Supermodel & Businesswoman Tyra Banks Becomes First Fashion Icon To Invest In TheHunt.com Through Fierce Capital, LLC.

SAN FRANCISCO, July 15, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- The Hunt, the first community-driven online shopping experience that makes social media photos shoppable, announced today another high profile investor – fashion icon Tyra Banks. The investment comes through Tyra's recently formed Fierce Capital, LLC, the investment arm of The Tyra Banks Company, for which she is Chairman and CEO. The Hunt marks the first fashion investment for Tyra through Fierce Capital, LLC, which aims to identify, develop and invest in early-stage startup companies, including firms that are female-led or female-focused. Tyra views The Hunt not just as an investment but also as a real opportunity to help women seek out style inspiration.

"The Hunt brings a fun and innovative approach to shopping and fashion," stated Tyra Banks, Supermodel and Founder of Fierce Capital, LLC. "What I love most about The Hunt is that women help other women find their perfect outfit H2T [head-to-toe]. I am excited to be part of this new approach to collective retail and styling."

Fresh off a completion of the three-year Owner/President Management program at Harvard Business School, Tyra has established Fierce Capital, LLC to help promising startups raise capital and develop profitable business strategies. Through Fierce Capital, LLC, Tyra is leveraging her unique background of 20 years as a leader in fashion, beauty and entertainment.

Tyra joins the ranks of The Hunt's distinguished investors including, actor and investor Ashton Kutcher and partner Guy Oseary, Co-founders of AGR-ade Investments, Rohan Oza, former Chief Marketing Officer of Coca-Cola Company's still coke brands and Founder of Idea Merchants Capital, RedOne, the Grammy winning producer behind Lady Gaga and Jennifer Lopez, Keli Lee, EVP of Casting for ABC Entertainment Group and Anjula Acharia-Bath, CEO of A-Series Entertainment. 

"The Hunt's fast growth to date is largely based on our highly engaged and passionate community which we are thrilled to welcome Tyra Banks to," said Tim Weingarten, Co-founder and CEO of The Hunt. "The desire to spot style trends on the street, share with a like-minded community and then help one another hunt down matching products is proving to be a natural online extension of our existing behavior."

As time spent online and on mobile rapidly shifts to sites and apps with the most visually appealing and highest volume of images, the nature of how consumers discover the styles they want to wear and buy is also changing. For a shopper, this creation of photo sharing has caused a major problem: the impossibility of translating the discovery of a trend or style from a user generated photo into a set of products that match the look and your budget. The Hunt solves this problem by providing a community where consumers help others to find products seen across tens of millions of images shared on blogs, photo apps and social media platforms including Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest and Tumblr. The site provides a true social shopping experience, allowing consumers to find and buy products based on suggestions from others in real time.

In just a few months, The Hunt has surged to one million monthly unique visitors and hundreds of thousands of active members that have started over 150,000 hunts and found over 250,000 products for each other.

About TheHunt.com

The Hunt is the first community-driven online shopping experience that makes it easy and fun to shop for the things you see in photos on sites like Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram and Tumblr. The Hunt is an evolution in online shopping and solves shopper's foremost pain point when browsing these sites: where to actually purchase the item in the photo. Based in San Francisco and co-founded by tech entrepreneurs Tim Weingarten and Simon Peck, the company is a seed stage startup that has raised $2.7M in funding led by Javelin Venture Partners.For more information, please visit www.thehunt.com.

About Fierce Capital, LLC

Fierce Capital, LLC identifies, develops and invests in early-stage startup companies, including firms that are female-led or female-focused.  Through Fierce Capital, LLC, Tyra Banks supports businesses through brand alignment and/or financial support that entrepreneurs might find difficult to procure through other VC channels.  Through Tyra's brand capital, Fierce Capital, LLC will help promising startups raise capital and develop profitable business strategies.  These businesses will have the opportunity to leverage Tyra's social and traditional media sphere of influence and tap into The Tyra Banks Company's extensive network to build significant business relationships.

SOURCE TheHunt.com