Child’s Play with Lovevery

Jerrid Grimm (02:45.952)

We’re incredibly excited to have Love Every as a brand partner here at Impact.com. I know me as a parent of two kids, I can immediately see the value of the Love Every Play Kits. Not only for keeping your kids entertained, which is a big deal, but you also want to make sure that they’re being educated in some way. I don’t know if it’s the guilty conscious that I have as a parent. I’d much rather them be doing something, be entertained, be learning.

rather than let’s say just playing on a video game where I know maybe they’re entertained, but maybe there’s not as much educational value to that. So as a parent, I see the value right away. And then I’ve been a marketer my whole life. And I think that this is a really cool business and product to work on partnerships with because I can imagine that the content that creators could talk about or review sites, you these are fun things with kids.

I mean the content is pretty dynamic. So that is a couple of the reasons why I’m thrilled to chat with you today, Colby. So why don’t we get started?

Colby Saenz (03:49.62)

Awesome. Thanks for having me.

Jerrid Grimm (03:51.498)

Of So why don’t we start off, tell me about the business. How did Love Every get started? What was the founding story?

Colby Saenz (03:58.497)

Yeah, so Lovery was founded by Jessica Rolfe and Roderick Morris. They founded the company in 2015. So this is fortunately pre-COVID before everything really took off. But they really decided that they wanted to make it easier for families to be able to have expert guidance and have beautifully made really well staged play essentials. We call them play things that are obviously made available from a simple subscription format, which

Obviously, back in 2015 was the start of a period where subscription services really took off.

Jerrid Grimm (04:33.377)

Yeah, you could have. remember the subscription wave. was like there was a subscription for everything. It didn’t matter if it was your kid, your dog, your cleaning items. Everyone wanted, it was the SaaS model, the subscription kind of model moved into everything. And you’re right, it was pre-COVID. So there was this subscription move and then COVID I’m sure accelerated that. And I’m curious, you call them playthings. Tell me a little more around the products or subscriptions that are offered at Love Every

Colby Saenz (05:03.382)

Yeah, so our flagship product is our PlayKits. Now, our PlayKits go from the ages of zero to 12 weeks all the way up until about four years old, or about closer to them getting to five years old. And it starts off for the first year kind of around hitting every couple of months, every two months. And then by the time you get to the first year all the way through year four, it comes every quarter. So it’s beautifully structured to be able to help children. And the goal is to really hit on

being Montessori-inspired toys, play things, hitting on the exact developmental stage of your child. So don’t really need to focus and worry about your child’s age, but it’s more of the stage.

Jerrid Grimm (05:42.475)

Yeah, that’s cool. So you have different playthings, different items come in depending on like the age and where your kid is at. So something that they’re going to play with when they’re six months old is quite a bit different, I imagine, than when they’re five years old.

Colby Saenz (05:55.817)

Exactly. And believe it or not, I have a five year old and a two year old and my son still plays with my daughter’s things and he’s the five year old and she’s the two year old. So it’s just like beautifully structured to where it is. You will see how your child is just like it’s also the moment when they open the kit and they are starting to engage with it and like something clicks in them of like, like, let me put this this square in this hole or let me like mess with it. Like there’s so many different unique items that are within each play kit.

Jerrid Grimm (06:02.316)

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Colby Saenz (06:25.01)

that is helpful and honestly we’ve expanded out over just even the past couple of years. We just launched our reading skill set which is geared on being like a play-based phonics system that is helping kids because I don’t know about you but reading for kids is becoming significantly more challenging and our system is to be a fun way for kids to learn how to read that way. We’re excited that it’s taken off to be honest. It’s been a fun way addition to the system.

Jerrid Grimm (06:50.733)

I can see that being a difficult thing. mean, my kids are 14 and 12, but even when they were young, I mean, everything’s so video based now that you don’t really see text the way maybe when we were kids, you like there was, you were either playing outside or you were like reading a book or you’re watching TV, maybe playing a little bit of video games. There just wasn’t this, you know, onslaught of just video content all the time. So I could see that helping parents figure out a way to teach their kids to read without trying to pin them down and

Be like, hey, we’re going to go through this novel today together. Yeah.

Colby Saenz (07:22.754)

Exactly, exactly. And it’s so much fun. Like one of the examples we have is it’s like a track. It’s a wooden track that you have like two dogs that you could play with. And it’s a deck of cards that comes with it and it has a picture of different things on it. And it’s about syllables. So like you see hummingbird, hummingbird. And like they, move the dog around the track and my son, it’s a game. Like he’s just so excited with it, but like he picks it up quick.

the words that are challenging to figure out how many syllables are in, we talk through it and the ones that he’s easy, it’s like, okay, helicopter, let me just do that. It’s fun, it’s a nice fun way for kids to learn how to read.

Jerrid Grimm (08:01.483)

Yeah, and these are, you know, different playthings are involved each time. What is it that you feel makes your company or these products, what makes them unique in the market? Because the toy market is insanely crowded, I imagine.

Colby Saenz (08:15.744)

Yeah, yeah. I think when it comes down to toys, Love Every really positions itself of being developmentally geared around children. as much as even I will say with my children, they play with them without the expectation of it being development. It’s a play thing. So yeah, they’re gonna mess with all the different variants. But our products have been built with child development experts, so that way it can be really geared towards exactly what a child needs.

It’s been tested with real families. We are very thorough, very big on being able to have families who engage with the product long before we launch it. And then obviously we really pride ourselves on being able to be made with safe, sustainable materials. So that way it really becomes easy for people to look at the quality of our products. I mean, you can look at the products within our kits when you go to our website, but when you actually like see the Amazon variations and think, I’ll just buy the Amazon version.

It’s so different when you actually get the kit, see it and it’s like you hold or compare it and you see like these are very well crafted, well put together items. Like my son and my daughter throw them down the stairs any chance they can get, those items are still here. It just goes to show you like we really try to focus on quality while also making sure that it’s, know, developmentally helping these children really accomplish what we hope it does.

Jerrid Grimm (09:34.562)

That’s cool. That’s a good differentiator. And again, I go back to this idea, like parents are out there just trying to do a good job, but everyone’s overwhelmed. So it’s nice when you can give like your kid enjoys it, but also, you know, you’re doing a good thing for them at the same time. I always think that’s a valuable thing for a parent to just, you know, take a little bit of the guilt away, right? Especially when you know, they’re going to be on screens quite a bit. So how can you make sure that in some times they’re getting educated, but they’re having fun doing it, right?

Colby Saenz (10:02.274)

Exactly.

Jerrid Grimm (10:04.151)

So tell me about your role at the company. What’s your involvement here at Love It?

Colby Saenz (10:08.886)

Yeah, so I oversee global affiliates and partnerships for the company, which we’re in obviously US and Canada. We are in the UK, the European, the EU area, and also at the APAC region. we really do hit on all of that. And I happen to oversee a lot of our the affiliate programs in all of those regions, as well as partnerships of how is it we can engage and expand beyond just the general affiliate.

Jerrid Grimm (10:36.565)

Well, cool. That’s great that you’re global company in that way, because I imagine like logistically, since you’re sending out packages, you know, by mail or by courier on a regular basis, it’s not, it’s not a digital product where you can just expand internationally, just turn on market after market. So that’s, that must also differentiate you in this, this kind of global reach and understanding different cultures. That’s an interesting part of, I imagine your role as well as understanding the markets that you’re in.

Colby Saenz (11:03.424)

absolutely. It’s been so intriguing just being able to embrace the fact like for the EU region we have come in, I believe it’s seven or eight different languages. So like we have really customized the play kits to really be adaptable by different languages. And then on top of that, that allows us to start incorporating new products that we feel like would fit from the reading skillset just recently launched over in the EU and the UK ranges. So

It’s a nice addition to have, but yeah, it’s really fun because let’s be honest, everybody’s having children worldwide. It just really comes down to being able to emphasize how is it we can get there and have those kids be a value to.

Jerrid Grimm (11:42.785)

Yeah, definitely. And so what is it that gets you excited about your job?

Colby Saenz (11:47.725)

Well, like I alluded to, I have a five year old and a two year old. I mean, I love the fact that my children get to experience the product and I get to see firsthand where the product really sticks and has the opportunity. I say for anybody, especially on the marketing side, when you can really love and use the products that you work at, it makes a difference in how you market, right? And I think for us,

For me, I love it because one, the product is fantastic and I see it every time I get a package in front of my door and the excitement that my children have. And then two, honestly, the people at this company are fantastic. It’s very rare you have a company that’s as big as of every, that still works like a very small startup. And when you have that product, you have leaders who are really big on testing, on making sure that the product really.

Thrives and like they pass that along to everyone within the company, but like we all have this all in we are very close-knit team There’s not silos It’s really just a collaborative team effort as far as to us being able to make sure we’re providing the best product while also making sure that everybody within the Marketing team has what they need to be able to let everybody know

Jerrid Grimm (12:57.291)

Yeah, so you got a great role. It’s a great company. The product itself, you know, must make you feel good. You’re educating the world’s children in a lot of ways. I mean, what can be better than that? I imagine there’s also some challenges with it. I’m curious, you know, what keeps you up at night or what bottlenecks are you running into?

Colby Saenz (13:05.932)

you

Colby Saenz (13:14.562)

So I’m gonna say this loosely and I hope whoever’s listening to this recognizes what I’m not talking about about the product. So the product is the most challenging point, at least for my role. And I would say the reason why is because the flagship product, the Play Kits, it’s been around since 2015. And of course we’ve added some older years, but like compared to other roles that I’ve had where I’ve sold mattresses, I’ve sold shoes, I’ve sold various mini products that you can say like oftentimes have a, you do get retention value from it.

The hard part with Love Every from what I’ve seen from an affiliate side is our product has been around and our play kits have not been updated to the level of something new is coming out every single year like you do with other products, right? And with us, it is harder to find affiliates who are new that have audience share, that have the captivity to be able to get in front of them and get us in front of new audiences.

as much as it is, always going back to the same resources and figuring out how we can tell a different story. So like it is challenging in that aspect because we truly do love the product and like we’re more than happy with, especially with some of our larger major publishers of figuring out, hey, you have a new person who’s on your team on the commerce side, maybe, and they’re having a kid. How can we get in front of them so that way they can experience it? But not everybody’s going to be pregnant. Not everybody’s going to have new kids.

Jerrid Grimm (14:31.245)

you

Colby Saenz (14:37.394)

And unfortunately for us, our products get to a point where by the time you’re that six, seven year old age range, your children age out of using Love Every. So it’s gotta be this, you know, constant recycling of finding new people who are having kids and being able to bring them on. And that’s just, it’s a challenge. It is very challenging to be able to navigate that and getting new content to fit that, that of a product that’s been literally a staple for almost 10, over 10 years now.

Jerrid Grimm (15:04.685)

Yeah, that’s interesting. You have this churn that is almost intentional, right? Like the kid gets to a certain age and they, they age out of your product, which means, you know, there’s gotta be another kid to replace that kid as far as the subscription goes. Cause your script subscription has some sort of limit on it. I’m curious, are there any, you know, stats or anything? I was here like, you know, my sister has four kids and that’s a lot of kids, right? Or, you know, my mom was one of 10, like

French Catholic family, they just have as many kids as you can physically have, think, right? And then I only have two kids and some people I know have no kids. Has there been changing demographics that pose any challenges?

Colby Saenz (15:45.731)

I mean, I definitely think with the tide of statistics that have come out of people having less kids than they have been, think that like that’s inevitable, right? I think that’s that’s out of stuff that’s out of our control that you can have is if you went from people went from having three, four or five plus kids to now it’s only two, it does change the dynamic of what that looks like. But yeah, I would say that is probably when it comes down to the world, the industry, it’s like.

It is harder for us to be able to navigate knowing that, okay, there’s not as many children that are there. But also I think economic climate makes it to where one, our kids coming into the picture, but also because our product is a little bit higher AOV than normal. Is there a willingness to subscribe to a product like this to justify the investment, right?

And that’s kind of just the world we’re navigating, which I honestly think you probably know from the subscription side. Subscription fatigue has been real. People have expressed that pretty ad nauseum, whether it’s a $10 audio subscription or it’s all the way up to a couple hundred dollars for your children. Everybody’s having these moments and waves and I think we’re just going through that as well.

Jerrid Grimm (16:55.499)

Yeah, definitely right. Great product, but the business model itself, which is a great business model. mean, everyone wants a subscription model, but it poses its own challenges because you have to retain them. You have to find new users on a regular basis. So that makes a lot of sense to me. Can you tell me a little bit more about your affiliate and creator programs? I’m curious. What are the goals that you have for these programs?

Colby Saenz (17:16.79)

Yeah, so our main things that we look for from a publisher standpoint come down to one, email signups or lead generation. Like how are you able to drive people to sign up for our program or to generally just even stay interested, buy through our newsletters, things of that, get into our list. That is a huge opportunity that I feel like from a publisher side, like leverage that. If you may not be able to get somebody to subscribe today,

like there we know that there is a longer conversion window for our product. So get them in and you can get that credit for that sale through the lead side as well as being able to eventual conversion. And then obviously traffic is a big one for us. I think obviously with the way that things have changed with search engine optimization and just how things are looking, traffic is always a challenging piece, but we don’t hold that as just a sole value point. We do want to be able to add that as a component, but traffic is definitely important for us.

And the new subscriptions are always going to be the, I would say the number one KPI we look for, the goal that we look for. How do you get new subscribers into Love Every helps the LTV of Love Every as a whole. But also it’s the best product we have to be able to get people introduced to the quality of Love Every. Combine all three. There’s so many ways to work with us on that side.

Jerrid Grimm (18:29.665)

Yeah, definitely. It sounds like you look at more than just, you’re not really a one-time sale. So it’s important for you to bring people into the community, learn about what you guys are, whether it’s the founding story or the new, you know, play things that are coming out next month or, or what age groups can have different developmental kind of, you know, concepts. So there’s a lot there and it sounds like you are looking for partners and you reward partners a lot of the way through that journey, not just on a one-time conversion.

So I’m curious how your affiliate and creator advocate programs help you achieve those goals of, you know, driving in email subscribers and then, you know, eventually subscribers to the Plaything subscription and then making sure that they stick around so that your lifetime value of that, you know, there’s a lot of value in someone sticking with you for five years, I’m sure. So tell me of how these partnership programs help achieve those goals.

Colby Saenz (19:22.486)

Yeah, I think the main word to use is flexibility, right? I think what you see within our programs that we have is that one, the affiliate side allows us to leverage the wonderful capabilities that impacts performance models that allow you to use, The tracking, the implementation of an affiliate model that helps these partners come in at different ways, whether it’s a creator, affiliate, or from an advocate standpoint. This allows us to adapt our partnerships well.

because some affiliates are great at getting people engaged, getting people to the site to learn about Love Every, while you do have others that are really good at being able to drive that bottom funnel conversion. So obviously being able to have that flexibility to incentivize based off of that, we do a really good job of being able to segment saying, hey, if you’re an introducer, we will give you preferred status as well as being able to know for those bottom of the funnels. We’ll still give you some level of credit as well because you did have value into that conversion window.

Now on the creator side, we don’t solely work on a CPA model. Like I do think that we are open to flexibility around that as far as to how do we have some level of a hybrid. But let’s be honest, most creators don’t want to just be on a CPA model nowadays. We do try to offer and lead with that just to be able to know, like, let’s see what the general interest within your audience, because, you know, the audiences of these creators do vary so widely between.

just a couple hundred, maybe a couple thousand all the way to a couple hundred thousand to millions, right? So we really try to find the best way to be flexible in that standpoint. And then even on the advocate side is like, we do have a referral program that allows us to be able to engage, but that’s a completely different opportunity that we see as a means to be able to get somebody in to engage with us and refer family and friends, obviously, especially those who do love the product.

we do see that that is a very big opportunity to leverage. But the goal oftentimes comes down to the partner than it does just one select group. And we really try to make sure that the relationships we have with partners go deep enough to where we can leverage it the right way.

Jerrid Grimm (21:23.681)

That’s cool. Yeah. You talk about it in this like flexibility standpoint. I’ve been marketing my entire career and it always, you know, advertising and marketing always seemed like these one channel approaches. Hey, I’m doing search marketing, right? Hey, I’m doing social marketing, but I do find that this partnership space, you might have some creators over here that are raising awareness of, know, your subscription product. You might have a coupon publisher over here because you’re doing a black Friday sale and you want to make sure that you’re in front of as many people as possible.

And you could have review sites as well that are comparing you against your competitive set and where you’re strong and maybe where you have rooms to improve the product. So I’d love to hear if you have a couple of big successes and feel free to name some names here that you’ve seen working to achieve these goals.

Colby Saenz (22:03.127)

Exactly.

Colby Saenz (22:12.17)

Yeah, one of them is I would say she’s that affiliate creator bucket. She’s been fantastic. Her name is the confidently mom. Her name is Rachel Ritlap. She’s fantastic. She has been with us for a long time, probably for I’m going to say over five plus years. She’s really big on the YouTube side. Her blog is fantastic. Her content is in depth, honest, like she has. We have a very close, direct relationship.

And that has been a big contributor to our business because our team hears the feedback and anything that she has had concerns with, we provide that feedback saying, hey, we hear you, here’s some feedback on how to address that. And it’s been a very fluid relationship, but she is honestly one of a great performers within our program. And then the next one I would say, which hits to where a lot of moms and parents do go to is registry sites are always a big one.

Babylist has been with us for a long time. They are a big contributor on the affiliate side. We’ve integrated with them in ways that honestly have helped our business and helped them. And we have a long-term partnership. We meet very frequently. We talk about how we can help and honestly get in front of new moms in ways unlike any other. it’s like, those are two definitely really good partners that kind of speak to the type of partners we work with.

Jerrid Grimm (23:28.449)

Yeah. Well, it’s really cool. The confidently mom, actually had checked out that site before and, they have love every, she has love every rate on the navigation bar. Like you can tell there’s a deep partnership. She’s reviewing, you know, the play things that are coming through and not only are you getting, you know, promotion to her audience, but also this feedback mechanism where you’re hearing back like, Hey, you know what? We were using this product and this part’s, you know, it breaks a little bit too easily or like one of my friends was using this. can imagine that.

You almost have this focus group that’s out there that can be able to give you product feedback at the same time as they’re promoting and helping you drive sales as well. Yeah. So we’ve mentioned a couple of partner types. It sounds like you work with creators or creator affiliates and you also work with some more traditional affiliates. So tell me what, what type of partners are you most excited to be working with right now?

Colby Saenz (24:01.442)

Exactly.

Colby Saenz (24:06.782)

Exactly. That’s a great way to put it.

Colby Saenz (24:23.35)

Honestly, top of the mind content publishers review sites. Those are two I will say any way we can get product into those people’s hands who are really reaching moms, reaching parents and really trying to get in front of or get love every in front of those audiences. Those are top two that we will always search for. We do work with some creators. I’ll be honest, not many. We do have a little bit of site overlap with our influencer team. But like we look really for creators who want to drive that like

I want to prove that my audience can move the needle for love every let’s partner on that side. So we do work on that side. And the major publishers I mentioned stuff like Babylist, even though they may not consider themselves a major publisher, I do think they’re but like we do work with dot dash, we do work with we do work with quite a few different brands as far like as far as to other different major publishers, especially ones that are focused on parenting kids and babies, you got to remember our product is for kids.

We really try to emphasize that we’ve tried to always go from a different range, whether we love newsletters, we love all of it, but it really comes down to how are you connecting with kids, babies and parents? Those are the key areas that we look for when it comes down to a publisher.

Jerrid Grimm (25:34.167)

That’s cool. So that’s why that’s the type of partners that you like to work with. And I’m curious on the flip side of this, why is it that, you know, a creator or a view site or traditional affiliate, why do you think that they should work with you?

Colby Saenz (25:48.451)

Well, to be honest, one, I think the quality that our products offer are very unique and valuable. think when it comes down to being on the opposite side, you always want to be able to provide the best products possible to your audience, right? And I think for us, we are very open to being able to see product to partner so that way they can see it for themselves, so they can experience it, touch it, feel it, everything around that.

I’m never shy about being able to partner on that standpoint, but I think with all of us I think a lot of people like yourself like myself We have children of our own and if you don’t have children maybe children’s in your future or you have nieces and nephews I think we all can agree that helping children is really a big thing for us and I think as a publisher

who has the audience to be able to reach parents and reach means to be able to help kids. I think honestly, we really try to make sure we’re top in the market when it comes down to how we can work with each other. So I’m always on the other end of communicating with people who are reaching out. And I think I always try to build this close of a relationship to make it worthwhile for someone to see somebody’s on the other end. But also we really try to make sure that the value that comes from you seeing the product, but also seeing how it can be the incentivization is.

is very worth it. provide a very competitive CPA. We really do always try to provide the best means to partner with brands, especially on a flat fee or a hybrid basis that can incentivize both parties. And yeah, man, I’m a pretty fun guy to work with every once in a while.

Jerrid Grimm (27:18.797)

Yeah. Well, I think it’s a, have a high quality product. The benefits to kids and parents are very clear, especially to anyone that has a kid in that, in that age range. Definitely. And you’re right. I think it’s fun and not only fun to work with you, but it’s a fun product to be able to promote. If you’re a creator or a review site, I just imagine people like us where we’re in this marketing or affiliate space, we’re sitting down for Thanksgiving dinner and people are like, what do do for a job?

It’s much more fun to say, Hey, we provide these like learning kits for kids to be able to play versus, know, Hey, I sell a VPN, right? It’s, it’s a little tougher to get, you know, your aunt and uncle’s attention. that’s incredible. It’s we’re so happy to have love every as a brand on the impact platform. So happy to be working with you and can’t wait to see the more creators review sites, content sites, and other partners that you’ll bring on board.

Colby Saenz (27:57.077)

I love it. Right.

Colby Saenz (28:15.872)

I appreciate you, Jerrid. I appreciate you having me.