Money, pricing & unit economics

Know if you make money on order number one, and price for value, not discounts.

What founders use for money, pricing & unit economics, ranked by how many answers lean on it.

  1. The clearest arithmetic on why discounting is more expensive than founders think - roughly 1.7 points of contribution margin... eightx.co Article The DTC Price-Increase Playbook (Without Killing Volume) Eightx In 2 answers
  2. The cleanest plain-English starting point from the platform most Indian D2C brands actually run on. It nails the core idea -... shopify.com Article What Is Contribution Margin? Definition and Guide Shopify In 2 answers
  3. Video Contribution Margin - CM1, CM2, CM3 | Startup Sarthak Ahuja In 2 answers
  4. The best worked-example explainer for actually doing the math: Net Sales minus product cost, shipping, payment fees, fulfilment... storehero.ai Article Contribution Margin Formula for Ecommerce (With Real Examples) StoreHero In 2 answers
  5. The canonical investor's-eye view of why LTV:CAC drives valuation, and why 3:1 became the rule of thumb. Read it to understand... a16z.com Article Why Do Investors Care So Much About LTV:CAC? Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) In 2 answers
  6. Goes one level deeper than a formula: it rebuilds the contribution-margin income statement for a real D2C P&L, so you can... polaranalytics.com Article Contribution Margin Ratio, Per Unit & Income Statement: The Complete DTC Breakdown Polar Analytics In 2 answers
  7. The most concrete India-specific breakdown of what a returned COD order actually costs - forward + reverse shipping, packaging,... hillteck.com Tool True Cost of RTO for Indian D2C Brands: Formula + Calculator HillTeck In 2 answers
  8. A free, ready-to-use P&L template plus explanation in one place, useful if you want to build your own tracker before (or... Intuit QuickBooks Template What Actually Is a Profit and Loss Statement + Free Template Intuit QuickBooks
  9. Goes past line-item definitions into what to actually look for, margin trends, expense creep, seasonality, the analysis layer... Entreprenista Article How to Actually Read Your P&L (And What to Look For) Entreprenista
  10. Hosted by someone who both runs an ecommerce accounting firm and co-owns a DTC brand, the rare finance content that's grounded... LedgerGurus Podcast The Ecommerce Finance Podcast Stephen Brown / LedgerGurus
  11. Surveys options specifically for ecommerce sellers (marketplace integrations, multi-channel order sync) rather than generic... Vyapar TaxOne Article What Are the Top 10 Ecommerce Accounting Software in India 2025 Vyapar
  12. Pairs the cohort-analysis explainer with current 2026 category benchmarks, so you're not just learning the method but... eightx.co Article What Is Cohort Analysis in Ecommerce? A DTC Operator's Plain-English Guide (with 2026 Benchmarks) Eightx
  13. Goes beyond the LTV formula into churn diagnostics - why a cohort's LTV curve flattens - which is the more useful, actionable... ask-luca.com Article Ecommerce Customer Lifetime Value - LTV:CAC Benchmarks, Churn Diagnostics, and Repeat Purchase Playbooks Luca
  14. Ties LTV back into the broader unit-economics stack - CAC, contribution margin, ROAS - so you don't calculate LTV in a vacuum... getfairview.com Article D2C Unit Economics Metrics Every Brand Must Track Fairview
  15. Directly resolves a confusion most founders don't realise they have - repurchase and retention sound interchangeable but... peelinsights.com Article Repurchase vs. Retention Rate: How to Measure and Why These Metrics Are Essential for DTC Brands Peel Insights
  16. The clean definitional explainer for Recency-Frequency-Monetary segmentation from the team that built cohort tooling... peelinsights.com Article What is RFM Analysis? Peel Insights
  17. A real, data-backed benchmark study (156K customers) rather than an assumed rule of thumb - gives you an actual number to... bsandco.us Article Repeat Purchase Rate Benchmarks: 18.8% Across 156K Customers BS&Co
  18. An India-first take on retention that names the specific levers Indian brands actually use - WhatsApp CRM, loyalty programs,... productgrowth.in Article D2C Retention Playbook: How India's Best Brands Win ProductGrowth.in
  19. A fresh, dated 2026 benchmark compilation that breaks retention and repeat-purchase rates out by category, giving a second data... taylorsicard.com Article DTC Repeat-Purchase & Retention Benchmarks 2026 Taylor Sicard
  20. Founder interviews that get into how Indian D2C brands actually structured their content and creator strategy, in their own... open.spotify.com Podcast The Indian D2C Playbook Isaac John Wesley
  21. A single-purpose calculator that answers the one question that matters when things get tight: how many months of cash do I... startupproject.org Template Startup Runway Calculator Template Startup Project
  22. For founders who want structured, certificate-backed training rather than piecing it together from blog posts - CFI's course is... corporatefinanceinstitute.com Course Startup / e-Commerce Financial Modeling & Valuation Course Corporate Finance Institute (CFI)
  23. Video Profit First: Practical Steps for Small Business Financial Success Mike Michalowicz
  24. Marketplace and quick-commerce settlement cycles create a receivables gap that invoice financing exists specifically to bridge... recurclub.com Article Top Invoice Financing Startups in India: Guide for SaaS/D2C Founders Recur Club

Show the next 24

The questions

Unit economics & contribution margin 7

Do you make money on order number one?

What is contribution margin for a D2C brand, and what do CM1, CM2 and CM3 mean? 4 → How do I calculate CAC, and what's the difference between blended CAC and new-customer CAC? 3 → What does a healthy CM1 / CM2 / CM3 actually look like for an Indian D2C brand? 4 → My revenue keeps growing but I'm still losing money. Why does that happen? 4 → How do I factor RTO, returns, COD, shipping and discounts into my true margin? 4 → All 7 questions in Unit economics & contribution margin →
Pricing & discounting strategy 6

Charge for value; stop training buyers to wait for sales.

How do I price a new D2C product when I have no direct competitor to benchmark against? 3 → Should I price the same on my own website and on Amazon, Flipkart and Zepto? 4 → How much can I discount before I train my customers to wait for the next sale? 4 → How do I raise prices without losing customers or crashing conversion? 3 → What pricing psychology actually works for D2C - charm pricing, bundling, anchoring? 3 → All 6 questions in Pricing & discounting strategy →
Financial modeling & forecasting 6

See the cash before it surprises you.

How do I build a basic financial model for my D2C brand from scratch? 4 → What's the difference between a P&L, a cash flow statement and a balance sheet - and which one actually tells me if I'll run out of money? 3 → How do I calculate my cash runway, and how do I know when I need to raise or borrow? 3 → Should I take on debt (working capital loans, invoice financing) instead of raising equity to fund inventory? 3 → What are the biggest financial modeling mistakes D2C founders make? 4 → All 6 questions in Financial modeling & forecasting →
Cohorts, LTV & repeat rate 6

The metrics that decide if you have a brand.

What is cohort analysis, and why does it matter more than a single repeat-rate number? 3 → How do I calculate customer LTV for my D2C brand - on revenue or on margin? 3 → What's a good repeat purchase rate for my category, and how do Indian brands compare to global benchmarks? 3 → What's the difference between repurchase rate and retention rate, and which should I report to investors? 2 → What is RFM analysis, and how do I use it to segment customers for retention marketing? 3 → All 6 questions in Cohorts, LTV & repeat rate →
Accounting & bookkeeping 6

Books that tell you if you're actually making money.

I'm not a finance person, what books/records do I actually need to keep from day one? 3 → What accounting software should a small D2C brand in India actually use, Zoho, Tally, Vyapar, or just Excel? 4 → How do I actually read my P&L and know if I'm making money, not just growing revenue? 3 → What is 'Profit First' and should I actually run my business that way? 3 → What unit economics numbers should I actually be tracking every week, CM1, CM2, contribution margin? 3 → All 6 questions in Accounting & bookkeeping →
eChai Partner Brands The partnership →