Raising Winnie
In January 2016, Anne Halsall and I got together with a goal: build technology that makes life easier for parents.
When we became mothers, we learned firsthand that caring for children is a job — one that too often falls to women, and too often considered invisible and inconsequential. Very few tools exist to help people do this job better. It was almost beyond belief to us that the tech community had yet to notice this opportunity, let alone seize it.
We founded Winnie to elevate the next generation of parents with well-designed, thoughtful tools, more direct access to information, and a platform for sharing their knowledge with one another. Most importantly, we wanted to do this at a hyperlocal level, so we can help parents connect with their communities and build the real-life networks they need.
9 months have passed and today our growing community of parents spans over 100 cities. Our database of curated and crowdsourced information contains over 1 million locations. And we have reached another exciting — and historic — milestone.
We’re proud to announce that we’ve raised over $2.25M in seed funding from an incredible group of investors including Homebrew, BBG Ventures, Ludlow Ventures, Flight Ventures, Deep Fork Capital, KPCB, and #Angels.
Raising money in the parenting space comes with a unique set of challenges. Parents are a very large and valuable consumer segment, yet many investors still do not take this market seriously. Some ask whether parents really need new technologies — after all, they have survived this long without them. We found we had to pitch more than just our company. We had to pitch the idea that raising children is real work, and that the people doing this work need and value great tools.
Of course, this bias is an opportunity in itself — one that smart investors are starting to see. As one of the first tech companies to address the rapidly growing market of millennial parents, Winnie is uniquely poised to become an essential tool and enduring brand for modern families.
We are proud to go on this journey with such an esteemed group of supporters who believe in our vision and our team. But what matters most is that parents are using Winnie and telling us it makes a difference in their lives. This is what motivates us to build something great.
As parents, we know very well that the real work begins 9 months after conception. Well folks, it’s been 9 months since Anne and I conceived of this idea. We just raised money, but now it’s time to raise Winnie.
