Mayvenn Raises $10 Million From Andreessen Horowitz

Who would have thought that hair extensions were a profitable market? Not Andreessen Horowitz — initially.

It took the investment giant a lot of convincing by Mayvenn co-founder and CEO Diishan Imira, as well as trips to beauty salons in East and West Oakland, to get on board. Mayvenn, an online seller of hair extensions, just announced that it raised a $10 million series A round led by Andreessen Horowitz.

“Just explaining the market and getting people in Silicon Valley culturally to understand — that took a while,” said Imira.

Mayvenn enables hair stylists to sell natural hair extensions with a 30-day quality guarantee, directly to their clients, without the upfront costs and burdens of having inventory. All they need to do is refer the client to their own website and chose the style and length they desire. For each sale, the hair stylist’s salon makes 15 percent. On its website, the online seller says extra earnings can be much as $2,000 a month. This is a very convincing incentive for hair stylists, who are used to making on average $27,530 annually.

According to Forbes, more than 30,000 stylists have signed up with Mayvenn since its launch in 2011. “The next step is to fill out all the hair extension categories, and then go into other beauty, hair, and health products,” said Imira. “Beauticians alone are going to be an enormous opportunity.”

At the end of the day, it’s all about taking the friction out of the experience. And this is not the first time that beauty salons are the target of innovative thinking in this regard. Last year, MPD CEO Karen Webster discussed with Aurus’ Chief Strategy Officer Bob Wesley and Shortcuts’ Vice President of Operations Tony Phoenix their plan to deliver a successful omnichannel strategy in the salon and spa industry. Customers can book an appointment and pay with one touch of a finger.

“We introduced online booking a few years back for our customers, and we discovered that 70 percent of bookings are made after salon hours,” Phoenix said. “If you make it easy for the customer to transact, they’ll come back. People don’t want to have to pick up the phone or sit on hold to try to make an appointment when they can do it in half the time, digitally – even in the middle of the night, if they prefer.”

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