Pod Foods is keeping grocery shelves full of emerging food brands that consumers are asking for and announced today $10 million in Series A funding to continue developing its digital wholesale business-to-business marketplace.
We profiled the Austin-based company's founders in February of last year, when they raised $3 million in a round led by Moment Venture. The company's technology offers a data-driven approach to streamlining the retailer procurement process with brands while connecting consumers to a wider variety of products, including those from up-and-coming brands.
Pod Foods launched in Chicago, New York and Los Angeles and also launched a mobile app for easy inventory management to match the right products to the right retailers.
The global Pandemic hit. Emerging brands were displaced from the shelves in favor of established brands, as the company tried to keep store shelves stocked. The company created brand awareness.
Russell said that the things they set out to change were amplified by that. We took 2020 to work on the business as a result of the Pandemic.
Pod Foods gets funding to change grocery distribution.
M12 and Moment Venture returned for the Series A, which gave the company $13 million in total funding. Other investors in the round include Unshackled, Barrel, Relish Works, X Factor, XRC Labs, K2 Global and Graphene.
Russell said the latest investment is in line with Pod Foods growth trajectory. The company will expand to 10 cities as it sees a 20% increase in repeat brand purchases compared to pre-pandemic data.
The Series A allowed the company to hire 58 employees, up from 33 in December. Pod Foods secured a chief technology officer, Timothy Wee, who has a background from companies like Amazon and Walmart, and will invest in data to build out new services and products.
Delivery services have grown rapidly over the past two years due to consumer expectations of getting items delivered faster. Pod Foods has seen its revenue and customer base triple year-over-year since the beginning of the year, while helping retailers adapt faster to resetting products based on what sells and what doesn't, Russell said.
Lee said that they had to adapt. Grab-and-go products used to be the most popular, but when the Pandemic hit, they were replaced by frozen items and beverages. We have to pivot quickly, but because we are small and quick, we can say what they want and keep retailers stocked.
Pod Foods is from Blank Space Studio.
Pod Foods plans to expand into the Pacific Northwest, New York and Chicago, as well as Florida.
Pod Foods is the first to provide the logistics infrastructure needed to completely transform the grocery supply chain for the better, creating a true end-to-end system that enables both retailers and brands to thrive, according to Christian Gammill, partner at Industrious Venture.
The company put digital at the forefront, built a data-intelligent operation and is now using an impending inflection point. He said that if Pod Foods can get the data play right, it will help customers and brands.
The skill set of Larissa andFiona is compatible. I didn't see a lot of attention on this space, but a ton in other supply chains, so it made sense and why we dug in.
Who is building the grocery store of the future?
