Catering tech startup HUNGRY just closed a $10M Series C1

With eyes on profitability, catering startup HUNGRY just closed a huge Series C round.

The Rosslyn, Virginia startup, which connects chefs with catering clients in an online marketplace, closed the Series C1 round at $10 million. According to leadership, it will be the company’s final raise before anticipated profitability. Robert Hisaoka, chairman and CEO of RGH Capital, led the round.

Investors in the round include athletes Anfernee Simons, Bobby Wagner, Roquon Smith and Laremy Tunsil; existing investors Sands Capital Ventures, Motley Fool Ventures, Evolutions VC Partners and GP Ventures; Dan Simons and Eric Kessler, along with chefs Tom Colicchio (of “Top Chef” fame) and Ming Tsai. This latest round boosts the company’s valuation to $270 million; previous investors include celebrities like Kevin Hart, Usher and Ndamukong Suh, as well as Stonewall Robb Investments, Studio Management, Bread and Butter Ventures, Ames Watson and Jay-Z’s Marcy Venture Partners.

“[This raise] means that we get to, essentially, just focus on growing the business versus fundraising,” founder and COO Eman Pahlavani told Technical.ly. “We can focus on our core, which is office catering, as we start to continue to grow into these new markets.”

With the funds, HUNGRY said it would be continuing growth plans with the goal of operational profitability, which it hopes to achieve by the end of the year. Since pre-pandemic, the company has grown from five markets to a presence in 13 cities. It also acquired the snacks brand NatureBox.

Credited with this growth, Pahlavani said, is the return-to-office movement that has improved margins, product additions and geographic expansions. HUNGRY plans to be in 16 to 20 markets as of next year; following this, Pahlavani is hopeful that the company can go public in the year or so afterward.

“As more cities start to have a bigger and bigger return to office presence, we’re going there early, establishing relationships with companies that are looking to incentivize their employees with food — and then we connect them with all of the incredible chefs that are in their city,” Pahlavani said. “We create that opportunity for the chefs to be able to do business with corporate offices.”

This round follows a successful Series C for the company in 2021 when it raised $21 million. Pahlavani put the company’s valuation at “well over $200 million” following that round. At the time, he was hoping to grow the team to 100 employees by the end of 2021; he has since boosted the staff headcount to 175.

Even with the tight economic environment, Pahlavani still sees companies adding these options for return-to-office initiatives and, likely, incentives for employee retention. The startup counts Carta, Tesla, TicTok, BCG and Cisco among its clients.

“Although many companies across the country are coming back to work in a hybrid fashion, there are more companies that are ordering food as an incentive for employees to come back than ever before,” Pahlavani said. “So our client base is growing rapidly. It’s just diversified completely over the past year, year and a half.”

In addition to its catering connections, Pahlavani said the company continues to offer meals to people in need through its Fighting Hunger program. For every two meals a client purchases, one is donated.