Even tiny influencers buy warehouse space to take control of supply chains

Evidence

Yet if we look into the videos of some particularly aspirational YouTubers, we find that even the “normies” are buying up warehouse space in the wake of the current warehouse boom. “The Sensible Mama,” an influencer on YouTube and Instagram, among other platforms, who has a PhD and transitioned from research to business after the birth of her child, has around sixteen thousand subscribers. In a video from January 13, 2020, which has around thirty thousand views, we’re taken on a tour of The Sensible Mama’s warehouse. The Sensible Mama combines social media content creation with a variant on drop-shipping—a method for “order fulfillment,” we’re told by the online sales platform Shopify, “where a store doesn’t keep the product it sells in stock. Instead, the seller purchases inventory as needed from a third party—usually a wholesaler or manufacturer—to fulfill orders.” An influencer who engages in drop-shipping may promote specific products on their Instagram or YouTube page and then set up an online store—via a platform like Shopify—to sell these products. Yet, Shopify lets us know, drop-shipping can be subject to inventory issues, supplier mistakes, limited branding, and other shipping complexities, because one is ultimately giving over complete control over the supply chain to online platforms and other, often somewhat anonymous, global wholesalers or manufacturers. The Sensible Mama, in purchasing warehouse space for herself, is still engaging in a kind of drop-shipping, taking slightly more control over the supply chain, advertising products such as blankets, thermoses, diaper bags, art supplies, and children’s toys on Instagram and YouTube, selling them on her website, which is itself powered by Shopify. — Grant Bollmer, Katherine Guinness, The Influencer Factory, 338