How Babylist grew from a baby registry site to a $400 million media and commerce business

In a retail landscape where the struggles of baby brands such as Babies R Us and Buy Buy Baby have been well chronicled, Babylist seems to have bucked the trend. Part of that could be because the company, which was founded 13 years ago, has moved beyond its online baby registry roots into a technology company funded by e-commerce, media buying and health insurance reimbursement. Subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, check us out on Spotify and hear us on Stitcher. This is our RSS feed. Tell a friend! “We don’t think of ourselves as a retailer,” said Lee Anne Grant, who joined Babylist nearly four years ago as a consultant and is now chief growth officer, speaking on the latest episode of the Marketer’s Brief podcast. “We think of ourselves as a technology company and what that means is a lot of product-led growth.” Funded by VC dollars, Babylist was initially only monetized through affiliate relationships on what was sold via its platform. Yet the brand also has a growing media network that generates dollars through bespoke campaigns for the likes of brands such as Shipt. Hundreds of advertisers, including retailers such as Etsy and smaller direct-to-consumer brands, invest with Babylist regularly to reach its audience, which includes newly pregnant women and parents, Grant said, noting that the company has more than $400 million in annual revenue from different streams. On the podcast, Grant discusses the “flywheel” of attracting new customers and serving up appropriate content to keep them around after they become parents. “There’s so many ways that you spend money when you’re becoming a parent,” she said. “Having media allows us to tap into how do we give them financial services content and monetize them that way.” Babylist recently opened its first showroom, an 18,000-square-foot outpost in Beverly Hills, California, where customers can test out gear including strollers and carriers and also host baby showers. Grant said it has also attracted a fair share of influencers, some of whom are invited and others who visit organically and post pictures on social media. Read more: Creator and influencer trends to know about “Influencers are coming in and having their baby showers and we do massages at them and tarot cards and their friends can try out all the products before they buy them for the baby shower,” she said. “It’s a very fun experience.” Yet she cautioned that Babylist does not plan to open several flagships and become a retail chain. On the podcast, she also discusses how the brand is experimenting with AI to drive efficiencies with its editorial strategies and brainstorm new marketing ideas. Subscribe to Ad Age Sign up now for the latest industry news and analysis Click here

How Babylist grew from a baby registry site to a $400 million media and commerce business

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