Canadian menswear designer Frank & Oak have concluded a $5m Series A round led by venture capital firm Lightbank with partcipation from Rho Ventures, previous backers Real Ventures and Bertelsmann Digital Media Investments, the corporate venturing arm of German media firm Bertelsmann.
Montreal based Frank & Oak, founded in February this year, operates a vertically integrated menswear fashion label, designing manufacturing and marketing their own line of clothing which are then sold online directly to customers.
Following the conclusion of this round Lightbank executive Vicki Levine will take up position on Frank and Oak’s board which already includes Real Ventures general partner Mark Macleod.
In a statement to the press Levine said: “With a menswear market of $112bn in North America and an increasing shift from traditional retail to vertically integrated e-commerce, Frank & Oak is well-positioned to change the shopping paradigm for the next generation of male shoppers.”
According Frank & Oak’s co-founder and Chief Executive Ethan Song, the company expects to ship 12,000 orders this month and is experiencing a sign up rate for its retail website of 60,000 users per month.