D2C Engine Simulator | Nexinc EA Consulting

Inputs & Assumptions

Keep it simple: revenue, orders, gross margin, fulfilment costs, returns, and CAC.

Currency

Decision Thresholds (editable)

Encodes your “healthy vs unhealthy” rule.

Min Contribution Margin %

Max CAC Payback (months)

Min Online Mix %

Total Retail Revenue (Annual)

Baseline: current total retail revenue.

Online Revenue (Annual)

Current online channel revenue.

Online Orders (Annual)

Average Order Value (AOV)

Unit Economics

Contribution = Gross Profit − fulfilment − delivery − payments − returns.

Gross Margin %

Fulfilment Cost / Order

Delivery Subsidy / Order

Payment Fees / Order

Return Rate %

Return Handling Cost

Acquisition Economics

CAC (Cost to Acquire Customer)

Gross Profit per Customer (12 months)

Used only for CAC payback (simplified). If unknown, set conservative.

Actions

Save or export assumptions for the Nexinc report pack.

Executive Dashboard

Core unit economics + gates to decide GO/HOLD/NO-GO.

Online Mix

—

Online revenue ÷ total retail revenue

Contribution / Order

—

After fulfilment, delivery, fees, returns

Contribution Margin

—

Contribution ÷ AOV

CAC Payback

—

Months (approx.)

Gate Checks

Quick “is this healthy?” tests. Tune thresholds on the left.

Contribution margin ≥ threshold —

CAC payback ≤ threshold —

Online mix ≥ threshold —

Decision —

Annual Impact (Online)

Not a full P&L — just “what online contributes” at current unit economics.

Gross Profit / Order

—

Return Cost / Order

—

Total Contribution

—

Contribution / 1M Orders

—

Execution Plan Template (D2C)

If the decision is GO (or HOLD with fixes), here’s the typical “what/how/when/by whom” plan.

1) Commercial Model

Target segments, pricing, promos, bundles
Assortment strategy (long-tail, exclusives)
Returns policy + refund SLAs

2) Operations & Fulfilment

OMS + inventory accuracy + pick/pack
Last-mile partners + delivery cost controls
Reverse logistics (returns) playbook

3) Digital Product

Commerce platform + checkout optimization
Personalization + search + recommendations
Performance, availability, observability

4) Data & Growth

CAC/LTV instrumentation and dashboards
CRM journeys, retargeting, lifecycle comms
Experimentation (A/B tests) governance

Notes

This engine is intentionally simple for fast executive decisions. For a full D2C business case, Nexinc expands this into channel cannibalization, OPEX allocations, capex, and a 3-year scenario model.