Direct-to-consumer (D2C) ecommerce is evolving, driven by Gen Z’s shopping habits and the rise of powerful AI tools.

Casper’s subway ads give commuters fun puzzles to solve while increasing its brand awareness. Albertsons Companies leverages a game to entice consumers to play for discounts and rewards. And Nike’s mobile app earns the brand a spot in consumers’ everyday lives. Here are five ways brands are embracing gamification across different stages.

D2C ecommerce will continue to grow at above-average rates. But that growth will be driven by established brands selling directly—not digitally native brands.

Digitally native D2C brands’ ecommerce growth is decelerating: That’s forcing these retailers to adopt new strategies such as opening stores and selling wholesale.

Recent gains in direct-to-consumer (D2C) ecommerce sales are being driven more by incumbent brands than disruptors. What can they learn from each other about building brands in the digital age?

Brooklinen and Parachute push to gain market share: The two D2C home goods brands are opening stores and expanding into new channels to drive sales growth.

For digitally native brands, 2020 was a hard year, especially as the pandemic shifted shopping priorities to essential goods. Even so, collectively, these brands saw increased growth—and more than we expected.

The emergence of new companies selling direct online has been a big story for some time. Mattress brands Casper and Emma, luggage maker Away, beauty company Glossier, and garment retailer Happy Socks were among the first highly successful direct-to-consumer (D2C) firms, many of them based in Europe.

For the first time, we are breaking out direct-to-consumer (D2C) ecommerce sales. We define D2C companies as digitally native brands that started as independent online retailers selling directly to consumers. Our estimates exclude travel and event tickets, payments (such as bill pay, taxes or money transfers), food or drink services, gambling and other vice good sales.

The direct-to-consumer brand movement has reached a critical juncture. Which of these brands will make the leap into the mainstream before their runway runs out?

eMarketer principal analysts Nicole Perrin and Andrew Lipsman discuss the state of direct-to-consumer brands and why some major players, such as Brandless and Casper, encountered recent struggles.

eMarketer principal analyst Mark Dolliver, junior analyst Blake Droesch and vice president of content studio Paul Verna talk about why Casper wants to sell sleep, the Oscars' viewership, whether Uber can make money, a new FTC, cashless shops, driverless deliveries, who pandas belong to and more.

More direct-to-consumer (D2C) brands are moving away from their digitally native foundations and experimenting with physical retail locations in the form of pop-ups, showrooms or fully fledged brick-and-mortar stores.

This year, ecommerce is set to be 10.9% of total US retail spending—about one-eighth the size of retail brick-and-mortar. The general merchandise category will account for about 50% of total retail sales this year, and that number climbs to roughly 67% when you look at strictly online general merchandise sales.

“Try before you buy,” AR and an improved online experience will breathe new life into established ecommerce categories like apparel and accessories, furniture and home furnishings, and toys and hobbies by the end of our 2023 forecast period.

Dismayed by a shortage of high-quality bras, and limited store inventory, Heidi Zak co-founded the direct-to-consumer (D2C) startup ThirdLove in 2013. The mission was simple: make shopping for a bra a better experience. With a strong focus on personalization, ThirdLove stocked a wide range of sizes and styles and used customer data to create an innovative buyer journey.

In the latest episode of "Behind the Numbers," Andrew Lipsman, principal analyst at eMarketer, details the emergence of digitally native consumer brands and how they developed so much heft in a relatively short period of time.

Direct-to-consumer brands are growing fast and disrupting the retail industry. How are these brands successfully reaching and converting customers, earning their loyalty, and capturing more of their online and offline spending?

Direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands such as Warby Parker, Casper and Everlane have shifted how brands interact with their customers. By cutting out the middleman and establishing online relationships with customers directly, guaranteeing swift delivery and painless buying experiences, as well as positioning themselves as a better alternative to the status quo, DTC brands are carving out a new retail experience.

The consumer retail economy, buttressed by low unemployment and rising wages, is experiencing its best growth since 2011. And despite the 2018 demise of old-retail stalwarts like Sears and Toys "R" Us, recent gains at retail aren’t only flowing in the direction of digital – although they do increasingly bear hallmarks of its influence.