How California Naturals Cut Reporting Time in Half and Built a Profitable Amazon Business with Drivepoint

ABOUT

Company: California Naturals

Category: Beauty & Personal Care

Distribution Models: DTC, Amazon, Wholesale

Use Cases: Automated Reforecasting & Variance Analysis, Wholesale Account Profitability, Cross-Channel KPI Reporting, Board & Leadership Reviews

THE CHALLENGE

California Naturals needed financial visibility that could keep pace with a multi-channel business

As California Naturals scaled across DTC, Amazon, and wholesale, the finance function was fighting to keep up. Every month, pulling together actuals, building budget-versus-actual comparisons, and stacking them against prior-year numbers was a manual grind. By the time the analysis was ready, the window for acting on it had already passed.

What the team really wanted was less time on the mechanics and more time on the questions that matter: Where are we profitable? Which channels are working? What are we missing?

They needed a model that the whole leadership team could work from, not a spreadsheet only one person understood.

THE SOLUTION

California Naturals brought Drivepoint in to replace the manual reporting cycle and give the leadership team a single model to run the business from.

Variance reporting in 30 minutes instead of 3 hours

Before Drivepoint, Kimberly spent roughly 3 hours each month pulling actuals, reconciling data from QuickBooks Online, and building out the budget-versus-actual and year-over-year comparisons. Now, the data imports from QBO automatically. Kimberly spends 30 minutes validating the results and another hour using Claude inside Drivepoint to summarize findings for management, identifying where to focus the leadership conversation. Total time: 1.5 hours, down from 3. A 50% reduction that frees up bandwidth for forward-looking planning.

"That work is taking 30 minutes for proper validation. Then I use Claude to help summarize findings to guide my output to Management and identify where to focus our conversation. Total improvement from 3 hours to 1.5 hours. 50% reduction in time for these tasks allowing for more time on planning for the future."

Wholesale account profitability, built on real data

With the reporting cycle compressed, Kimberly now has time for work that simply wasn't getting done before: building out account-level profitability for the wholesale business. That analysis starts with a QBO export and an Excel summary, then gets layered into the Drivepoint model as actuals for wholesale. The result is a forecast grounded in historical averages from real channel performance. An end-to-end process that takes about 2 hours, and that feeds directly into how the team thinks about scaling wholesale.

"Because we are using Drivepoint, I have time to do this work. I now take that analysis and have layered it into the Actuals for Wholesale in Drivepoint to inform a more accurate forecast for Wholesale that is building on averages based on Actuals. This is a 2-hour process end to end."

Cross-channel KPI visibility that unlocked Amazon profitability

One of the more consequential insights to come out of having clean, connected data across channels: the team could finally see how DTC acquisition investment was driving demand on Amazon. With that visibility in hand, California Naturals pulled back Amazon marketing spend by 2 percentage points, enough to move the needle on channel profitability. The Amazon business is now profitable in a way it wasn't before.

"We have pulled back 2pts in spend now that we can see the KPIs so clearly in our models across Shopify and Amazon. This has allowed us to drive to a profitable business at Amazon."

A leadership team working from one model

Every month, California Naturals' three senior leaders (CEO, VP of Sales, and VP of Product and Operations) sit down with Kimberly for a 90-minute review of the Drivepoint model. They look at KPIs across channels, discuss where revenue is coming from, and work through how to improve profitability and scale accounts. That conversation is grounded entirely in the Drivepoint model and results.

In addition, the Director of E-commerce uses the web tool daily to track KPIs across Amazon and Shopify.

"We have the 3 leaders of the company (CEO, VP of Sales and VP of Product and Operations) and me meet monthly for 90 minutes to review the Drivepoint model and results. We are looking at KPIs across channels and discussing how we can drive revenue, improve profit and scale customers. This is all informed by the Drivepoint model and results."

This is what alignment looks like when everyone is working from the same source of truth: fewer debates about whose numbers are right, and more time on what to do next.

THE RESULTS

From reactive reporting to strategic planning, with a leaner team

The headline numbers tell part of the story. Monthly reporting time cut in half. Amazon ad spend reduced and the channel turned profitable. A wholesale profitability model that didn't exist before, now informing how the team forecasts and scales.

But the bigger shift is structural. Kimberly's time has moved from mechanics to strategy. The leadership team has a shared model they trust. And a cross-functional group of four leaders, including daily use by the e-commerce director, is running the business from a single, live financial picture.

• 50% reduction in reporting time (3 hours to 1.5 hours per month)
• 2 percentage points pulled back in Amazon marketing spend, channel now profitable
• Wholesale profitability analysis built and integrated into forward-looking forecasts
• 4 leaders aligned on one model; monthly 90-minute leadership reviews powered by Drivepoint
• Director of E-commerce using the web tool daily for channel KPI monitoring