Your Marketing, Supply Chain, and Finance Don’t Talk - and It’s Killing Your Profit

Hey there,
Let’s talk about the truth no one in the DTC space says out loud.

Most brands don’t die because of bad products or weak marketing.
They die because they make money, but never get to keep it.

Cash in → cash straight back out.
Revenue grows. Stress grows faster. Profit? Flat… or negative.

And the reason is simple:
Marketing, Supply Chain, and Finance - the three most important parts ofyour business don’t work together.

You’re the one plugging holes, fighting fires, and wondering why growth feels like chaos.

The $5M Brand That “Felt Broke”

I once worked with a brand doing $5M a year.
Instagram was popping. Influencers posting.
Marketing was scaling. Everyone thought they were killing it.

Then the founder called me and said:

“Where did the money go? I feel broke.”

Here’s what we found:

• They were scaling ads on SKUs with a 10% margin.

• Ordering too much inventory on products with no payment terms.

• Finance was reporting last month while marketing was planning next week.

• Supply chain was buying for next quarter.

Three timelines. Three truths. Zero alignment.

Great brand. Great demand. Still broke.
Not because they failed, but because their business model was never built to work together.

Why It’s Even Harder in DTC

People think enterprise companies have it harder because they’re big.
Nope.
Enterprise has time, budgets, and full teams.

DTC?
You’re planning in 2-week windows, launching monthly, and scaling ads daily.
One bad decision in one department and the whole thing collapses.

Marketing scales ads → stockout.
Supply chain over-orders → cash dies.
Finance cuts ad budget → campaign tanks.

It’s not that you’re doing it wrong.
You’re just doing it without a unifying system.

The Fix: Align All Three

When Marketing, Supply Chain, and Finance work together, everything changes.
You move from:

• Guessing → Clarity

• Scrambling → Control

• High revenue, low profit → Scalable, sustainable growth

This is what I call the DTC Flywheel.

Marketing creates demand → Supply chain fulfills it → Finance fuels it.
Each one feeds the next.
When they’re aligned, your business compounds.
When one breaks, the wheel stops.

A quick episode on how finance and operations finally start speaking the same language, and why this one shift changes everything.

What It Looks Like When It Works

Let’s look at Brand B, a real example.

Marketing planned a drop 60 days out.
They shared forecast + pricing + launch date.

✅ Supply chain saw it early → secured better cost & lead time.
✅ Finance modeled cash impact → set terms & ad budget.
✅ Inventory landed 2 weeks before launch.
✅ Campaign hit profit target on Day 1.

Revenue doubled.
Profit tripled.
Cashflow was clean.

That’s not luck. That’s alignment.

The 10 Reports That Keep the Flywheel Spinning

To make this work, you need one source of truth, 10 key reports that connect all three functions:

1️⃣ P&L by Product/Channel – See where profit really comes from.
2️⃣ Contribution Margin – Know if every sale is truly profitable.
3️⃣ Forecast vs Actual – Match demand with supply.
4️⃣ Budget vs Cashflow – Avoid suffocating during scaling.
5️⃣ Inventory Health – See how much cash is trapped in stock.
6️⃣ Launch Performance – Learn from every drop.
7️⃣ Event Readiness – Prep for BFCM, not panic for it.
8️⃣ Channel Profitability – Scale what truly performs.
9️⃣ Executive Dashboard – Track the 5 key metrics that matter.
🔟 Root Cause Report – Fix problems permanently.

🛠️ Next Steps:
This week, pick one:

• Create a P&L by SKU.

• Or build a Forecast vs Actual sheet.
  Even one aligned report can shift how your team makes decisions.

How to Turn This Into a System

Here’s how the best DTC brands do it:

1. Align Roles: Who owns demand, fulfillment, and cashflow?

2. Build the 10 Reports: Decision tools, not dashboards.

3. Create Meeting Rhythms: Weekly alignment + monthly reviews.

4. Use Data to Drive Decisions: Replace “gut feel” with truth.

5. Automate: SOPs and dashboards for scale.

This isn’t about more work, it’s about finally making your work count.

Cut hidden costs before Q4 with the Packaging & 3PL Savings Guide.
See how carton optimization and smarter fulfillment can unlock 12–18% margin gains.

If You’re Ready for the Full System…

We built a 12-week program that helps founders actually implement this.
It’s called the DTC 3-Way Alignment Accelerator, a hands-on system for aligning Marketing, Supply Chain, and Finance to work as one.

✅ Live weekly sessions (small cohort of 10)
✅ Done-with-you report templates
✅ Implementation support across your team
✅ Only 2 cohorts per year

If you’re scaling and tired of chaos, this is where clarity and profit begin.
To know if you fit in this system, book a call here.

🎬 Watch next: The DTC Profit Machine Explained - how to scale without chaos. 

→ Watch the VSL on YouTube

You don’t need another agency, or more dashboards.

You need one thing: alignment.

When you fix that, everything else starts to work.

Until next time,

Lara