RC Williams could have pursued many career paths when he graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 2022. But having caught the entrepreneurial bug early, RC teamed up with Kristen, his mother, to launch Rejuvia—an approachable DTC supplement brand centered around oral sprays. He also runs 1800d2c, a one-stop hub for all things ecommerce.

RC's mother had previous experience building a medical devices manufacturing business. She noticed that while the efficacy of oral spray delivery methods for supplements was proven, no brand explicitly catered to consumers.

Sensing a market opportunity, they incorporated in 2018 to sell sleep and stress supplements directly to customers. RC handled digital marketing and front-end operations while his mother developed products and oversaw finances.

Challenge: Exponential Growth Overwhelms Manual Sales Tax Management

Rejuvia enjoyed swift success, leveraging lean digital marketing to acquire customers. Once they determined an effective customer acquisition model, sales took off rapidly. RC highlights:

"We just stumbled into the Shopify Facebook ads game and learned as we went. It took us about a year and a half to figure out how to grow DTC.”

By 2021, Rejuvia was generating significant revenue—their momentum hit a considerable snag when states started notifying them of sales tax owed.

However, having focused intensely on customer acquisition and order fulfillment, Rejuvia had left sales tax considerations as an afterthought for their lean team. The gravity of the misstep set in when multiple states flagged their non-compliance. RC recalls:

“Once we started getting notices from states where we owed taxes, we realized we hadn't been collecting or paying any. So we had to scramble to set everything up and fork over what we owed."

Without a proper solution, sales tax management became a hugely manual burden. Lacking expertise, RC and the team went through registrations and filings themselves initially:

"We registered in all these states, doing all the filings ourselves. And it became the most time-consuming thing out of anything the brand was doing at that point."

Not only were compliance activities eating up 6-8 hours each month, but they also owed back taxes and late payment penalties. This painful lesson highlighted the urgent need to automate.

While outsourcing sales tax sounded ideal to free up RC's bandwidth to focus on customer acquisition, they wanted to keep control. 

Solution: Numeral's Superior Automation Unlocks Exponential Growth

When Rejuvia evaluated sales tax platforms, Numeral stood out for its affordability, security, and ease-of-use combination.

The onboarding was streamlined, ensuring they could quickly manage recent notices. The self-service interface helped RC to maintain control over their tax compliance—Numeral checked all the boxes as RC elaborates:

"Maybe it was from Twitter. We saw a bunch of the other brands that you guys work with and just realized it was a good solution. It would make everything super easy for us to do, and it was just a no-brainer like, hey, do you want to spend eight hours on doing your taxes or do you want to spend 10 minutes?"

Specifically, Numeral delivered value across these key pointers:

• Easy onboarding: Intuitive workflows for connecting sales channels and registering entities accelerated compliance.
• Automated monitoring: Ongoing nexus evaluations and jurisdiction rate changes addressed proactively.
• Effortless filings: Simple self-service validation of returns before auto-filing.
• Proactive support: Fast, personalized assistance resolving any questions.

Above all, Numeral provided Rejuvia the convenience without having to manage resources internally or pay steep agency fees:

"The best thing is, it does everything for you. I do not have to file any states or even taxes myself. Numeral is always on top of everything."

Instead of occupying several days per month, sales tax compliance was reduced to a quick review and approval cycle, requiring just 5 minutes per month:

It takes us five minutes to prove everything. It goes from us having to do everything ourselves to just becoming an approver or denier of the sales tax."

For high-growth digital brands, you must take advantage of sales tax compliance services like Numeral to scale quickly without bottlenecking the team.

Impact: Achieving Triple Digit Annual Growth Thanks to Numeral

Within months of onboarding Numeral, Rejuvia recouped all time and penalties related to past non-compliance. With staff hours previously dedicated to manual sales tax management freed up, RC doubled down on digital marketing and partnerships.

This high-impact focus helped Rejuvia achieve triple-digit sales growth in 2021. Reflecting on the transformation, RC shares:

"It was game-changing for us in terms of time consumption. I could suddenly spend my time on high-value activities like optimizing our ads and expanding our influencer affiliate program rather than getting bogged down in spreadsheets tracking tax changes."

Numeral didn't just help Rejuvia resolve past issues. The ongoing automation opened up the next stage of hyper-growth for Rejuvia:

"We project about mid-7 figures in revenue this year, and with that volume, compliance would be at least a half-time job without Numeral. That's 20-30 states and thousands of tax rate jurisdictions to stay on top of."

Instead, RC estimates they save 150-200 hours each year, not having to monitor nexus or ensure accurate filing manually. Numeral's software handles everything behind the scenes so Rejuvia's team can focus exclusively on core business initiatives.

As they prepare to expand internationally in 2024, Numeral sits behind the scenes, ensuring compliance will continue their growth. RC wholeheartedly recommends automation to fellow founders:

"If we were to start another brand today that sold online, I would 100% bring on Numeral from day one to take sales tax off our plate."

By the numbers

• Triple-digit sales growth in 2021 with Numeral operating behind the scenes
• Multi-million million projected revenue in 2024 because of the additional free time 
• 5 minutes per month spent on compliance with Numeral vs. 6-8 hours previously

In just four years since incorporating Rejuvia, RC achieved exponential DTC growth rarely seen for new CPG brands. They continue pushing boundaries thanks to Numeral's automation, liberating their capacity for innovation.

Rather than playing a losing game of catch-up, automate your ecom sales tax compliance from day one with Numeral. 

Our customized onboarding integrates your sales channels to monitor taxability accurately. The ongoing automatic rate and nexus updates prevent surprise obligations, while the intuitive dashboards and self-service filing let you fully control your sales tax compliance whenever required.