Online (and offline) invitations startup Paperless Post has become a modern-day greeting card company, enabling users to create custom cards to their events and send them to friends. TechCrunch has confirmed that, today, the startup has closed a $25 million Series C led by August Capital, with participation from existing investors.
That’s in addition to the $12 million that it’s raised since being founded in 2008, bringing the company’s total funding to $37.4 million. Previous investors include RRE Ventures, SV Angel, Draper Associates, Ram Shiram, and Mousse Partners.
Paperless Post launched in 2008 with a series of skeuomorphic online invitations that attempt to evoke the same emotions one might get from ripping open a real-life envelope and reading a real-life greeting card sent by real-life people.
With a healthy focus on design, the startup started out by providing a wide variety of virtual stationery and that online users could personalize and have delivered by email to their contacts. It also provided a way for those contacts to RSVP and for users to track who might (or might not) have opened the invitation, signed up, and decided to attend (or not).
While the company started out as a purely online way for users to send invitations and RSVP, it’s expanded to provide offline printing services, as well. A year-and-a-half ago, it launched a premium stationery offering called PAPER that allows users to have custom invitations printed out and emailed to their contacts.
Today, the company enjoys over 45 million users, doubling its user base for the second year in a row, and has sent over 100 million custom invitations and cards since launching. The company currently has 70 full-time employees in an office in downtown Manhattan.
Here’s what founder James Hirschfeld had to say about today’s raise:
Paperless Post lets you communicate beautifully, conveniently and privately about the social experiences you care about. Our goal is to become the new protocol for valued social communication, regardless of the medium you choose. We’ve always been a very capital efficient company with strong organic growth. Adding this cash to our balance sheet will help us realize this vision faster for a greater number of people in the US and abroad.
The funding will go toward accelerating the development process of the company’s mobile and online tools.