The DTC Playbook Search ⌘K
The DTC Playbook
Contents Glossary Benchmarks CalculatorsBeta Tools Health Check Dashboard
Free with an account · Your command centre

Your brand, on one dashboard

Your Health Check score, a "Fix next" shortlist of your weakest sections, your progress across 472 checklist items, your metrics powering live calculators, your tools and exports - organised into focused tabs. The dashboard turns the diagnosis into a tracked plan, so you always know what to fix next.

Free · No subscription · No credit card

Silent explainer video. It presents The DTC Playbook's tagline - Build a brand. Scale it. Sell it? - and introduces the playbook: a free, single source of truth for direct-to-consumer founders, written by Rob Ward, who bootstrapped Quad Lock to $50M+ in revenue before a $500M exit. It shows the Health Check that diagnoses what to fix in your business, and the sections, checklists and tools that show you how to fix it.

8
Category Scores
472
Checklist Items
8
Excel Tools
Free
Forever

What is on your dashboard

One command centre for your brand instead of a scatter of spreadsheets and half-finished notes - organised into focused tabs: diagnose, progress, your numbers, tools and team. Everything you need to know what to fix next - and prove you are actually fixing it.

Your Health Check score
The overall number plus the category breakdown, so your weakest link is obvious at a glance.
A "Fix next" shortlist
Your weakest sections by Health Check score, in one prioritised list - so the next move is never a guess.
Progress over time
Every Health Check you take is charted, so you can watch the score climb as you fix things.
Checklist progress
Completion across all 30+ sections and 472 action items, with a progress bar for each section.
Your Metrics Profile
Enter your numbers once - AOV, margin, CAC, repeat rate - and every calculator on the site uses them.
Live decision calculators
The Three Gates calculator runs right in the dashboard - with break-even, allowable CAC and more a click away, results saved to your brand.
All 8 Excel tools
The P&L template, unit-economics calculator, 13-week cash flow, acquisition planner and more, in one place.
One-click exports
A dynamic Action Plan (Excel) and a Health Check PDF, both built from your live data.
Team access
Invite co-founders or operators so everyone works from the same numbers, on one shared brand.

How it works

01
Sign up free
Register in under a minute. Free access to the whole playbook - no subscription.
02
Take the Health Check
Your dashboard is created automatically and scored across the 8 categories.
03
Work the plan
Read the sections it points you to, tick off checklist items, use the tools.
04
Track your progress
Re-take the Health Check each quarter and watch the score climb over time.
Why it matters
Know what to fix. Prove you are fixing it.

At Quad Lock we grew from a bootstrapped Kickstarter to a global brand with millions of customers, $200M in revenue and a $500M exit. The thing that separated the good quarters from the wasted ones was a tight feedback loop: know the weak spot, act on it, and measure whether it actually moved.

The dashboard gives you that loop. It takes the Health Check diagnosis and the 472-item checklist and turns them into one tracked plan - so you are not guessing what to work on, and you have proof you are making progress. Most founders operate without it. You do not have to.

Ready to track your brand?

Create a free account, take the Health Check, and your dashboard is ready. Free forever - no subscription, no credit card.

Free forever · No subscription · No credit card

One command centre for your brand

From diagnosis to a tracked plan

Most DTC founders know roughly what is wrong but have no single place to work on it. The DTC Playbook dashboard fixes that. The Health Check scores your brand across 8 categories and flags where you are thin. The dashboard then keeps that score, charts it every time you re-take the diagnostic, and shows your completion across all 472 checklist items - so the path from where you are to where you want to be is always visible.

It is also where your 8 Excel tools live - the P&L template, unit-economics calculator, 13-week cash flow, acquisition planner and more - alongside one-click exports: a dynamic Action Plan and a Health Check PDF, both built from your live data.

Your numbers, entered once

The dashboard is home to your Metrics Profile - AOV, contribution margin, CAC, repeat rate and the rest of your core economics, entered once and saved to your brand. Every decision calculator on the site reads from it: the Three Gates customer-economics calculator runs right in the dashboard, and break-even, allowable CAC, can-I-scale-ads and free-shipping-threshold are a click away. Change a number in one place and every answer updates.

Get your team on the same page

Invite your co-founders, CMO, CFO and operations lead. Everyone works from the same shared brand, the same scores, and the same checklists - so alignment is not a meeting, it is what happens when the whole team is looking at the same numbers. The playbook, the Health Check, the dashboard, the tools and every additional team seat are free forever. No subscription, no upsell, no limits on how many people you can add.