Breef has raised $3.5 Million in funding to develop what it calls the world's first online marketplace for transacting between brands and agencies.
Greycroft was the leader of the round, and was joined by Rackhouse Ventures and The House Fund, John McBain and Lance Armstrong, 640 Oxford Ventures, and John and Helen McBain. The total amount of funding for the New York-based and Colorado-based company, which includes the new round is $4.5 million. It was founded in 2019 by George Raptis (husband and wife) and Emily Bibb (wife).
Bibbs' background is in digital marketing, brand building, and branding at companies such as PopSugar and VSCO, while Raptis was part of the founding team at Fintech company Credible.com.
Both stated that they had difficulties finding agencies. This involved making numerous calls and asking for referrals. Sometimes, their companies were in high demand for talent but did not necessarily require a full-time employee to accomplish the project goal.
Although outsourcing is nothing new, Breef's unique selling point is its ability manage complex projects. A traditional freelance project costs less than $1,000 and takes less than a week. Raptis stated that the company works with team-based projects, which average $25,000 and last about six months.
Raptis explained to TechCrunch that Breefs is revolutionizing the way boutique agencies and brands connect in the planning, scoping, pitching, and payment for projects process.
Bibb said that the agency is going online at its core. We are creating a platform that will simplify the complex process of outsourcing high-value work. Users can find, pay for, and work with agencies in days instead of months.
Breef allows brands to create their own briefs to describe what they want. Breef will then connect them with a few agencies that meet those needs. The company can reduce the search time to just five days, rather than spending a month or more.
After seeing demand for millions of dollars each month on the platform, Raptis and Bibb decided to look into venture capital. Many brands that had previously used in-house agencies or agency of record, have now switched to smaller distributed teams.
Breef has been processing large amounts over the internet because agency work is expensive. The founders are keen to develop the technology further and hire talent to ensure that the system is secure and trustworthy.
Breef(pay), a buy now, pay later funding service for project funding, was also launched to simplify payments to agencies and to reduce cash flow problems. You can set your own payment terms and mix them up. You can also use a credit line to manage external spending.
Breef currently has over 5,000 vetted boutique agents in 20 countries. It is able to offer 32% savings compared to traditional agencies. It has a large customer base that includes Spotify and Bluestone Lane, Shutterstock, Bluestone Lane, Kinrgy, Shutterstock, Bluestone Lane, Bluestone Lane, and Shutterstock.
Rackhouse Ventures founder Kevin Novak said that he met Raptis through Australia's tech community. Raptis launched his first fund to support startups using data in new applications.
Novak stated that Novak was intrigued when they spoke to me about their plans. I enjoy finding markets where the idea is well understood and accepted by all parties. Emily and George found a way to find advertising agencies by looking at the matching problem.
