Three-year growth 2,929%
Join the Cords Club. From the beginning, founders and couple Ben and Lexi Petersen have been the best listeners a customer could ask for. The brand originally started as hair scarves and scrunchies but has pivoted to a top-selling flat-back, hypoallergenic earring brand focused on the fun, the weird and the colorful. Up until last year, Lexi ran all the social media herself and made a point to respond to every comment she could — showing customers that Cords Club is never too big to connect (even when the brand has more than196K followers on Instagram). Cords Club’s eclectic drops have included the “junk drawer” line, “Cords Club Cola” soda line, and more. The Petersens are proving that jewelry can tell a story in addition to accessorizing, as long as you’re not afraid to color outside the lines.
LEXI Every iteration of the brand has been a matter of us learning how to run a business better, learning what our customers want, learning what “hypoallergenic” actually means, and so forth. Brands can get in a rut of doing things the same way forever, and then they get left behind. We see constant ego death with Cords Club. We’re trying to stay humble and recognize that we don’t have all the answers.
Before Cords Club, I was in school for dental hygiene. Cords Club started as an accident just trying to pay for college. We didn’t even start with earrings — we started with hair scrunchies and hair scarves.
It wasn’t until the end of 2020 when I decided to quit dental hygiene. Ben said, “You’ve got the Sunday scaries constantly. Why don’t you do your side hustle full time?” I was so scared, but he encouraged me and said, “You’ve got this. People are interested in what you’re selling.”
BEN Back then, we were making two scrunchies per hour, then started baking sheets of polymer clay earrings. That output went from two scarves/scrunchies an hour to earrings as well, so we could do around 50 products an hour.
Lexi is so strong. I remember once when we were on a camping trip, and she was getting 50 orders via Instagram, writing addresses by hand, using Venmo. The drops kept getting bigger, and it became clear that we needed to get on Etsy first, then Shopify and build the website. I was in software development — which I still do to help out with the team — but when I told my boss that I was going full time with this and told him our revenue, he said, “Oh, you should have left a year ago!”
LEXI By 2024 we had around 10 team members in our house. It was so cramped, parking along the street, working out of two bedrooms. We started looking for office space and found a place in Spanish Fork. When we moved into that space, we had so much room, and now we’re bursting at the seams.
I was handling all social media until this year. I knew our customers’ names, families, struggles, history with jewelry. It’s not just about the jewelry; it’s about the relationships we’re creating.
BEN People think we grew so fast in just a year, but really it was years of building. We hit some really fun revenue milestones before we ran a single paid ad. That fact alone speaks volumes to Lexi’s ability to connect with customers on social media.
LEXI I tried to respond to every comment. We’ve all been that customer who’s really excited about a brand, and we’ve tried to be a part of it, and they’ve ignored us. We’re trying our best to make customers feel seen and appreciated. It takes time to do that.
Ben We’ve had some wild growth, built on the foundation Lexi established and fueled today by our people and our playbook. There’s nothing better than finding people who love what they do and get to bring that passion into your brand.
When it comes to hiring, I’d rather hire someone who’s hungry and can communicate and adapt than someone who has a polished and lengthy resume. The game now is all about adaptability and moving fast. A good question is: “What have you learned in the last year about what has changed in your world?” If they don’t have an answer, they’re not paying attention.
Lexi At Cords Club, we’re helping people tell their stories and get excited to feel like they’re part of something bigger. The weirder the drop, the more people respond to it. You can find a circular stud at literally every single jewelry place, but you can’t find a pretzel flatback stud or scissors or a button. It’s fun to provide pieces that help people share more about themselves with the world. It’s more than an ear stack; it’s a story.
“It quickly became apparent we’d need more space, so we looked for a building to own. We wanted to find a space that would be fun, unique and not cookie cutter.”