Investors are delivering $3.3 million to meal-kit service Fresh Prep.
The Vancouver-based company announced December 6 the financing round would help it upgrade its technology, hire additional workers and improve its facility.
The meal delivery service is offered through an online platform, with promises of meals prepped with pre-chopped ingredients that can be cooked at home within 30 minutes.
Co-founder Dhruv Sood tells Business in Vancouver Fresh Prep will be using some of the investment dollars to expand beyond the Lower Mainland and Victoria.
“Nothing is finalized so far but we’re … looking at Alberta as our next stop,” he said.
“And everything from here [Vancouver] to Alberta, based on what makes sense.”
Fresh Prep launched in 2015 and has since expanded from three full-time employees serving 100 customers to more than 150 workers and 20,000 customers.
To date, the company has delivered more than 1 million meals over the past three years.
Customers place orders on the company’s online platform by midnight on Thursdays for meals the following week.
Deliveries begin Sunday evenings, while the company offers customers a delivery window and updates them on the progress via text.
Sood said most people order two to three meals a week, paying $9-11 per meal.
He added Fresh Prep will use the investment to improve both its customer-facing platform as well as its own behind-the-scenes technology.
“Internally, this is a very complex logistics-based business, and so we need a lot of technology to help us do what we do, which is switch our menu every single week,” Sood said.
“It takes a lot to do it at high volumes.”
Fresh Prep originally operated out of a 750-square-foot storefront and has since expanded into a 35,000-sqaure-foot facility in east Vancouver.
First West Capital and private investors led the round through a mix of equity and debt financing.
