Tovala, the sensible oven and meal package service, heats up with $30M extra in funding – .

As more of us spend a lot of time at home due to Covid-19, our attention is increasingly focused on how and what we eat. Eating delicious, nutritious, and new things all the time can be a challenge even for those who enjoy cooking, but especially those who may not have the time or inclination to do so. Today one of the startups, which has seen its business pick up as a result, announced a round of funding to expand its business.

Tovala, the intelligent oven and meal set service, has completed a Series C worth $ 30 million. David Rabie, co-founder and CEO of the Chicago startup, told . that he plans to use much of the funds to open a second facility, most likely in Utah, to help distribute fresh food to the western half of the US. Other investments This includes improving customer service and bringing in more talent.

It’s also slowly starting to introduce more prepackaged meal and recipe options: Rabie said it’s working on a service with leading restaurants and chefs to create meals that can be sold and cooked in the Tovala oven.

“We believe the oven can bring us closer to the dining experience,” Rabie said. “By preparing food and not just warming it up, we can open up the reach for a local restaurant.”

The funding is being led by Left Lane Capital, which also includes Finistere Ventures, Comcast Ventures, OurCrowd, Origin Ventures, Pritzker Group Venture Capital and Joe Mansueto – all previous supporters.

Originally incubated at Y Combinator, Tovala has attracted other interesting investors into the company, including poultry giant Tyson. Notably, this is the startup’s second round of funding in six months after raising $ 20 million in a Series B last June.

As in this preliminary round, the evaluation will not be announced today. However, the company has hit some significant numbers, as evidenced by this funding, which suggests its value may rise.

Annualized sales have increased tenfold over the past 18 months (including pre-Covid-19 growth). The number of employees for the year has increased by 40%; The company has handed over 3 million meals shipped. and the company says its stoves are used an average of 32 times a month by their owners (a statistic it can keep track of because those devices are plugged in).

But the total number of users is still not known, Rabie said.

Tovala’s oven costs $ 299, but the company typically tees off $ 100 if you also commit to six of its $ 11.99 meals (that feed one person) over the next six months. Right now – possibly to take advantage of the wave of people rethinking after restaurants have closed and simply spending more time at home – Tovala is offering discounts of up to $ 130 and down to those who buy the oven with no meal commitment the furnace price to about $ 170.

In addition to the company’s own pre-made trays that you put in the oven and garnish once it’s finished (toppings are included), Tovala’s oven can also cook hundreds of pre-made dishes and meals that are sold in stores by scanning package barcodes . and recipes it develops and you can make yourself and program the oven to cook through the Tovala app. You can also use the Tovala just like you would use any top-mounted oven to roast, steam, bake and roast whatever you want independently of all that.

A plethora of food equipment and grocery delivery companies that allow you to order with the touch of a finger has changed the way many people think about food at home.

All of them are meant to make the process of eating more eager. With this wider range of options, Tovala has expanded its business in the hopes that it could cover a specific niche: people who want to eat fresh foods that they cook at home, but have no time or interest in placing those meals together – not even when they come with items pre-cut and measured by food kit companies.

That’s only one side of the deal, though: Tovala’s stoves, Rabie said, are a key part of the vertical integration the company has built, and even with the stories you might hear about how “hardware is heavy,” they are stay here as part of the sentence.

“We strive to provide high quality meals to people and the oven is our means to achieve that,” he said. “We’re both a tech and a food company, and at no point do I see us getting out of the oven business.”

However, the company is also expanding with partnerships with others who also manufacture stoves.

In particular, Tovala has signed a contract with LG to embed its software in LG ovens so that they can prepare Tovala’s meals and the other dishes that can be programmed using the app and the barcode scanning system. Rabie said the deal makes sense because the types of full-size LG ovens that run Tovala’s software are “not the type of product line we’re going to get into”.

It seems that LG is not an investor, and it is not clear when these new devices will be launched: the deal between the two was announced back in 2019.

However, this partnership is a sign of how the hardware companies that build connected appliances and services around them are working more closely with incumbents to take their next steps to scale.

In at least two cases, this has led to potential competitors being acquired: The grill giant Weber started up the startup for intelligent ovens in June (in which it had also previously invested). And in 2017, Electrolux acquired the sous vide startup Anova for 250 million US dollars.

Such an exit may or may not be on the menu for Tovala, but it is a signal of the options the startup has to move from starter to main course in the future.

For now, however, the key is to stay independent and grow. Rabie had told me that Left Lane’s interest was based on how Tovala was viewed as a “peloton” -like category definer for smartly preparing food at home, also because it could become part of a person’s daily habits and routines.

“By combining a meal subscription with a connected device, Tovala has been able to achieve a retention rate that is a step function that is better than anything else we’ve seen food delivery – similar in many ways to Peloton at a traditionally low value – Retention Fitness Industry, “said Jason Fiedler, co-founder and managing partner of Left Lane Capital, in a statement. “Our team has a proven track record of investing in category-defining consumer subscription businesses. We are excited about Tovala’s potential to be the next major food technology company.” With this round, Fiedler joins the board.

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