Silver Star Brands, f/k/a Miles Kimball Company

What Silver Star Brands, f/k/a Miles Kimball Company does

Silver Star Brands, f/k/a Miles Kimball Company, is a privately held multi-channel direct marketing company headquartered in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Founded in 1934 by Miles and Alberta Kimball as a direct marketer of personalized Christmas cards, the company has grown through a series of brand acquisitions (Walter Drake, Easy Comforts, Exposures, Dream Products, Native Remedies, As We Change, Starcrest, Paula Young, and Collections) into a portfolio of nine consumer-facing sub-brands that operate as catalog retailers and e-commerce sites. The company is owned by Crosby Rock LLC, a privately held Delaware corporation, following a 2015 divestiture from Blyth, Inc. Silver Star Brands reaches more than 120 million households through its combined catalog (five titles reaching 50+ million households annually) and e-commerce properties, and processes nearly 4 million orders per year from a single 2155 S Oakwood Road distribution center staffed by approximately 300 core team members plus seasonal workers.

The business generates revenue primarily through direct-to-consumer product sales across consumer gifts, household products, personal care, health and wellness, memory preservation, and apparel categories. Distribution channels include company-owned e-commerce sites (mileskimball.com, wdrake.com, easycomforts.com, exposuresonline.com, dreamproducts.com, nativeremedies.com, starcrest.com, paulayoung.com, collectionsetc.com), five catalog titles, and the Fox Valley Traders brand on the Amazon marketplace. Personalization services — including hand-painting, printing, embroidery, engraving, and foil stamping — are a point of differentiation, particularly for the legacy Miles Kimball Christmas card business. The company has invested in operational efficiency, including a $150,000 distribution center lighting upgrade yielding 1.1 million kWh annual savings and recycling programs handling 600 tons of cardboard and 60 tons of office paper annually.

The underlying technology stack is conventional e-commerce infrastructure: DAX operating software for order management, Google Analytics and Mouseflow for analytics, Google AdWords and Simpli.fi for marketing, PayPal for payments, and Cookiebot for consent management. There is no evidence of proprietary AI/ML, APIs, or software products; the company does not publish a developer platform or mobile application. The company holds standard retail compliance certifications (PCI DSS via third-party processors, GDPR, CCPA) and has been recognized as a Great Place to Work and one of America's Healthiest Workplaces. Ownership transitions have historically occurred through corporate acquisitions — Blyth, Inc. (2002), then Carlyle Group via Blyth (2015), then Crosby Rock LLC (2015) — with no venture capital or institutional funding rounds identified.

Name

Silver Star Brands, f/k/a Miles Kimball Company

Legal name

Silver Star Brands, Inc.

Website

https://silverstarbrands.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

1934

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

251–500 employees

Short description

Silver Star Brands is a privately held multi-channel catalog and e-commerce retailer managing nine consumer brands (Miles Kimball, Walter Drake, Easy Comforts, Native Remedies, Paula Young, etc.) serving over 120 million households with personalized gifts, household goods, health and wellness, and apparel products.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Catalog and Direct Marketing Retail

NAICS

Office Supplies, Stationery, and Gift Retailers (4594), Health and Personal Care Retailers (4561), Sporting Goods, Hobby, Musical Instrument, Book, and Miscellaneous Retailers (459)

akta.pro primary industry

Private-Label–Led Mass Merchandisers (CRAGABAG)

Keywords

• Catalog retail
• Direct marketing
• Consumer gifts
• Household products
• Personal care products

Headquarters

HQ city

Oshkosh

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices3 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Operations, Personnel, Marketing or Sales, Supply Chain, Technology or R&D, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Direct Product Sales: Revenue generated from direct-to-consumer sales of consumer gifts, household products, health and wellness items, and personal care products through company-owned websites and catalogs.
2. Catalog Sales: Revenue from catalog-based direct marketing, with five catalog titles reaching millions of households annually.
3. Marketplace Sales: Fox Valley Traders brand generates revenue through Amazon marketplace sales.

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels4 records

Core offering

Silver Star Brands is a multi-channel direct-to-consumer retailer operating multiple catalog titles and branded e-commerce websites selling 8,000+ consumer products. Core categories include personalized cards and gifts (Miles Kimball), kitchenware and household products (Walter Drake), value-priced health and personal care items (Easy Comforts), memory preservation albums and frames (Exposures), innovative everyday products (Dream Products), and natural and homeopathic remedies (Native Remedies). The company reaches 120+ million households and processes nearly 4 million orders annually from its Oshkosh, Wisconsin distribution center.

Product overview

Silver Star Brands is a multi-channel brand management company that operates multiple catalog and e-commerce brands serving over 120 million households. The portfolio consists of six core sub-brands: Miles Kimball (personalized cards and gifts), Walter Drake (household products and stationery), Easy Comforts (health and personal care), Exposures (memory preservation), Dream Products (innovative everyday items), and Native Remedies (natural wellness products). Additional brands include Starcrest, Paula Young, Collections, and Fox Valley Traders. The company offers personalization services including hand-painting, printing, embroidery, engraving, and foil stamping. With approximately 300 team members in Oshkosh, WI, the company processes nearly 4 million orders annually and features over 8,000 different products across its catalogs and websites.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• Miles Kimball: Catalog retailer offering cards, wonderful gifts, helpful household items and unique food products. Specializes in exclusively designed ornaments, labels, children's accessories, outdoor décor and gifts.
• Walter Drake
• Easy Comforts
• Exposures
• Dream Products
• Native Remedies
• Fox Valley Traders
• As We Change
• PetAlive
• Starcrest
• Paul Young
• Collections

Products and services

• Miles Kimball Catalog and e-commerce brand offering personalized Christmas cards, gifts, household items, ornaments, labels, children's accessories, outdoor décor, and unique food products for individual consumers.
• Walter Drake Direct marketing brand offering kitchenware, household products, organizers, personal healthcare items, gardening and outdoor décor, personalized gifts, calendars, stationery, and address labels for individual consumers.
• Easy Comforts Catalog and online retailer of value-priced health and personal care products, including home safety, bathroom safety, daily living aids, diabetic socks, and pain remedies for individual consumers, particularly those seeking solutions to physical challenges.
• Exposures Memory preservation brand offering genuine leather albums, handcrafted scrapbooks, display pieces, and archival-quality acid-free frames for individual consumers.
• Dream Products E-commerce brand offering innovative products for daily life and gift items at affordable prices for individual consumers.
• Native Remedies Direct-to-consumer online marketer of natural and homeopathic health and wellness products offering over 250 quality herbal and natural remedies for common ailments for humans and pets.
• Starcrest Catalog and e-commerce brand offering a variety of consumer products, integrated into Silver Star Brands' portfolio to support growth through strategic acquisitions.
• Paula Young Direct-to-consumer apparel brand offering women's clothing, including career separates, casual wear, and specialty sizes for individual consumers.
• Collections Etc. Home décor and gift brand offering unique products for the home.
• Fox Valley Traders Multi-channel merchant brand operating on the Amazon marketplace, offering thousands of unique products across multiple Silver Star Brands categories.
• As We Change Health and wellness products brand offering health-related merchandise for individual consumers.
• PetAlive Herbal supplements and homeopathic medicines brand offering natural remedies for pets.

Segments2 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Integration7 records

Partnerships

One partnership is on record.

• Starcrest, LLCcoreStrategic or Co-development Partner · 20 October 2022Silver Star Brands announced the acquisition of the brand assets of Starcrest, LLC, integrating several of its catalog and e-commerce brands into its portfolio. This move supports Silver Star Brands' growth through strategic acquisitions and leverages existing infrastructure.

Scale indicators13 records

Recent moves7 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Broad incumbents

• Qurate Retail Group: Owner of QVC, HSN, Zulily, and Cornerstone Brands — the largest multi-channel direct response retailer in the U.S. Operates the same catalog + TV + e-commerce model that Silver Star Brands runs, but at vastly larger scale and with a far broader brand portfolio. Most structurally comparable peer for understanding the long-term trajectory of the multi-brand direct response model.

Direct peers

• Cornerstone Brands: Qurate-owned subsidiary that aggregates multiple catalog and e-commerce brands (Frontgate, Ballard Designs, Garnet Hill, Improvements, etc.) under shared infrastructure. Operates the exact same brand-aggregation playbook Silver Star Brands uses with Miles Kimball, Walter Drake, Easy Comforts, and Exposures.
• Lands' End: Public catalog and e-commerce apparel and home retailer that ships from a single U.S. distribution center to consumers nationwide. Comparable business model, comparable channel mix, and a useful public-comp benchmark for direct-to-consumer catalog economics.
• Brylane Home: Catalog and online retailer of home textiles and decor, formerly part of the multi-brand Blyth portfolio alongside Silver Star Brands. Comparable customer demographic, comparable merchandising depth, and a direct historical association through the Blyth ownership era.
• Vermont Country Store: Privately held catalog and e-commerce retailer of classic American goods, gifts, and household products. Closely comparable product mix (gifts, household, hard-to-find items) and a similar heritage-driven brand positioning that appeals to older demographics.
• L.L.Bean: Iconic catalog and e-commerce retailer selling outdoor gear, apparel, and home goods from a single U.S. distribution footprint. Useful benchmark for catalog-to-e-commerce migration economics, single-site fulfillment, and heritage-driven consumer brand management.
• Oriental Trading Company: Direct marketing retailer of party supplies, novelties, gifts, and toys via catalog and e-commerce, owned by Berkshire Hathaway. Comparable multi-channel direct response motion and similar target-customer overlap in gifts and household categories.
• iHerb: Large online retailer of natural health, wellness, and supplement products with global fulfillment. Direct overlap with the Native Remedies and PetAlive portion of Silver Star Brands' portfolio and a useful benchmark for pure-play online wellness retail economics.
• Talbots: Multi-channel women's apparel retailer operating catalogs, e-commerce, and physical stores, with a customer demographic that overlaps the Paula Young womenswear brand within the Silver Star Brands portfolio.

Regional players

• Massey's: Catalog and online retailer of outdoor workwear, footwear, and western lifestyle goods, serving a similar rural and suburban U.S. customer demographic to Silver Star Brands' core catalog audience. Comparable channel mix but focused on a narrower product vertical.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Facebookfacebook.com/silverstarbrands
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/miles-kimball

Compliance3 records

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles1 record

Subsidiaries10 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A2 records

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Silver Star Brands, f/k/a Miles Kimball Company