DALLAS, TX—(Marketwired – June 30, 2015) – rewardStyle, the first and only monetization platform solution that empowers the world's influential content creators and retailers to achieve maximum economic success by providing an ecosystem of innovative technology and strategic consulting, announced today that the company is closing on a $15 million Series A financing with a post–money valuation of $290 million. New York–based Maverick Capital Ventures led the investment round with other strategic investors including Miroslava Duma, Nasiba Adilova and Veronica Chou.
Over the last four years, rewardStyle has fueled the arrival of a new influence on the retail industry: premium digital style publishers. By providing proprietary web applications and strategies necessary to empower a global army of 9,000 handpicked content creators and 4,000 global retailers — these digital influencers are now making a tangible impact on global e–commerce sales.
“rewardStyle's disruptive business model and technology platform create a unique global value proposition,” said Riad Abrahams, Managing Director of Maverick Capital Ventures. “The company is not only highly sustainable but its path of organic growth is impressive.” The platform was first launched in 2011, driving more than $60 million during its first year of fiscal operation in 2012. In 2015, rewardStyle content creators will drive north of $.5 billion in retail sales and will eclipse the $1 billion lifetime retail sales mark by end of 2015, an annualized growth rate of 102% since company inception.
“rewardStyle has been bootstrapped, funding its operations with a scalable business model that has been earning revenue since day one,” said CEO and Co–Founder, Baxter Box. The first round of strategic financing will be used to spearhead international business growth, secure on–the–ground market presence in Asia, the Middle East, Central Eastern Europe and Russia, extend its luxury category offering, expand the platform's current content creator portfolio, and accelerate rewardStyle's product roadmap. “My generation and those younger than me are more equipped to ideate, generate, create, share and syndicate than anyone else in history. The most rewarding part about our business is that we are empowering thousands of these online publishers around the world to create wealth doing what they love,” said President and Co–Founder, Amber Venz Box.
Strategic investors, Miroslava Duma, Nasiba Adilova and Veronica Chou, are well positioned within the fashion industry, possessing an innate knowledge of some of the world's top luxury digital markets, an increasingly important area of growth for rewardStyle. “Many companies and great fashion minds have increasingly been trying to help retailers and publishers monetize their daily content and communication. rewardStyle has distinguished itself by building this extraordinary platform. Idea is 10% and execution is 90% and the way rewardStyle has executed is pristine,” said Miroslava Duma.
About rewardStyle:
Founded by Baxter Box and Amber Venz Box, rewardStyle is the first and only monetization solution that empowers the world's influential content creators and retailers to achieve maximum economic success by providing an ecosystem of innovative technology and strategic consulting. rewardStyle has publishers in more than 80 countries and the platform monetizes content in more than 120 countries. This is the collective ambition of a results–driven team committed to shaping and leading the digital–style industry. In March 2014, rewardStyle created LIKEtoKNOW.it, an in–Instagram service, concepted for the “socially–inspired shopper”. The service enables nearly 1 million consumers to access full product and service information at the source of inspiration — a “like” on Instagram. rewardStyle's team, a multi–hundred–million–dollar business of more than 100 employees, works from the company's three offices — Dallas, London, and most recently, San Francisco.
About Maverick Capital Ventures:
Maverick manages private investment funds, certain separately managed client accounts, a fund–of–funds group and a venture capital effort (Maverick Ventures). Since its founding in 1993, Maverick has been dedicated to the preservation and growth of its investors' capital. With total managed assets of $10 billion, Maverick's 124 partners and employees are based in Dallas and New York, with research offices in Philadelphia and San Francisco.
About Riad Abrahams:
Mr. Abrahams rejoined Maverick in 2009 after serving as Managing Partner of BlackSwan Partners for almost three years. In his position as Chief Strategist, Mr. Abrahams sits on the Portfolio Management Committee and Stock Committee of the firm. He first joined Maverick in 2003 and was a member of the Consumer team before becoming Chief Strategist. Prior to that, he was an Analyst in the Principal Investment Group at The Blackstone Group. Mr. Abrahams received both his A.B. (Cum Laude) and his M.B.A. from Harvard University.