The idea for Dollar Shave Club (DSC) emerged from a conversation entrepreneur Michael Dubin was having with his co-founder about the annoyances of shaving. They found it inconvenient and costly to have to purchase brand-name blades each month. They decided to create DSC, a subscription-based service headquartered in Venice, California. Consumers that become members of DSC are mailed razors for $1, $6, or $9 per month. Since the company launched, it has expanded its offerings to include personal-care products like hand cream, shave butter, and hair gel.

The entrepreneurs had to find a low-cost way of communicating with customers. For $4,500 Michael Dubin developed and starred in a humorous video marketing the benefits of Dollar Shave razors, while poking fun at the extra bells-and-whistles that come with brand-name razors. The video was posted on YouTube, where it went viral. Sales for DSC’s subscription service soared to 12,000 orders in a single day and caused the company’s website to crash. To date the video has more than 25 million views. Video-sharing sites like YouTube are free for companies to use,  

Questions for Discussion

1. How is Dollar Shave Club using digital marketing to reach its customers

2. How does Dollar Shave Club foster loyalty with its blog and podcast

3. Discuss the challenges Dollar Shave Club may face with international expansion and how they should address these issues