Secretsales.com has raised £4.5m in investment that it plans to spend on improving its customer acquisition and retention, as well as boosting its technology and infrastructure.
The third-round funding comes from Partech Ventures through its new Partech VI fund, French private equity business 123Venture, existing investors Pentech and Doughty Hanson as well as the business’ co-founders and key managers.
It comes soon after the fashion flash sales business notched up net sales growth of 70% in 2013, as it turned over £27.4m. It now has 3.2m registered members and sells 650 brands. Some 29% of total sales are made over smartphones and 26% from tablet devices. In the last 30 days, it saw 3.5m visitors, of which 69% came via mobile devices.
Nish Kukadia, Secretsales.com chief executive, said: “We are delighted to welcome Partech VI and 123Venture as new investors and are pleased that our existing shareholders continue to demonstrate their support and commitment through their participation in this latest funding round. We are really excited to now focus on the next stage of our ambitious growth plans for secretsales.com.”
Philippe Collombel, managing partner of Partech Ventures, said: “Globally, the flash sales market has undergone a revolution where the stronger, data-driven businesses are starting to successfully emerge. We have been consistently impressed by secretsales.com’s performance and see an opportunity to grow a stand-out British business in this space.”
In December 2013, Notting Hill-based secretsales.com was named as one of the Future Fifty most exciting high-growth digital businesses, as nominated by Downing Street and TechCityUK.
It was founded in 2007 and is managed by founding partners Nish Kukadia and his brother Sach, who is buying director.
