Venga, a Washington, D.C.-based customer management system for restaurants, closed a $1m Series A round.
The round was led by Militello Capital, with participation from:
– Think Food Group (Jose Andres’ restaurant group),
– Big Red Ventures (Cornell University’s venture fund),
– Bill and Pat Anton (founders of Anton Airfood),
– Philip Cummins (partner, Innovative Dining Group),
– Gus DiMillo (owner, Passion Food Hospitality),
– Brad Zions (co-founder, Lemonade Restaurants),
– Alicia Aloe (founder, RezSource),
– Jodie McLean (President and Chief Investment Officer, EDENS), and
– other angels.
The company, which has raised a total of $1.65m, intends to use the funds to to scale their sales team and develop a CRM product for the casual dining market.
Founded in 2010, Venga provides patent-pending technology that automatically links restaurants’ point of sale systems and reservation systems (such as OpenTable®) to connect purchases to the individual guests who made them to build profiles on individual guests’ habits and preferences.
Restaurants use this information to increase visit frequency, customer satisfaction, and spending through targeted email campaigns and personalized service.
The product has been adopted by Michael Mina, Michael White, Richard Sandoval, Fig & Olive, and EMM Group, among others.
FinSMEs
15/01/2014