The Reasoning Behind Our Recent Price Increase

Today we increased the prices of our products by an average of 10.6% as a result of increased costs. Some products (shorts) were increased more and some (overalls) were not touched at all.

A price increase. Isn't that a 2022 thing? Well, maybe, but instead of doing it opportunistically when it seems like everyone was, we are doing it now because we truly need to. Before I get into why it's the right call for LIVSN, I'll give some insight into how the cost increases we’ve incurred are of benefit to you.

• Increased quality control
  • In 2023 we implemented stricter QC standards at our manufacturer level. We added additional inline inspections, more rigorous end-of-line third-party inspections, and lowered our threshold for defect rate.
  • This may be invisible on the product page, but has a huge effect on the overall quality of our clothing. It also drives costs up as the added quality checks have a negative effect on efficiency. It's worth the cost. We have already seen significant improvements in size consistency and a resulting 50% reduction in our return/exchange rate since Fall '23.
• Product durability updates
  • We have been iteratively making changes to the way our products are constructed in order to prevent the most-common failures we see day-to-day. These changes usually mean incremental cost increases and we have absorbed them in the past, but now they're baked into the price of the garment.
• Expanded warranty repair program
  • We have smoothed and automated our repair program process with new technology and refined processes with our partner repair facility so that the repair experience is quick and easy.
  • We are doing more repairs than ever and it's growing. This is a great thing for us to see. It is a huge validation of our core brand message. It's also rising as an expense and we need to account for that in order to offer (and expand) the service in the future.
• Increased customer service support
  • We hired a full time employee to take care of our customers day in and day out. Previously, customer service has been one of the many hats our employees have worn. Now, though, we are investing in people and technology to make working with us easy, fast, and delightful.
• Rising labor costs in manufacturing
  • Labor costs increased dramatically over the last few years. We support this! We want to help our manufacturers pay a great wage to their employees. While we do negotiate appropriately (and effectively) to keep our prices reasonable, we also want to meet our suppliers half way and charge the true price of what it takes to make something without exploiting people.

The reason raising prices is the right call for LIVSN, and by extension - for you, is that we need to charge the price for our clothing that supports high-quality products, tons of features, sustainable production, ethical manufacturing, a lifetime warranty, incredible customer support, and a motivated team.

Chasing costs down to the bottom of the barrel leads to exploitation, quality compromises, and bad corporate citizenship. We are confident that the updated prices you see now are sufficient to carry us well into the future without having to change again.

Thank you for your time. I know how valuable it is.

- Andrew Gibbs-Dabney, Founder and CEO