Foxtrot Market closes $42M funding round, adds execs
A company looking to reinvent the convenience store and café has raised $42 million from investors. Chicago-based Foxtrot Market recently announced the funding, led by David Barber’s Almanac Insights and Monogram Capital Partners. Other well-known backers of Foxtrot Market include Momofuku co-founder David Chang, sweetgreen co-founder Nicolas Jammet and Whole Foods CEO Walter Robb.
"With this new round of funding and an incredibly strong executive team now fully in place, we see 2021 as a year of tremendous growth for Foxtrot," said CEO and co-founder Mike LaVitola. "We have built a business that marries the local approach of a corner store with the convenience of e-commerce. We know how our stores operate best and in which markets, which is where we'll be going deep with our expansion efforts next. We also look forward to showcasing to customers coast-to-coast what Foxtrot is all about as we continue to rollout shipping nationwide."
The company said that the investment will help double its store count by the end of the year, including as many as nine stores in their existing footprint in Chicago and Dallas, as well as stores in new markets. The money also will help Foxtrot develop its private label packaged goods and gifts lineup, as well as support its build-out of its e-commerce capabilities and nationwide shipping on its exclusive and private label products.
Along with the funding, Foxtrot also is growing its c-suite. The company has added Sumi Ghosh as COO, Scott Holloway as senior vice president of delivery and Caroline Barry as vice president of strategy. They join the company from leadership roles at Starbucks, Instacart and sweetgreen, respectively, and Foxtrot said they will be central to its growth.
"Foxtrot has mastered giving their customers a seamless and convenient shopping experience — using innovation to meet guests where they are, when they want," Barber said. "Foxtrot's commitment to building a sense of community in every market they enter by creating a space for both members of that neighborhood and local makers to test products and grow distribution is admirable. We're proud to lead this latest investment round and be part of helping Foxtrot reimagine the future of the neighborhood corner store."
Foxtrot launched in 2014, offering a combination of an upscale corner store and café with app=based shopping that makes its entire inventory available for delivery in under an hour. Executives said the company saw sales more than double in 2020, with 55% of that growth coming from same-store sales and more than 200 percent growth in its e-commerce sales, including a doubling of its app downloads.
"Foxtrot is leading the way in the long-overdue re-platforming of the convenience channel, creating an environment that is both a third place for meetings and community engagement and an incredibly easy on-demand convenience offering across both physical retail and omnichannel delivery,” said Jared Stein, co-founder and partner of Monogram. “The company was built for where the consumer is moving in terms of providing a small format store for all of a customer's essentials, and a few bonus items that you can't find anywhere else, elevating the curation with its own best-in-class proprietary offerings."
The company offers grocery staples as well as a full-service café, a selection of wines curated by sommelier and unique gift bundles.
Additional investors in Foxtrot's Series B round include Imaginary Ventures, Wittington Ventures, Fifth Wall, Lerer Hippeau, Revolution's Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, M3 Ventures, The University of Chicago, Collaborative Fund, Wasson Enterprise, Bluestein Ventures, and Barshop Ventures.