UK-based Black-owned haircare enterprise Afrocenchix secured $1.2 million in seed funding from Google.
WHO: Rachel Twumasi-Corson and Joycelyn Mate met at college and suffered from alopecia, hair breakage, eczema, and low confidence, so determined to make their very own pure merchandise free from toxins, honest commerce, and vegan. Founded in 2010, Afrocenchix gives a spread of haircare merchandise focusing on afro, coily, and curly hair. The merchandise are offered in 27 nations with 70% of their gross sales coming from word-of-mouth suggestions.
WHY: The enterprise will use the funds to launch three new merchandise and develop their group.
IN THEIR OWN WORDS: Co-founder Rachael Twumasi-Corson instructed UCL News, “After years of scuffling with our personal hair associated issues and the challenges of bootstrapping, we”re delighted to shut this spherical with a lot assist from Google, our buyers and our clients, with a few of our angel buyers coming straight from the Afrocenchix neighborhood. This spherical is the subsequent step in direction of establishing Afrocenchix because the primary model for afro and curly hair, so we can provide our clients and neighborhood the protected, efficient merchandise they want for optimum well being and wellbeing. When we registered the corporate in 2010, we would not have dreamt {that a} tech large like Google would know who we have been or care sufficient about our mission to again us.”
Marta Krupinska, Head of Google for Startups UK, mentioned, “Everyone talks about founder-market match and I do not assume there’s a greater instance than two buddies seeing an issue, learning it, constructing a enterprise for individuals like them and profitable the market because of their impeccable consideration to element, dedication to high quality and a loyal, tight knit neighborhood of consumers. We’ve been so impressed by Rachael and Joycelyn’s imaginative and prescient to make a profitable data-driven enterprise whereas delivering a lot wanted protected and responsibly made haircare merchandise that everybody deserves, and we’re excited to see their enterprise develop additional.”
DETAILS:
Afrocenchix closed a $1.2 million seed spherical of funding backed by Google for a complete of $1.3 million in funding, in line with Crunchbase. Additional buyers included Backstage Capital, Community Growth Ventures, Cornerstone Ventures, and Impact X Capital Partners.
In 2018 the model gained a WeWork Creator Award and acquired $350,000 of funding at a regional competitors in London.
https://beautymatter.com/articles/afrocenchix-secures-1-2-million-in-seed-funding
