Grana is an online, own‑brand fashion retailer that sells exclusively through its website, operates an offline Hong Kong store and has run pop-up shops in four countries. The company sources fabric from Italy, Peru, China and elsewhere and offers about 3,000 SKUs across 90 styles and 10 fabrics for men and women. Grana ships to 12 countries, with the U.S. and Hong Kong as its largest markets (ahead of Australia and Singapore), and runs a single 18,000 square foot warehouse in Hong Kong where its 50-person team is based. The company avoids distributors and middlemen, ships direct to customers, and targets lower retail mark-ups (roughly 2–3x versus a typical 7–8x). Disclosed operating metrics include average growth of 15% month-on-month, single-digit return rates, and a flat collection fee for returns (US$10, SG$10 or HK$20). Planned product expansion includes sportswear, bags and accessories next year and shoes longer term, alongside geographic expansion including a planned China soft launch and greater U.S. focus. Grana designs wardrobe essentials in-house and sources fabrics directly from mills, offering items made from materials such as Peruvian Pima cotton, Mongolian cashmere, Chinese silk, Irish linen, Japanese denim and Italian merino. The company operates primarily online with a showroom-style "Fitting Room" footprint in cities including Sydney, Singapore, Hong Kong and San Francisco. Since its March 2014 beta (when it sold 2,000 Pima t-shirts in three weeks) Grana reports month-over-month sales increasing by 40% since its October 2014 launch. The U.S. market already represents 20% of Grana’s global sales, and the company has more than 40 employees in Hong Kong with recent hires in San Francisco. Future plans cited in the article include expanding shipping to new markets (including U.S. and China), launching new product categories such as leather goods, undergarments and activewear, opening additional Fitting Rooms and upgrading in-store technology. The brand emphasizes cutting traditional middlemen costs to deliver higher-quality fabrics at lower prices. GRANA sells wardrobe basics—T-shirts, tanks, jeans and other staples—made from premium fibers (pima cotton, cashmere, silk, Japanese denim) at low prices by working directly with mills and manufacturers. The company integrates logistics and its tech platform with DHL for global shipping and fulfillment, and operates an offline-to-online strategy with pop-up stores and plans for a permanent Hong Kong showroom. It launched initial inventory in April 2014 and now ships to eight countries, with most customers in Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia and the U.S. GRANA has about 27 employees across its warehouse and pop-up operations and says repeat shoppers accounted for roughly one-third of revenue in the referenced month. The startup plans to use its latest funding to triple its range of styles, expand online marketing into more countries, open more pop-up stores, launch a new site integrated with social networks, and significantly expand its catalogue by year-end. GRANA is an online-only fashion brand that sources fabrics directly from mills to cut out middlemen and ships from a new warehouse in Hong Kong where its team is based. Its initial product was Peruvian pima cotton t-shirts, and during a beta launch the company sold out 2,000 shirts at $14 each. GRANA has a logistics partnership with DHL to offer discounted next-day delivery to Australia and currently ships to eight countries, with plans to expand to over 20. The company plans to broaden its assortment to include Japanese denim, French poplin shirts, Mongolian cashmere sweaters, English Oxford shirts, Irish linen shirts and USA twill chinos. The founder relocated from Australia to Hong Kong to access global manufacturing and logistics and has hired a team of seven to help scale the brand. Financially, GRANA recently closed a $1.1 million seed financing round and the founder had previously invested about $150,000 from earlier ventures.

Total raised

$16M

Funding rounds

4

Latest round

Series A

Latest activity

Oct 2016