Dear BookBub Partners,
Today I have an exciting milestone to share with you. We recently closed $7 million in new equity and debt financing for BookBub. Now we have even more resources to pursue our two core goals — to make it easier for readers to discover great books, and to help authors and publishers reach avid readers.
I’m happy to report that the new equity funding comes from the same investors in last year’s $3.8 million round of financing. It’s a group of people that I’ve known and trusted for more than 15 years, and who share our company vision. We’ve all been excited with the progress and feedback on our new initiatives, and decided to take additional capital to accelerate expansion.
A lot has happened since we announced funding last year. We grew to more than 5 million members. We expanded internationally, building localization for the UK, Canada, and India. We added eight new categories to target for Featured Deals. We launched Author Follows, a new service that hundreds of thousands of our members have started using to connect with authors.
As a result of these improvements to our service, our partners now sell millions of ebooks each month and continually make bestseller lists due to their promotions with BookBub. And because of the successes we’ve seen since raising our last round of funding, we were fortunate enough to be named the Hottest Seed Startup by the New England Venture Capital Association last week.
The funding we’re announcing today will not change our vision or strategy. We believe we’re in the midst of a massive shift in reader behavior. Today about half of U.S. book purchases happen online while half of U.S. adults own a tablet or ereader. As their habits change, readers need new ways to discover books, and authors and publishers like you need new to ways to reach them. BookBub added more than 20 employees last year to address these needs. With this new capital we plan to grow the team further so we can innovate and build new ways to serve you and our readers even better.
Finally, as we get ready to begin BookBub’s next chapter, I want to thank you. Thank you for your support, your feedback, and your business. This is an exciting time for our industry and our craft, and we’re thrilled to be working with you.
We’re just getting started!
Josh Schanker
