LOS ANGELES, Feb. 11, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Club W, the first company to offer a personalized and curated subscription model for wine announced today it's closing a $3.1 million round of financing led by Los Angeles-based Crosscut Ventures. This financing follows an angel round of $500,000 closed in early 2012.
"We look at wine and see a $34 billion annual market ripe for disruption," says Adam Goldenberg, Venture Partner at Crosscut. "Club W has great traction and a solid model. We realize we're taking a contrarian position on eCommerce given the prevailing attitudes among venture capitalists but we'll continue to bet on the early movers leading great teams in markets with huge potential."
"It's clear we've connected with an audience that continues to be grossly underserved by existing retail options, online and off," says Club W CEO and Co-Founder Xander Oxman. "While the financial backing from Crosscut will provide us with a whole range of tools to expand our reach and better connect with consumers, we are equally excited about the business acumen the partnership brings."
Effective immediately Goldenberg will join the Club W Board of Directors.
"Adam (Goldenberg) has an uncanny ability to scale consumer brands with strong potential into category leaders," says Oxman, "and that experience will be invaluable at this stage in our growth. We couldn't ask for a better strategic investor."
Joining Crosscut in the current round of financing is Guild Capital, Los Angeles-based Siemer Ventures, Mountain View-based 500 Startups, Brenner International Group and LA angel investor Csaba Konkoly. Guild's managing partner Iain Shovlin will join Goldenberg on the Club W board.
As a part of Club W's continued growth strategy the company will relocate to Los Angeles.
"The move to LA is a natural progression," offers Mark Lynn, Club W's Chief Business Development Officer. For the last several months Lynn managed business development from the campus of Los Angeles-based incubator Amplify.La, which added Club W to its portfolio a year ago and also participated in the round.
"Attracting and fostering a company from very early stage through growth and a significant institutional round all within LA speaks volumes about the vibrancy of the Los Angeles entrepreneurial ecosystem," says Amplify.La's Managing Director Paul Bricault.
About Club W
Founded in 2011, Club W is an online community of wine enthusiasts committed to taking the hassle, guesswork and pretentiousness out of enjoying a great bottle of wine at a reasonable price. For too long buying wine has been a one-way street with experts using overblown wine jargon to tell people what to drink. Club W's mission is to transform choosing wine into an ongoing conversation between their curators and consumers' personal tastes. Wine is not about being told what to drink; it's about the experience of discovering what people like. It's time for choosing and buying wine to catch up with the simple, personal pleasure of drinking it.
For more information contact Ari Radetsky. [email protected] - 303.668.2345.
SOURCE Club W
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