Grabble Closes $1.8M Angel Round For Its Tinder-like Fashion Shopping App

Various startups out there are trying to create either an Instagram or Tinder for fashion, ultimately leading the buyer towards a purchase. This is the Holy Grail and you will easily uncover a multitude of companies trying to achieve something along these lines, even though the approaches and business models vary. In Europe the main players are new-ish startups like ASAP 54 (a TechCrunch Battlefield alumni), Shopcade, Snap Fashion and longer-player Mallzee. Some take an inventory approach, pulling feeds from retailers, some take an algorithmic image identification approach like Snap Fashion. One of the newer players is Grabble, an iOS and Android app who’s Tinder-like interface has piqued the interest of users.

It’s now closed a £1.2 million ($1.8m) funding round from a number of Angels. Grabble is about “instant, shoppable fashion content that can be bought on the go, by users, in just a couple of swipes.” Retailers of any size can add their products into Grabble and users can checkout their purchases simply from within the app.

The Angels involved include:
• Alex Hoye, chairman of Skimlinks, co-founder Ski-company Faction (three web exits with one public listing)
• Darren Childs, CEO of UKTV, Ex MD of BBC Worldwide
• Marc Boyan, Founder and CEO of Miroma Ventures
• Guy Hipwell, Head of E Commerce at C&A, previously head of Ecomm at Liberty’s and Harrods
• Seamus Keating, Ex CFO of Logitech Worldwide
• Nishul Saperia, Founding Team of London startup ‘Markit’ which had a $1bn IPO
• Pablo Barclay, CEO and founder of Rubbersole.co.uk which exited to Spartoo
• A Silicon Valley-based angel fund
• Chris Conn, Co Founder & CTO Fusepump, sold to WPP in 2014
• Rob Durkin, Co Founder Fusepump, sold to WPP in 2014′

Co Founder and CMO Daniel Murray and Joel Freeman, Co Founder and CEO tell us the cash will be used to expand in the US and Asia. To do so they’ve hired the ex Global Head Stylist from Net a Porter Group, among others.