Consumers are more impatient than ever. And now a startup aimed at getting their hands on the latest and greatest technology products in a matter of hours has just raised $150 million.
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Enjoy, which is essentially a mobile, on-demand retail store, wouldn’t confirm the amount of its raise, but sources familiar with the deal told Crunchbase News it’s $150 million.
The Menlo Park startup in a press release disclosed only that it had “secured a significant investment from LCH Partners” in what it described as a Series C growth round. LCH Partners is the new consumer technology platform of global investment company L Catterton.
Enjoy also said in a release the new financing brings its “total investment” to more than $350 million. Previous backers include Riverwood Capital, Stamos Capital, Kleiner Perkins, Highland Capital and Oak Capital Management. Its Crunchbase profile shows a $50 million Series B led by Highland Capital in 2015, and a $30 million Series A in 2014.
Ron Johnson, the individual responsible for the now ubiquitous Apple stores, co-founded Enjoy in 2014 although the service launched in 2015. (Johnson also once served as CEO of JCPenney in an experience that one reporter described as “tarnishing” Johnson’s star)
Today, Enjoy partners with companies like AT&T, Google, Sonos, and EE, a British mobile network operator that is part of British Telecom Group, “to deliver the store to their customers.” It also goes beyond delivery to offer help in setting up devices, and helping consumers learn how to use them.
“One of the highlights of my retail career was creating a new channel for Apple customers, which was the Apple Retail Store,” said Johnson, who serves as Enjoy’s CEO. “Now I get to do it again by creating the mobile retail store for not just one company, but for many great companies around the world.”
I asked Enjoy reps for some growth metrics and while the company would not disclose revenue or even revenue percentage growth, it did say the company currently has more than 1,500 employees compared to more than 950 a year ago. Its goal is to increase that to more than 2,000 employees by next spring.
Enjoy plans to use the new capital (in part) for expansion into more local markets in the United States and in the United Kingdom. It now operates in more than 54 U.S. markets and will be available in 11 markets in the UK by the end of 2019. The company also plans to expand to one more country this year and additional countries in 2020.
Illustration: Li-Anne Dias
Disclosure: The author’s husband works for Apple.
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