Unbox the Dress
Year founded: 2017
No. of employees: 31 full-time, 2 part-time
Top executives: Grace Lightner, CEO and co-founder; Lorraine Stewart, chief strategy officer and co-founder
Address: 4410 Providence Lane, Suite M, Winston-Salem 27106
Phone: 336-979-3666
Website: unboxthedress.com
Instagram: @unboxthedress
TikTok: @unboxthedresss
Facebook: facebook.com/unboxthedress
Less than three months after moving to a larger building, Unbox the Dress knew it was going to need more space.
Thankfully, the front of its new building in northwest Winston-Salem had an additional 2,500 square feet that the first-of-its-kind wedding dress redesign and repurpose company will expand into at the beginning of 2023.
Unbox the Dress takes both vintage and modern wedding dresses and upcycles them into over 50 proprietary products, including garments, accessories, home décor and keepsakes. In September 2022, it also launched its “Save to Transform” program where Unbox the Dress cleans, repairs and stores wedding dresses as brides accumulate points to apply to future redesigns.
Selling nationally through e-commerce, the company has served over 7,000 clients – an increase of 2,000 since early October, according to CEO Grace Lightner. Unbox the Dress has served customers from all 50 states and sells an average of three items per customer.
This year also saw other new launches for the company, such as its investment in 500 custom-designed and reusable dress boxes for shipping. Unbox the Dress also began selling its most popular product – the robe – at two different price points; the more expensive offers complete customization and only uses fabric from the original dress while the more affordable option uses pre-cut fabric and adds on design elements from the original dress.
In October, Unbox the Dress opened a new fundraising round. A Form D filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission shows $225,000 raised out of a $1 million offering.
Lightner told TBJ that Unbox the Dress, as of mid-December, has closed about $300,000. She expects to close the fundraising round in February 2023, and this round might just be a precursor to a Series A fundraise.
“The first couple months of the year are huge wedding planning months. Most of what we’re raising for is basically to get gasoline to pour on marketing ahead of that huge season, and that will allow us to hit these milestones that we think will position us well for a series A, like trailing 12 months revenue over a million,” Lightner said.
Unbox the Dress has recently been able to shorten its production and delivery time – a “great sign,” Lightner said. For a while, it had been over three months, but is now back down to just six to eight weeks, thanks to the aggressive hiring and training the company has been doing.
Since October, the company has hired eight employees, including a director of inside sales, client care members and seamstresses.
Although she couldn’t say anything official yet, Lightner said one of the big goals for 2023 will be to partner with additional established retail brands. Currently, Unbox the Dress has a revenue share partnership with retailer Adrianna Papell.
Due to shipping and logistics constraints, Unbox the Dress has remained a U.S. company. Lightner said, as the company grows, it could expand into Canada in the near term.
The additional space that Unbox the Dress is moving into at the beginning of the year brings the company’s total square footage up to 12,000. The new space will be for client care, marketing and photography, allowing the sewing team to grow in the larger back space.
But, even that 12,000 square feet won’t suffice for long before Unbox the Dress is bursting at the seams again.
“We’re thinking that, by quarter four next year, we’ll be looking for a second location,” Lightner said. “It might not be in Winston-Salem, but it will be in North Carolina. We’re looking at some other markets to get a fresh pool of sewing candidates.”
Lightner confirmed that she will keep the headquarters in Winston-Salem even if a second location is opened elsewhere in the state.
Q&A with Grace Lightner
Why are the first few months of the year big for Unbox the Dress?
Most engagements happen between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Eve. There are the beginnings of that trickle of excitement for some people where it’s like, ‘I just got engaged and am starting to think about wedding planning’ or excited mothers of the bride who want to get started. And then it just ramps up.
What are your goals for 2023?
I would like to hit the trailing 12-month revenue. I would like to open a second location. I would like to start our Series A and then solidify some of these partnerships in the works with traditional retail brands.
How are you handling the tremendous growth your company is experiencing?
My strength aligns with the challenges because it’s easy for me to focus on the vision. If there’s momentary stressors, as long as I’m focused on the vision, the solution presents itself.
And then fundraising – I’ve always had a love/hate relationship with it. We know what we’re building, and we could build it faster if we had more money. It’s finding the right balance of how hard you can push it to grow without stressing your team or your infrastructure or burning through your cash too fast while still taking advantage of some of these seasonal trends.
