From an 8 percent loss to 24 percent gross profit: a pet brand's one-year turnaround

A year ago, the owner of a pet brand on Amazon was losing 8 percent every month and did not know what was broken.

At a seller mastermind weekend, instead of the public dismantling she feared, she found dozens of experienced operators working to build her business up. The experts had reviewed her social media accounts before the event and arrived with specific, point-by-point actions rather than vague advice.

The decisive lessons: fix unit economics first and calculate profitability before any decision, and recognize that some products belong on other channels, in her case Nordstrom, TikTok Shop and Chewy, rather than forcing everything to live on Amazon.

Twelve months later her gross profit stands at 24 percent. She describes the shift as going from Amazon seller to brand owner.

The format behind the turnaround, small hot-seat sessions with curated experts, has now been run for two dozen sellers, with the next edition scheduled for November 13 to 17 in Austin.