Online retailer Warby Parker has raised a $75 million funding round led by asset management firm T. Rowe Price, the eyeglasses retailer told Internet Retailer.
Warby Parker has raised $290 million to date. New York-based Warby Parker also announced that as of today, the retailer is profitable. 2018 will be the first full year that Warby Parker will be profitable, a spokeswoman says.
The retailer will use the new funds for research and development and technology that will,“help the company better serve customers and continue to transform the optical industry in the years to come,” says a spokeswoman without revealing more details.
The retailer also announced that Youngme Moon, a Donald K. David professor of business administration at Harvard Business School, is joining Warby Parker’s board of directors. Moon is a specialist in innovation and brand strategy, with a focus on millennials and the digital economy.
Warby Parker, which launched in 2010 under parent company JAND Inc., is No. 189 in the Internet Retailer 2017 Top 500. The retailer started as a web-only brand and now has 65 physical stores, and more than 1,400 employees. The retailer features designer-style prescription glasses starting at $95. The retailer also has a charitable program and has donated millions of glasses globally.
Dave Gilboa, Warby Parker’s co-founder and co-CEO, is a keynote speaker at the annual IRCE 2018 conference in June.