Cooking.com News
Cooking.com Secures $13 Million in Funding
SANTA MONICA, Calif., June 18 PRNewswire — Cooking.com, the leading online marketplace for cooks, today announced that it has closed a $13 million round in venture capital from lead investor Azure Capital Partners and venture debt from ORIX Venture Finance. Azure Partner Michael Kwatinetz has joined the Cooking.com board of directors.
The funds raised will be deployed toward supporting the company's expanded business operations, opening a second distribution facility in Ohio to provide more efficient customer shipping and service, augmenting editorial content and expanding the community and social networking capabilities on Cooking.com's sites, and deepening the network of 'powered by Cooking.com' partner sites.
In addition to its own site, Cooking.com also powers top Web sites including StarbucksStore.com, PillsburyStore.com, BettyCrockerStore.com and FoodNetworkStore.com, and has forged marketing relationships with many leaders in the industry, including Starbucks, General Mills, Food Network, Rachael Ray, Kraft and Gourmet Catalog.
"We are excited to have new investment partners and funding, which will allow us to enrich the Cooking.com experience and brand, and also further our goal to increasingly become a driving e-commerce force for some of the world's most visited culinary sites," said Tracy Randall, founder and CEO of Cooking.com. "Our new relationship with Azure Capital Partners has already generated compelling ideas and we look forward to leveraging their know-how and industry relationships as we expand and enhance our technology, site offerings, and editorial content."
"We view Cooking.com as a standout success in the world of e-commerce, and have the utmost respect for how much Tracy and her team have been able to accomplish," said Mike Kwatinetz, General Partner at Azure Capital Partners. "I am excited by the opportunity to work with such a dynamic team and to help further position Cooking.com as not only one of the web's top destinations, but also as the power behind other strong online brands."
About Cooking.com
Cooking.com was founded in 1998 and is based in Santa Monica, CA. As the leading online marketplace for cooks, Cooking.com operates five uniquely branded websites: Cooking.com, FoodNetworkStore.com, StarbucksStore.com, PillsburyStore.com, and BettyCrockerStore.com. Cooking.com offers its customers over 90,000 products for the kitchen as well as recipes, menus, articles and a growing library of user-generated cooking content and online tools. Cooking.com is committed to providing customers with an exceptional experience and was the recipient of the 2006 i.Merchant Gold award for overall excellence as an online retailer. Its investors include Azure Capital Partners, Idealab, Clearstone Venture Partners, Starbucks Corp. and ORIX Venture Finance.
About Azure Capital Partners
Azure Capital Partners is a venture capital firm with over $650 million under management, headquartered in San Francisco, California. The firm's goals are to identify, invest in and help build early stage information technology companies that are at the forefront of a transformative opportunity for growth. Azure's partners have a long track record of identifying and helping to build some of the most successful companies in communications, consumer, enterprise and Internet technology segments. The team's proven methodology and primary research enable Azure to identify companies in attractive markets whose business models provide sustainable competitive advantage. For more information, visit http://www.azurecap.com.
SOURCE Cooking.com
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