D2C Watch

DTC brands have never been easier to launch. A Canva logo. A Shopify store. A influencer with 200k followers. And a formula that doesn't match the label. Nobody is checking these brands. We are. Welcome to D2C Watch.

Dr. Salúd is my favourite doctor. Really smart and down to earth doctor.

I really did not want to be writing this morning. But this issue is too important. It’s been said that the last thing the weather person should do before going on the air is look out the window. The _day before_ @eringriffith profiled Medvi in @nytimes as the AI company of the future, the FDA approved Lilly’s new oral medication: orforglipron. *Not tirzepatide.* In fact, it’s not even a peptide. It’s the first non-peptide, small-molecule oral GLP-1 receptor agonist. Lilly owns tirzepatide. They invented it. If you could put tirzepatide in a pill, Lilly would do it. They would desperately want to. Instead, they spent millions and nearly eight years licensing a completely different kind of molecule, because oral tirzepatide is a biological impossibility. Tirzepatide is a 39-amino-acid, 4,813-dalton peptide. Your gut does not distinguish it from a piece of chicken. SNAC, the absorption enhancer that barely gets oral semaglutide to 1% bioavailability, is compound-specific. It failed with liraglutide, another GLP-1 peptide, and has no demonstrated mechanism for tirzepatide. There is no published human study of oral tirzepatide. There is no plausible mechanism. Medvi sells it starting at $279 a month. A RICO class action against its supply chain partners has already called the product modern-day snake oil. Lilly’s own strategy is the best witness. We can hear the lawyers now: “So doctor, what was your assumption on why Lilly was not pursuing oral tirzepatide despite that in not doing so they would instead pursue an entire entirely different type of molecule and possibly create market confusion with their new entrant?” The Times profile actually described an accountability architecture whose impact in part is that no single entity owns the patient and process. Medvi handles marketing. CareValidate provides the clinical workflow. OpenLoop provides prescribers and pharmacy fulfillment. The marketing layer can say the doctors make the decisions. The doctor platform can say the brand controls the messaging. The prescribers say the pharmacy fills what’s ordered. Everyone can point at everyone else. That structure explains a lot of the financials. Medvi reported a 16.2% net margin. Hims, with 2,442 employees selling the same drug categories, reported 5.5%. The 10.7-point spread represents in part everything Medvi may not pay for: extensive clinical oversight, advanced adverse event monitoring, satisfactory regulatory compliance, sound quality systems. The Times says they verified Medvi’s revenue. They did not seem to verify or note many other aspects. Six weeks before the profile ran, the FDA had issued Warning Letter #721455 for misbranding compounded GLP-1s. OpenLoop had disclosed a data breach: a threat actor claimed access to 1.6 million patient records, and multiple class actions were filed. The company’s ad network included fabricated physician personas, “Professor Albust Dongledore,” “Dr. Tuckr Carlzyn MD,” running over 5,000 Meta ads alongside a website disclaimer that these individuals “may be actors or AI portraying doctors.” The Times told the story of a man who used AI to build a billion-dollar company alone. The article was really a transcript of a Silicon Valley fever dream. A byproduct of regulatory lag and consumer desperation A billion dollars in pharmaceutical transactions running through an organization with no one seeming to care if a product can survive contact with the human stomach better than a chicken nugget.

This is what I mean. Telehealth is becoming the new fake supplements from China dropshipping model. “Everyone is playing dirty”. “Get rich get out”.

@NotZainAgain Zain, if you want, I’ll stop posting

“In America if you use fake doctor testimonials to sell supplements and rebill customers illegally without their knowledge the government doesn’t do anything but you get shamed by anonymous accounts on twitter”

@anothercohen @RobertFreundLaw Alex, stop, you’re lying. These are the best companies in the world. They are providing life changing drugs to help seniors. There’s absolutely nothing shady about them. This is just part of the game. Who cares about the consumer. Just stack it up and win and open another one!!

Friend got a marketing email from Medvi this morning. Email copy aside, the provider they are using in the screenshot is an actual doctor, not an NP, whose real name is Alec Wier, and he is COMPLETELY UNAFFILIATED with Medvi. This entire company is run on fraud and deception and I hope the founder ends up in prison

Should we say who this is?

i mean i am happy about this but i got tirz through one of these services without speaking to a doctor but that's how i wish every request for medication went, so i'm a happy consumer... not really sure who limiting tirz access to will help? i see the argument for people with eating disorders but if i weigh the net effect i think it's still better to have it widely available

I’m going to stop posting about telehealth companies for now. Because the pattern is obvious, and at this point people can look for themselves. Telehealth, when done properly, is a genuinely powerful innovation. It can expand access, lower friction, and help patients get legitimate care faster. But there is a world of difference between responsible telehealth and telehealth run like a blackhat ecom funnel. If a company is using pay first, review later flows, vague intake logic, hard to reach providers, aggressive rebilling, hard to cancel flows, or misleading authority cues, people are going to question it. And they should. What has been most revealing is not the criticism itself, but the reaction to it. The moment certain practices get questioned, the same small circle always gets very loud, very fast. That tells its own story. If you are selling real medications to real people, especially vulnerable people looking for help, the standard should be higher than what you would tolerate in some random dropshipping funnel. Healthcare is not a TikTok Shop gimmick. It is not a fake supplement landing page. It's not a fake gummies dropshipping from China model. It's not a fake methylene blue dropshipping operation. It's not a fake PDRN mask business. It's not a fake calcium stick business. If your model is legitimate, it should be able to survive basic transparency. Real screening, real disclosures, real identities, clear billing, clear cancellation, and real access to qualified providers. That should not be controversial. Anyway, that is enough from me on this topic. People can look at the flows, the ads, the reviews, the billing complaints, and the reactions, and draw their own conclusions. Just know, the "network" is far greater than you think.

@Jason______A Very common as well: x.com/robertfreundla…

By the way, no, Hims is not the same.

@TheD2CWatch Except when you put your CC in you with have the money held. You have to submit your ID and a selfie and a doctor will review your answers on this quiz and your ID and selfie. You will be disqualified and your hold will not turn into a payment.

Yay! I got approved on directmeds.com! I weigh 90 lbs as a male but I feel like I'm obese and 30 lbs would look much better on me. Can't wait to begin my journey with Oral Tirzepatide and lose the 60 lbs that has been haunting me for life. I cannot wait to be 30 lbs!

@Jason______A We did the same test on Hims. You’re right, they rejected us immediately and recommended we see a doctor in person. No need to enter any credit card info. That’s exactly how it should work. Not recommending Tirzepatide before a single doctor reviewed anything.

@NotZainAgain Zain... please send me a link to all the ads/content you run on TikTok shop. Thank you sir.

i’m assembling a team

@cpgwire Lol.

A veteran operator and exited founder has anonymously launched BrüChew, a mushroom coffee gummies brand. Why anonymously? Because BrüChew is about you, the consumer, NOT the founder. BrüChew reimagined mushroom coffee in gummy form to make it easier and more convenient for consumers to get their energy & clarity fix. No scooping, no brewing, and no messes. Each serving of BrüChew delivers 50mg of caffeine and 1g of functional mushrooms, including Lion’s Mane, Cordyceps, Reishi, and Turkey Tail Extract. Any idea who’s behind this?

If you want to go down a rabbit hole, check who is running most of the ads for directmeds in Google's Ad Center. Then search that same advertiser name. See what else comes up.

Matthew, great post. But you left out the most important part. Nobody is anti telemedicine. Nobody is against making healthcare more accessible. What you left out is that, by your own admission, you had “no idea” what your affiliates were running. That is a pretty important detail to leave out while posting about being bullish on humanity. The issue isn't white label telemedicine. The issue is allegedly having fake doctor profiles running ads to push people toward a GLP-1 funnel. Maybe you knew. Maybe you didn’t. Only you have that answer. But you cannot post about democratizing healthcare while casually leaving out that your affiliate network was allegedly running ads like that at scale.

Watching in realtime as people learn about white label, drop shipping, and affiliate marketing is like seeing cavemen “fire bad” White label telemedicine is a huge benefit with a net positive for humanity. It has been the driving force behind big pharma lowering prices and making healthcare accessible to everyone from home. Low energy people think offering life-changing weight loss medication, prescribed by a doctor, is a trendy “pill mill”. Wait til you see what’s possible with longevity services and peptides. I’m bullish on humanity. If you are too, I’ll help you build.

Running a telehealth company with fake doctor pages on Facebook ads directing to your GLP-1 platform violates several U.S. laws, even if done via an agency and you claim ignorance: - FTC Act §5 & Endorsement Guides (16 CFR Part 255): Fake doctor profiles are deceptive fabricated endorsements lacking genuine expertise/opinions. Recent FTC actions (e.g., NextMed 2025) targeted fake testimonials in GLP-1 telehealth ads. - FDA rules (FD&C Act): Misleading claims on compounded GLP-1s (e.g., implying equivalence to approved drugs like Ozempic/Wegovy or obscuring sourcing) constitute misbranding. FDA issued 30+ warning letters to telehealth firms in March 2026 for this exact issue. - Meta ad policies: Impersonation and unsubstantiated health claims banned; violations risk account suspension. - Potential state false advertising/unfair competition laws and Ryan Haight Act issues if ads undermine valid prescribing. This is a serious problem. Brands are primarily liable as advertisers (even via agencies/affiliates) if they benefited or should have monitored. FTC/FDA enforce strictly—fines, injunctions, refunds common. Ignorance isn't a defense without due diligence.