CONFIDENTIAL – DO NOT SHARE | Company: Wander (wander.com)
One Liner: vertically integrating the travel industry at scale: creating a radically better experience for travelers and a dramatically more profitable, defensible business for investors.
Terms:
Series A (extension) – raising $10M on a $116M post-money cap, <$1M is left
This extension takes the company through to profitability (1Q24)
Investors in this round include include QED (Klarna, NUBank, SoFi, etc.), Redpoint Ventures (Twilio, Stripe, Snowflake, etc.), Authentic Ventures, Fifthwall, Kevin Durant and Rich Kleiman's Thirty Five Ventures, Packy McCormick (Not Boring Capital), Sahil Bloom, Alumni Ventures, Jake Paul and Geoffrey Woo’s Anti Fund and others.
Note upfront - I previously turned down an angel investment opportunity into Wander, probably for the same reason you’re close to ruling out this as a VC-outcome potential investment - “it won’t scale”... I consider myself very fortunate to have another opportunity to invest today (alongside Jolt LPs), as back then I didn’t foresee the hugely disruptive, business-model defining innovation that Wander recently launched (more on that later..).
Overview: Wander is a vertically integrated short-term rental company disrupting Airbnb through a highly-differentiated, vertically integrated business model and brand. The company acquires, fully equips, and rents out architecturally stunning vacation properties in unique locations. By owning the end-to-end value-chain - acquisition, design and renovation, booking, and property management - Wander has greater control of delivering the highest quality guest experience.
As a result, Wander boasts market leading customer satisfaction scores, occupancy rates and financial metrics across its portfolio. Key takeaways:
Company is only 2 years old, at ~$5M annualized run-rate today
Led by a Thiel Fellow and second-time founder
17 properties today, 15 launched, (~$30M of balance sheet property value), growing to 50 by YE24
Targeting profitability by 1Q24
Remarkable trajectory - flywheel being borne out - exceeded June occupancy target by 6%, July target by 26%, and August target by 147%
Recently secured $100M Credit Facility from CS/UBS
93% customer satisfaction
The last bullet is important. Customers love Wander. People are starting to see (and look for) the Wander brand in the same way people look for their favorite hotel brands (dynamic of customers loving the Ritz Carlton for hotels is happening with Wander and vacation rentals). Customers love the consistency, and quality promise in that same way. With vacation rentals being such a massive market, the opportunity on the consumer side is huge and the logical next step in the space.