How Every® Doubled Retention by Going Subscription-Only

After initially positioning themselves around convenience during the pandemic, every® identified their most loyal subscribers and discovered a common thread: the product was transformative in their daily lives. This insight shifted their marketing from generic convenience messaging to transformation-focused storytelling, helping customers achieve their personal health goals through consistent healthy eating habits.

every® discovered a direct correlation between AOV and CAC, leading them to test deeper first-order discounts (up to 40%). While this significantly reduced acquisition costs and increased new customer numbers, retention quality suffered. Their extensive testing revealed an optimal balance of initial discount combined with smaller incentives on subsequent orders to establish purchasing habits without sacrificing long-term value.

Rather than offering a complex meal builder requiring 20+ decisions, every® tested curated bundles targeted at specific customer types. These pre-selected meal packages reduced decision fatigue and streamlined the path to purchase, helping recoup conversion rate losses when transitioning to subscription-only and better serving their inherently busy target audience.

Despite extensive testing of referral programs and rewards, every® found their consistently high referral rate (30%+) came primarily from unprompted word-of-mouth rather than formal referral systems. This reinforced that when a product genuinely solves a meaningful problem, customers naturally share it with others facing similar challenges—more effectively than incentivized referrals.

After initially relying on agencies, every® brought critical marketing functions in-house, maintaining only external development execution. This enabled them to rapidly test "a million small things" when optimizing for subscription conversion, from trust-building elements to offer structures. The cross-team collaboration and efficiency gains proved essential when navigating major business model changes.

One of every®'s early strategies was influencer co-created products, similar to successful models in fashion and cosmetics. When this underperformed, they pivoted away completely rather than iterating. In retrospect, Casimir notes this made subsequent brand-building more difficult, as maintaining consistency while evolving would have provided stronger brand foundations for future growth.