2025 wasn’t just another growth year.

It was a reset year.

For Porcellia, and for D2C at large, it forced us to question assumptions we’d treated as truth for years - about scale, Shopify, discounting, teams, creativity, and even talent.

We didn’t just grow.
We were forced to rebuild how we think.

Here are the lessons that genuinely changed how we operate - and why your D2C brand needs to internalise them heading into 2026.

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1. Shopify wasn’t the bottleneck. Our thinking was.

Until mid-2025, we believed most D2C brands couldn’t scale beyond ~₹2Cr MRR on Shopify BAU.

That belief collapsed fast.

We began 2025 with one brand crossing ₹1Cr MRR.
We ended it with eight brands doing ₹1Cr+ monthly, with half of them crossing ₹4Cr+.

Same platform.
Same tools.
Different outcomes.

Shopify wasn’t the ceiling.
Our mindset was.

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2. Discounting is not acquisition. It’s conversion.

We used to be firmly anti-discounting.

Today, we’re anti-lazy discounting.

Here’s the rule we now live by:
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Discounts exist to convert fence-sitters, not to acquire new users.

If your brand uses discounts as a front-door acquisition lever, you’re training customers to wait, not buy.

Discounting should reward intent.
Not manufacture demand.

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3. Scaling teams breaks roles before it breaks revenue.

We grew from 8 people to 56 in under 12 months.

As a bootstrapped founder, that number still feels unreal.

But growth didn’t just increase headcount - it forced role evolution.

Team leads had to shift from:

• Direct execution to
  
• Building systems and enabling mid-management
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My own role changed too.

I went from spending ~60% of my time on client work to under 10% today.
The rest is spent hiring, training, documenting, and building repeatable systems.

That shift wasn’t optional.
It was survival.

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4. Creative output now dictates performance outcomes.

Our philosophy which was still being formed in early 2025, is now cemented. 

We invested heavily in building a killer creative and copy team (as opposed to hiring more left brained folks), and that has paid off for our brands massively. We will continue to add more creative and radical thinkers in the team.

If you’re someone who knows that creativity & storytelling is important but does not know how to go about it, you should definitely give this a read.

Your Business Will Die Because You Can't Tell a Story

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5. MBAs are not bad.

I used to villanise MBA folks for the longest time. but the sheer volume and velocity at which they operate make them worth it. Finding hardcore left brained "Dhandha" understanding MBAs who have an immense respect and reverence for creative processes and creative freedom is where we found our sweet spot.

Men in suits need to realise that creatives will be running the perf world 2026 and beyond. Their job is to channelise and bring out their creativity best to meet business objectives. 

These are folks who can work at the intersection of right brain and left brain and are the ones organisations need to optimise their hiring for.

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6. My take on AI

AI is dangerous if used for creativity. It is immensely valuable when used to increase velocity and speed. Every tom, dick and harry will be using AI for creativity soon enough and as a result, their brands will all sound the same and feel the same. Your creative team and your storytelling skills will be your biggest MOAT heading into 2026.

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7.  Skill × Ownership = Output

We stopped tracking KPIs/ output independently

Lots of folks are able to "show" output and meet business KPIs without having the skills to back it up. This may be due to momentum or team or luck.

But we are in the business of delivering repeatable, predictable value for multiple brands. not just one.

And the only way that can happen is if we as founders consciously work on optimising the skills of every individual employee.

This is a skill tracker of our creative strategy department:

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Business impact and KPIs (which also include soft skills) are given a 50% weightage and the other 50% weightage is given to (technical) skill growth. 

This has allowed us to be much more fair and transparent during the appraisal process. 

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8. Talent scouting network

I used to hate HR. But that was not getting us anywhere. So now we look at recruitment and talent ops quite differently. I am committed to operating Porcellia like a football club.

We finally have a head of HR now (lead scout). We went from not needing or caring about HR to having a four member HR team. Scouting quality talent and intentionally upskilling them throughout the year is what this team's main objective is.

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Final thoughts

If you’re running a D2C brand, ignore these lessons at your own risk.

2025 didn’t break D2C.
It revealed what was never solid to begin with.

2026 will reward brands that fixed fundamentals, not optics.