Raised $3.5 Million!Startup Chums Focuses On Social Shopping

Chums, which focuses on social shopping, announced it raised $3.5 million ahead of YC Demo Day, TechCrunch reports.

Chums is a startup that provides a social shopping service that allows users to focus on the types of products they might want to buy and recommend items to each other that might meet their friends' needs. Users earn commissions by recommending products, and Chums takes a cut of the commission.

Noah Elion, one of the founders of Chums, mentioned that his company raised $1 million in December, after which the startup's stock generated a lot of interest, so Chums next raised more than its $150 goal. $1 million. That said, Chums has raised a total of $3.5 million in two pre-seed rounds.

Elion said the $1.5 million goal is based on the amount of capital his company will need over the next 18 months. The final funding raised came from Ludlow, Shrug, Contrary Capital and Fuel Capital, as well as other companies and individuals.

However, as Elion said, the app was launched 3 weeks ago. When asked about the early traction, Elion said that while the team has seen "encouraging" participation levels, it's too early to say too much.

Currently, the startup consists of four people. Elion and Dick Fickling (early engineers at Honey) built Charms' predecessor, Chums Referral, on a team that also included Lauren Williams (Director of Engineering) and Lena Gasilina (Product), former colleagues of Fickling's.

After that, the team plans to hire a designer and front-end developer, and plans to keep the team of six until the next round of funding.

When it comes to the development of Chums, Elion believes that Google’s search is too gamified, while Amazon is suitable for users who know exactly what products they are looking for. According to Elion, people like shopping malls because of their diverse content and space for spontaneous shopping. Chums may be able to meet this need of users and create a niche market.

As a start-up company focusing on social shopping, let us wait and see what kind of development Chums will achieve in the future.