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21Buttons, a social-commerce app dedicated to fashion, closes $10M Series A

By Steve O’Hear From TechCrunch

21Buttons, a social-commerce app that lets fashion influencers share their wardrobe, has closed $10 million in Series A funding. The round is co-led by Kibo Ventures, and JME VC, and existing investors Samaipata Ventures, Breega Capital, 360 Capital Partners, Banc Sabadell Venture Capital, Sputnik, and Mediaset.

The Barcelona-based startup says the new capital will be used grow its user base in the U.K., where it recently launched in addition to Spain and Italy, and for further international expansion.

Founded in in 2015 by Marc Soler and Jaime Farres — former consultants at Mckinsey (surprise, surprise!) — the 21Buttons app resembles something akin to Instagram and Pinterest combined but designed for social-commerce from the get-go rather than adding a buy button much later.

It lets you create a profile and then photograph or bookmark items of clothing that you own or intend on purchasing and share them with friends and followers. Each item has a buy button and if there are partnerships in place or the necessary affiliate scheme, 21Buttons generates revenue for any clicks that lead to a sale and shares it with the influencer who generated the lead.

“Users become influencers themselves, and the platform remunerates those who generate quality UGC,” says 21Buttons. “Most top fashion influencers in their geographies are already using 21Buttons to share their looks with their audience”.

More broadly, 21Buttons is looking to tap into the wider influencer marketing trend that is seeing social networks build on top of their ‘shopability’ potential. Instagram hasadded its own buy button, and Pinterest has developed a ‘Shop-The-Look’ tool and Visual Search Engine. Amazon has also launched its own compare an outfit feature and a beta program for influencers.

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