take on the cereal industry and chosen Shopify to power their on-site subscription driven experience.
Puresport was created to craft the finest natural products to support mental and physical wellness. Founded by ex-professional athlete, Grayson Hart, Puresport noticed the modern world’s reliance on a quick-fix mentality, neglecting the power of natural products to support long-term health. Providing an alternative to this lifestyle, Puresport created the world’s most tested and trusted CBD, along with a range of nootropic and adaptogenic supplements to form a wellbeing ecosystem of expertly balanced natural products. Subscriptions drives a seamless and frictionless experience for repeat purchases on-site.
Absolute Collagen is the UK's best-selling collagen drink, and the most concentrated on the market. Each daily dose contains 8000mg of premium hydrolysed marine collagen enriched with Vitamin C, and can be taken straight from the sachet at any time of day for maximum convenience. Not only is the brand powered by Shopify they offer a subscription option for their customers.
Pasta Evangelists deliver what they think is the best pasta in the UK to homes across the country, as well as beautiful sauces & garnishes sourced from Italy. They then invite customers to prepare a 5* pasta dish in as little as 5 minutes, impressing amici and delighting famiglia. Buon appetito. The store leverages a custom store experience to supply a build-your-own style subscription service.
After a year of testing Days Beer landed on a unique process that’s specifically designed to never produce alcohol. It allows the brand to protect all of the flavour and integrity of their premium ingredients without needing to use harsh de-alcoholisation treatments which are more common in the industry. It means all of their beers are 0.0% and they pride themselves in offering a really clear option to anyone choosing to cut back on alcohol. Days chose Shopify to power their subscription offering.
Space good's founder was tired of stacking supplements to get the results he wanted - focus, energy + calm (or, in other words, the effects of a microdose in a legal and tasty alternative format) so he got to work dreaming up and creating the ultimate all-in-one daily blend that was yet to exist - 5 months of research + development later - Rainbow Dust v1.0 was born. Space Goods deliveres a bright and rich-onsite experience with of course the convenience of subscription.
Founded by entrepreneurs Marisa Poster and brothers Teddie and Levi Levenfiche, matcha green tea-powered energy drink PerfectTed proved a hit with the panel on Dragons' Den. The brand have launched with a bang and a highly immersive and on-brand on-site experience. PerfectTed's online store is powered by Shopify and offers a convenient subscription option.
After months of travelling back and forth from Germany, brewing 60,000 litres of beer, the founder Luke got a call from the Brewmaster. He had something new to show Luke, a beer that had been left unfiltered. Poured fresh from the tank, hazy and golden, Luke took a sip. That was it - the beer he had been searching for. Lucky Saint sell their alcohol beer with Shopify and give customers the option to subscribe.
Dirtea make the purest and most potent functional mushroom extract powders, proven to improve your health, wellbeing and lifestyle when consumed daily. Just add hot water or add to your coffee or shake! The brand chose Shopify to deliver a seamless subscription offering when buying online.
Cheesegeek makes eating, gifting and exploring cheese easy and fun. Just the best cheese gifts, hampers and subscriptions delivered to your door. Cheesegeek claim they are the only company in the UK to provide tailored subscriptions to each customer individually. Choose from a rolling subscription or a prepaid gift subscription, great ways to try new and exciting cheeses and kick start your cheese adventure. Cheesegeek leverage Shopify and ReCharge to deliver an intelligent and unique subscription offering.
Jimmy's offers refreshing Original Iced Coffee. The absolute go-to if you're looking for a straight-up Iced Coffee, made with single-origin Rain Forest Alliance coffee. The brand has a brand-consistent on-site experience and allows customers to subscribe via their Shopify store.
From a sustainable aquifer in Fiji to more than 60 countries across the globe, FIJI Water has been bringing Earth's Finest Water to the world since 1996. Fiji Water uses Shopify to sell bulk options and a subscription offering straight to your door.
Buy proper loose leaf tea and whole leaf tea bags blended right here in the UK from Brew Tea Co. The website offers a bright yellow branded experience and allows you to subscribe to regular deliveries of loose tea all powered by Shopify.
Quarter strength spirits. 1/4 of the booze, 1/4 of the calories, 1/4 of the strength, 1/4 of the impact. Welcome to Light Spirits offered by quarter proof. The beautiful and elegant store leverages Shopify to offer a subscription offering online.
What is the benefit of a subscription model on Shopify?
Selling subscriptions or giving merchants the option to subscribe via your Shopify or Shopify Plus stores helps create a seamless ecommerce experience for you and your customers. It establishes predictable and consistent recurring revenue to aid in future planning, management and business expansion so that you can achieve your long-term strategic goals and brand strategy more effectively. In addition to this, when you add subscriptions to Shopify, your website can turn one-time buyers into devoted subscribers and followers of your brand. Shoppers can purchase from your website more easily and flexibly which can encourage loyalty and promote repeat purchase options in the future. Shopping experiences become more fluent for the user when a subscription is involved, promoting retention and lifetime value. Subscriptions also integrate well with other platforms such as Gorgias and Yotpo and is delivered by mission driven, world-leading ecommerce brands. The demand for subscription products is growing and the opportunity to integrate with other areas of your tech stack like reviews is continually improving. Learn more about subscriptions
here.
How does subscriptions work on Shopify?
Shopify now supports subscriptions natively within it's platform. (Historically, customers would be diverted to a non-Shopify checkout page to process the order). This means that customers can add subscription items to the cart and still remain within the Shopify checkout when they wish to purchase. But how does it work, I hear you cry! Well, Shopify released extra modules of data called "selling plans" which is a special piece of code that commutes to the Shopify checkout that an item is a subscription item and that the payment should be recurring by a specific interval and amount. However, it does not stop there, Shopify does not manage the UI and dashboard for managing your subscribers - instead, it simply offers the facility to charge your customers on a recurring basis via Shopify's native checkout. To physically set up subscription products, manage subscribers and gain access to subscription reporting you'll need to opt for a subscription app provider. Head to our whats the best Shopify subscription app section for our recommendations. You'll need to choose a subscription partner apps such as
Skio or
ReCharge to help you manage your subscription model. All the apps allow you to customise the experience to match your branding, even the UI on product pages and more. Subscription apps are very well developed and can seamlessly integrate into the on-site experience of your store. Some partners will allow you to extend the subscription offering with features such as subscription box builder so that customers can change their subscription boxes with ease.
Does it cost more to sell subscriptions?
It is important to note that most subscription providers that integrate into Shopify do charge a monthly fee to use their software whilst also incurring a small transaction charge too. Shopify's transaction fees will apply also. Another cost is to consider the implications of incentivising subscriptions whether it be giving free shipping / delivery or offering a subscription. Other options we've seen brand offer is a free or reduced price trial to promote customers trying out a subscription. Whilst it may cost more to offer subscriptions, the benefits of recurring revenue, increased lifetime value, customer retention and increased customer loyalty usually outweigh those costs.
Learn more about why you should choose Shopify.
Our top 25 subscription brands on Shopify list by Charle
And that is a wrap! You've read our top 25 subscription companies that leverage the powerhouse of Shopify & Shopify Plus to power their subscription offering. Brands choose Shopify to allow their customers to subscribe to their products and manage their subscriptions independently. You can also see our
Top 50 of the biggest brands on Shopify guide here.
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