These are guide ranges, not rules. Your category, stage, market and timing will move them, so use them to work out where to look, not to mark yourself pass or fail.
| Metric | Benchmark | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| CAC payback period | Under 3 months elite, 3-6 healthy, 6-12 workable, over 12 fragile | Payback is the months until a cohort's cumulative contribution profit covers its nCAC. Past 12 months you're funding growth with outside capital, and fragile to any CAC spike or platform shock. |
| Payback: consumables | 1-6 months | Food, beauty, pet and supplements: a short repurchase cycle earns the acquisition cost back fast. |
| Payback: fashion and home | 3-6 months when repeat is genuinely strong; 6-9 when it isn't | Be honest about which one you are, because the difference decides how much working capital growth needs. |
| Payback: durables and electronics | 6-12+ months | Long replacement cycles stretch payback, which puts more weight on first-order contribution. |
| LTV:CAC ratio | 3:1 to 5:1 is strong (nCAC at 20-33% of contribution LTV) | Measured on a 12-month contribution LTV window. Above 5:1 you're likely underinvesting in growth; 2:1 to 3:1 is workable only with payback inside 6 months. |
| LTV:CAC below 2:1 | Red, unless first orders are genuinely profitable | Below 2:1 at that window you're buying revenue if first orders are underwater. It's only acceptable with years two and three observed in your own cohort tables. |
| How to measure LTV | Contribution profit over a stated window, usually 12 months | Never revenue, never gross margin alone, and never 'lifetime' with no window. Revenue LTV against paid CAC looks roughly twice as good as the honest version. |
| Early LTV signal | ~30% growth beyond the first order within 60 days; roughly double within 12 months | Value growing like that means a genuine brand connection. With no 12-month cohort yet, run the test at the longest window most of your cohort has reached, often 60 or 90 days. |
| The three gates | First-order floor, payback under 6 months, nCAC under ~33% of contribution LTV | Run every acquisition decision through all three, with first and repeat order values as two separate numbers rather than one blended AOV. |
| nCAC vs blended CAC | nCAC: new customers only | Blended CAC lets repeat orders you didn't pay for flatter the maths. When deciding whether to spend more, run the gates on the marginal customer's incremental nCAC. |
How to use these benchmarks
These ranges are guides, not guarantees or rules. They are drawn from The DTC Playbook and Rob Ward's experience taking Quad Lock from $0 to a $500M exit, cross-checked against widely cited DTC data. The point is not the exact number - it is whether you sit well above or below it, and what to do about the gap. Your category, stage, market and timing all move them, so judge yourself against your own trend as well.
Last reviewed: October 2026. Benchmarks are refreshed as the playbook is updated.
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