From $20 Socks to $1B Beauty: DTC's Wild Week in Capital, Credit & Category Creation

If you needed a reminder of how strange, brilliant, and high-stakes the DTC and CPG world remains, this past week delivered in spades. We saw an influencer-led brand flip for $1B, a delisted company secure $277M more in credit, and a startup sock brand doubling on eight figures while keeping margins clean. Here are the key moves — and what they say about the evolving playbook.

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Fan Bi
June 03, 2025

Touchland: $880M for Hand Sanitizer, 14 Years in the Making

In 2010, Andrea Lisbona started selling hand sanitizer in emerging markets like Kenya and Tanzania. By 2018, she was rebooting the category via Kickstarter, aiming to make hygiene a beauty ritual.

Touchland raised just $67K, but did $1M in year one. A $1.75M seed round in early 2020 — just before COVID hit — proved perfect timing. Revenue surged. Fast forward to 2024: $130M in sales, $55M in EBITDA, and a $75M minority buyout by Sonoma Brands.

Last week, Church & Dwight (makers of OxiClean and Arm & Hammer) acquired Touchland for $700M upfront + $180M in earnouts.

Why it matters:

  • Proof that “boring” categories can become cult obsessions

  • Timing helps — but taste, positioning, and perseverance are harder to replicate

  • Among the highest EBITDA margins seen in DTC M&A this year

Solo Brands: $12M in Cash, $429M in Debt… and Still More Credit

Solo Brands (parent of Solo Stove, Chubbies, and Oru Kayaks) lost $113M last year. With only $12M in the bank, delisted from the NYSE, and already $150M in debt to JP Morgan — they walked in asking for more.

JP Morgan granted it: a $277M extension, bringing total debt to $429M.

The bet is mostly on two brands:

  • Solo Stove: $300M rev, $45M EBITDA (but declining)

  • Chubbies: $110M rev, $15M EBITDA (and growing)

Why it matters:

  • DTC isn’t dead — but the credit market has picked its survivors

  • Chubbies proves product + positioning still matter

  • Solo Stove's once-iconic viral moat is weakening — can they recover?

Rhode: The 3-Year-Old Brand Selling for $1B

In June 2022, Hailey Bieber launched Rhode with Lauren & Michael Ratner (founders of OBB Media) and former Honest Co. CEO Nick Vlahos.

Just three years later, e.l.f. Beauty is acquiring Rhode for $1B. The brand did $212M in sales — a whopping 4.27x sales multiple — and is reportedly profitable.

Why it matters:

  • The influencer beauty playbook still works — but only with elite execution

  • Bieber, like Rihanna and Selena Gomez before her, proved trust + taste convert

  • e.l.f. is now the leader in M&A among modern beauty players

Podcast Recap: The Power of Focus: Rob Fraser on Building an 8-Figure Sock Brand

This week on In the Money, we had Rob Fraser, founder of Outway — a performance sock company that’s grown from hand-selling at cycling events to doubling YOY on eight figures.

A few standout lessons:

  • $20 Products Can Scale — if you understand volume, design pull, and AOV math

  • IRL Still Wins — Rob credits customer events for invaluable insight into positioning, product iteration, and early traction

  • Don’t Diversify Too Early — despite temptation, they stayed focused on socks, even pulling back 7-figure category experiments to go deeper into their core vertical

  • Smart Omnichannel — DTC remains their best margin, but events, Amazon, wholesale, and corporate sales all feed back into LTV

"People said a sock brand couldn’t work. Our thesis was simple: build the Lululemon of the foot. Performance + design."

Final Thought: The DTC game isn’t over — but it is changing. This week proved that real brand equity, real EBITDA, and real channels still win.

And for founders navigating tough terrain? There's still room to build something lasting — even if it takes 14 years and a bottle of hand sanitizer to do it.