By Jason Kong, Eric Liaw and Jules Maltz
Today we are honored to congratulate the fashionable and amazing team at Lulus on a successful IPO. This marks the 129th IPO for IVP and 14th in 2021.
Lulus is a widely popular women’s brand because it is extremely customer-driven and digitally native. Lulus offers its customers affordable luxury fashion through curated, exclusive products, great customer service and a highly personalized shopping experience.
Surprising and Delighting Millions of Customers
In April 2018, IVP led Lulus’ $120 million Series A, the company’s first outside fundraising since H.I.G. Growth’s majority investment in 2014. At the time, Lulus was — and remains — at the center of two key e-commerce trends that are very exciting to IVP: the rise of digitally-native brands and data-driven merchandising and design. Lulus has capitalized on those trends and transformed its humble beginnings as a vintage clothing store founded in Chico, CA in 1996 into a beloved brand powering a company driving nine-figures in revenue and equally impressively, significant profitability.
By primarily focusing on selling their own branded products, Lulus has become one of the best online shopping experiences for millennial and Gen Z women today. Lulus has earned 7.5 million followers on social media who interact one on one with personal style advisors, fit experts and even a bridal concierge. Customer growth by word of mouth is also off the charts. Today, Lulus has 2.5 million active and loyal customers — 94% of its reorder products are sold without moving to sale pricing and 65% of its sales are from repeat customers. It is no wonder why so many millennial and GenZ women simply “#lovelulus!”.
Staying Connected to and Supporting Its Customers
Although the company was impacted by the pandemic in 2020, Lulus benefited from its strong following and online presence; 58% of Gen Z consumers say they are online almost constantly which is where Lulus operates as a digitally-native brand. Lulus goes beyond customer experiences and social presence — it also actively supports its demographic, having created an endowment to foster higher education and empower women in all aspects of life back as far as 2013.
The Next Chapter — A Public Company!
From its humble beginnings, Lulus has now joined the ranks of a small number of digitally-native brands able to take the step of making a public market debut, listing on the Nasdaq Global Market under the symbol “LVLU”! All of us at IVP congratulate and are proud to be partners with the entire Lulus team!
The comments expressed above are not a statement on Lulus’ behalf.
Jason Kong, Eric Liaw and Jules Maltz are investors at IVP, a later-stage venture capital firm.
Originally published at https://www.ivp.com on November 11, 2021.
