• Second Nature

  Participated · Series B · Jul 2017

  Second Nature began as FilterEasy, a D2C subscription service to help homeowners remember to change air filters and has expanded into partnerships with HVAC companies, real estate agents, utilities and commercial properties. Its core products are recurring air filters and a new water‑filtration line launching with refrigerator filters; the company is positioning itself as a broader “home wellness” brand. The business reports hundreds of thousands of customers and around 150 employees, roughly two‑thirds of whom work in fulfillment and distribution across warehouses in Ardmore, OK and Wilson, NC. In response to COVID‑19 it has retooled manufacturing to produce masks for hospitals, with materials on hand to make ~800,000 masks and capacity to produce up to 2 million per month as materials allow. The company says demand has generally risen even as some commercial channels were hurt, and it plans to use new funding to expand, hire and advance first‑party products in R&D with an emphasis on product/process improvements and environmental benefits. FilterEasy is a subscription-based HVAC air filter fulfillment service launched in 2014 and based in Raleigh. It uses a proprietary web-based platform to guarantee correct-size HVAC air filters are delivered to a customer's doorstep so they may be replaced on a regular cadence. The service addresses the common problem of consumers forgetting to change air filters and aims to simplify that task so filters are changed "on time, every time." Proper filter replacement is presented as improving indoor air quality and human health, and the company cites potential reductions in monthly heating and cooling expenses of 5%–15%. FilterEasy announced a $6.9 million Series B1 financing led by One Better Ventures and joined by Lead Edge Capital. The company says the funding will be used for product innovation and development, expanding warehouse and fulfillment capabilities, and accelerating growth. FilterEasy is a Raleigh, North Carolina-based company offering a subscription-based HVAC air filter fulfillment service via a proprietary web-based platform. Co-founded by Thad Tarkington and Kevin Barry, the company focuses on residential HVAC filter subscriptions and fulfillment. Its filters are manufactured in the United States by AAF Flanders, the nation’s largest residential HVAC filter manufacturer and a supplier to NASA and U.S. hospital systems. In July 2017 FilterEasy raised $6.9M in a Series B led by Arsenal Venture Partners. The round brought the company’s total funding to $11.4M. The business operates as a direct-to-consumer subscription fulfillment service for residential HVAC filters. FilterEasy operates a subscription-based air-filter replacement service for homeowners, letting customers pick filter size and quality and choose how often replacements ship. The site offers over 40 filter sizes and three quality levels, and pricing is the same as retail but sold on a recurring basis. The company partners and co-locates with U.S. manufacturer Flanders to ship filters directly to customers at store cost. Since launching out of beta in March 2014, FilterEasy has signed up over 10,000 paying subscribers and is running at a revenue run rate of more than $1 million per year. The team of 13 plans to use new funding to expand marketing and is beta-testing a commercial program for businesses such as gyms and restaurants. FilterEasy was founded by former NCSU students Kevin Barry and Thad Tarkington and is based in Raleigh, N.C.; the founders participated in The Iron Yard accelerator in Greenville.

• Perkville

  Participated · Series A · Oct 2014

  Perkville is a San Francisco, CA-based provider of a SaaS loyalty and retention platform that enables businesses to create customer rewards programs. Through integrations with point-of-sale systems, the platform automatically rewards customer visits, tracks referrals, and drives social media engagement. It is free for consumers and offers monthly subscriptions for businesses of all sizes. Led by CEO and co-founder Sunil Saha, the company plans to use new funding to grow in the fitness and gym vertical. Perkville also intends to accelerate expansion into retail, salons, spas and similar categories. The company closed a $2.4m Series A to support these growth initiatives. Perkville provides a SaaS loyalty platform designed to let local businesses quickly create customized loyalty programs. The platform is free for end users and is offered to businesses via monthly subscription plans. Led by CEO Sunil Saha, the company plans to use new capital to add sales and marketing team members and to enhance platform functionality. Perkville closed a nearly $500k seed round and has raised $1.2m in total to date. The company is focused on expanding its go-to-market capabilities and improving product features to better serve local-business customers. Perkville provides an email-based loyalty platform that replaces physical cards and apps by using customers' email addresses as virtual reward cards. Merchants configure point- or visit-based reward programs and award points at the POS or via an in-store tablet; customers track points online and can refer friends for rewards. The platform is free for merchants and monetizes by taking a 30% cut of profits from highly targeted perpetual or “winback” deals. Perkville integrates with POS providers such as Mindbody and supports iPad-based POS workflows to scale adoption among local merchants. At launch the company reports 200+ active U.S. merchants and 100K+ consumers on the platform, with roughly 25% of those consumers registered. A Charm City Yoga case study showed 21% adoption among 9,000 users, participants taking 70% more classes on average, 500 social postings, 100 tweets, 77 referrals that generated 340 additional classes, and 150 reactivated customers via winback campaigns. The founders, Sunil Saha and Eric Bollman, previously held product and UX roles at LinkedIn and Yahoo! and have been partnering with POS software providers to scale the business.

No current team members are available.