Exclusive: Outdoor Voices founder Ty Haney raises $11 million for her second startup
– Loyalty program. Outdoor Voices founder Ty Haney launched her second startup, Try Your Best (or TYB), more than three years ago. It was peak Web3, a space that Haney became highly interested in after she left the athletic apparel retailer that, in some ways, defined 2010s startups.
Today, Haney is still building TYB, with 38 employees—and it’s outlasted the rise and fall of blockchain/crypto/NFT-mania. The platform is intended to be a layer of loyalty infrastructure for consumer brands, what Haney calls “community commerce.” Two hundred brands use the platform, as do 2 million users—mostly Gen Z women.
Haney just raised an $11 million Series A for TYB, Fortune is the first to report. The round was co-led by Offline Ventures and Strobe Ventures, with participation from Coinbase Ventures, Castle Island Ventures, and Unusual Ventures. This brings its total capital to $23.5 million.
Talking to Haney about TYB, you can feel her excitement. Years after the drama that engulfed Outdoor Voices, which included board battles and Haney’s exit and return, she’s thrilled to be at step one again. “I love this stage. I love building something from zero,” she says.
The brands that use TYB include several of the buzziest brands from the beauty industry—like Glossier, Rare Beauty, and Saie. “Beauty as a category has popped off significantly for us,” Haney says. “[Beauty] consumers are already creating so much content and participating in rituals around the brands.” There’s also Poppi, Urban Outfitters, Set Active. Coming soon to the platform are Crocs and Away.
Consumers on TYB participate in gamified challenges, earn collectibles, and have blockchain-enabled loyalty profiles that can potentially follow them from brand to brand. A TYB-using customer has 40% higher frequency of purchase and a 28% higher lifetime value, Haney says. Monthly engagement rates for brands crack 40%. Haney tells brands that TYB can drive 5% to 10% of revenue—”in a more profitable fashion than putting all your dollars against Instagram or Facebook.”
TYB is developing “affinity webs” that can map a user’s loyalty to one brand and apply it to another. “Within the Glossier community where I’m level three—can that mean something to Nike?” Haney explains.
She’s brought some lessons with her from Outdoor Voices and the tens of millions it raised. “I’ve become a lot more sophisticated, or precise, in terms of who I who I raise money from, how much money I raise, and ultimately considerate of ownership and as little dilution as possible,” she says.
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
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