Online-ordering startup ChowNow gains $10M, 2 new execs

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Online-ordering and restaurant-marketing startup ChowNow has closed a $10 million financing round, according to a company statement. The company, which offers restaurants a platform through which customers can place orders, plans to direct the funds toward new hires and a new suite of products.

Currently serving restaurants throughout the U.S. and Canada, ChowNow, which debuted in 2012, incorporates ordering capability into restaurants’ websites and Facebook pages and creates custom iOS- and Android-compatible mobile ordering apps for $99 a month. The startup also provides an in-house marketing agency for restaurants.

Accompanying the funding are a number of new hires, including Nick Kellermeyer, former vice president of sales at GrubHub; Arpan Jhaveri, former vice president of product and marketing at Yodle; and Emily Neudorf, former product and content marketing manager at Groupon. ChowNow CEO and co-founder Chris Webb said the company has hired over 30 employees since closing the round, bringing the total to approximately 65. The company's hiring efforts have primarily focused on sales growth.

"The bulk of this funding will be spent on expanding our sales and marketing teams," said CEO and co-founder Chris Webb. "Since closing the round we hired Nick Kellermeyer...to lead our sales team. Since joining, Nick has grown our team from five to 25 reps. In addition to our sales team, we have also earmarked part of the funding for product development. Expect to hear more on that in the coming months."

Following two recent partnerships — an Apple Pay integration, which positioned the startup as the first online-ordering service to offer the mobile pay option, and a deal allowing clients to take orders directly from their Yelp pages — ChowNow plans to continue launching cross-platform capabilities, as well as a new catering option and “ slew of new products and features,” Webb said.

“We’re on track to process $100M+ in orders this year, up from $25M in 2014,” said Jhaveri in a statement. “The team is working tirelessly to build and deliver a product suite...It’s going to be a big year ahead.”

Upfront Ventures led the round, with additional participation from Steadfast Venture Capital, Daher Capital, and Karlin Ventures.

ChowNow last surfaced in news reports with a $3 million extension of its Series A round. Since then, the company's client base has grown to approximately 2,000 restaurants throughout 45 states, Webb said.

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