Casper Sleep (also known as Casper) is an

e-commerce E-commerce (electronic commerce) is the activity of electronically buying or selling of products on online services or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies such as mobile commerce, electronic funds transfer, supply chain mana ...

company that sells sleep products online and in retail locations. Headquartered in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

, the company has showrooms in New York City,

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...

, and elsewhere. Its mattresses are manufactured in

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to t ...

and

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; (Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, Ma ...

History

Casper was launched in April 2014 by Philip Krim (previously of The Merrick Group, angelbeds.com, tranquilitymattress.com and SleepBetterStore.com), Neil Parikh, T. Luke Sherwin, Jeff Chapin (previously of

IDEO IDEO () is a design and consulting firm with offices in the U.S., England, Germany, Japan, and China. It was founded in Palo Alto, California, in 1991. The company's 700 staff uses a design thinking approach to design products, services, environ ...

), and Gabriel Flateman. In January 2014, the company raised $1.85 million in its first round of funding. The round was led by Lerer Ventures and Norwest Ventures and also included funding from Crosslink Partners, Vaizra Investments, and Correlation Ventures. On April 22, 2014, Casper officially launched In August 2014, an additional $13.1 million was received in

Series A funding A series A round (also known as series A financing or series A investment) is the name typically given to a company's first significant round of venture capital financing. The name refers to the class of preferred stock sold to investors in exchan ...

, including investments from

New Enterprise Associates New Enterprise Associates (NEA) is an American-based venture capital firm. NEA focuses investment stages ranging from seed stage through growth stage across an array of industry sectors. With ~$25 billion in committed capital, NEA is one of the w ...

, Ron Conway’s SV Angel,

Ashton Kutcher Christopher Ashton Kutcher (; born February 7, 1978) is an American actor, producer, entrepreneur, and former model. He is the recipient of various accolades, including a People's Choice Award, and nominations for two Young Artist Awards, a S ...

's firm,

A-Grade Investments A-Grade Investments is a venture capital firm founded in 2010 by actor Ashton Kutcher, entertainment manager Guy Oseary, and billionaire investor Ron Burkle to invest in technology start-up companies. The company is headquartered in Los Angeles, ...

, fashion designer Steven Alan, Queensbridge Venture Partners, and the investment group of musical artist Nas. In November 2014, Casper expanded its delivery from the contiguous

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

to include

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tota ...

. Led by

Institutional Venture Partners Institutional Venture Partners (IVP) is a US-based private equity investment firm focusing on later-stage venture capital and growth equity investments. IVP is one of the oldest venture capital firms, founded in 1980. History While Reid W. Denn ...

, the company raised $55 million Series B venture funding in June 2015. The Series B funding included participation from celebrity investors:

Tobey Maguire Tobias Vincent Maguire (born June 27, 1975) is an American actor and film producer. He is best known for playing the title character from Sam Raimi's ''Spider-Man'' trilogy (2002–2007), a role he later reprised in '' Spider-Man: No Way Hom ...

, Leonardo DiCaprio,

Scooter Braun Scott Samuel "Scooter" Braun (born June 18, 1981) is an American entrepreneur, investor, and entertainment executive. Known as the manager for artists such as Ariana Grande, Justin Bieber, J Balvin, Demi Lovato, The Kid Laroi and other artists ...

Adam Levine Adam Noah Levine (; born March 18, 1979) is an American singer and songwriter. He serves as the lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist of the pop rock band Maroon 5. Levine began his musical career in 1994 with the band Kara's Flowers, of which ...

, and Pritzker Group Venture Capital. Led by

Target Corporation Target Corporation (doing business as Target and stylized in all lowercase since 2018) is an American big box department store chain headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is the seventh largest retailer in the United States, and a compo ...

, the company raised $170 million in

Series C A venture round is a type of funding round used for venture capital financing, by which startup companies obtain investment, generally from venture capitalists and other institutional investors. The availability of venture funding is among the ...

funding in June 2017. The Series C funding included participation from Tresalia,

Norwest Venture Partners Norwest Venture Partners (Norwest) is an American venture and growth equity investment firm. The firm targets early to late-stage venture and growth equity investments across several sectors, including cloud computing and information technology, ...

, Lerer Hippeau Ventures,

, and Irving Investors. In September 2017, Casper collaborated with American Airlines to provide a full suite of sleep products. In April 2018, Casper Sleep partnered with

American Airlines American Airlines is a major US-based airline headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas, within the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. It is the largest airline in the world when measured by fleet size, scheduled passengers carried, and revenue passenge ...

to design pillows, blankets and other products for the airline's passengers. Casper also announced later in April that they would be opening up a Canadian office in

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most pop ...

, along with a manufacturing facility in the country. In early 2019, Casper Sleep received a $100 million

Series D A venture round is a type of funding round used for venture capital financing, by which startup companies obtain investment, generally from venture capitalists and other institutional investors. The availability of venture funding is among ...

funding from its existing investors

Target Target may refer to: Physical items * Shooting target, used in marksmanship training and various shooting sports ** Bullseye (target), the goal one for which one aims in many of these sports ** Aiming point, in field artillery, fi ...

, NEA, IVP, and

, as well as new sponsors

Dani Reiss Dani Reiss (born November 7, 1973) is a Canadian businessman, best known for his role as president & CEO of Canada Goose Inc. Early life Reiss is the son of Malca (née Tick) and David Reiss. His maternal grandfather is Samuel Tick, who in 19 ...

of the Canada Goose Holdings and Gordon Segal of

Crate & Barrel Euromarket Designs Inc., doing business as Crate & Barrel (stylized as Crate&Barrel), is an international furniture and home décor retail store headquartered in Northbrook, Illinois. They employ 8200 employees across over 100 stores in the Uni ...

. Dani Reiss also entered the startup's new independent board directors along with Karen Katz (board member of

Under Armour Under Armour, Inc. is an American sports equipment company that manufactures footwear, sports and casual apparel. Under Armour's global headquarters are located in Baltimore, Maryland, with additional offices located in Amsterdam (European head ...

and former CEO of

Neiman Marcus Group Neiman Marcus Group, Inc. is an American integrated luxury retailer headquartered in Dallas, Texas, which owns Neiman Marcus, Bergdorf Goodman, Horchow, and Last Call. Since September 2021, NMG has been owned by a group of investment compani ...

). With the new round of funding, the company was valued at $1.1 billion, according to Bloomberg and Casper Sleep. On January 10, 2020, Casper Sleep Inc filed an S-1 with the U.S.

Securities and Exchange Commission The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government, created in the aftermath of the Wall Street Crash of 1929. The primary purpose of the SEC is to enforce the law against mark ...

declaring their intention to

IPO An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investment ...

under the ticker CSPR. On February 6, 2020, it

went public Going public may refer to: * Initial public offering, financial action by a business * Whistleblowing, exposure of previously private information * ''Going Public'' (Newsboys album), 1994 * ''Going Public'' (Bruce Johnston album), 1977 {{Dis ...

at $12 per share, translating to a market value of $476 million, listing on

New York Stock Exchange The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its listed ...

under the ticker CSPR. On March 31, 2020, its stock dropped to $4.12 per share, translating to a market value of $163 million, down from its $1.1 billion valuation in March, 2019. In April 2020, Casper announced the winding down of its European operations and laid off 21% of its staff (78 people) after a poor IPO performance and declining revenues due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identified ...

. Additionally, the company announced that Greg Macfarlane, Casper’s CFO and COO, would depart the company in May. In November 2021, Casper announced that it had entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by Durational Capital Management. The transaction completed in January 2022 and Casper's stock was delisted from the New York Stock Exchange. Casper published ''Van Winkle's'', a news website focusing on sleep until November 2018. After the shutdown of Van Winkle's, Casper announced a quarterly lifestyle magazine, ''Woolly''.

Retail presence

In June 2016, Casper began selling their mattresses at

West Elm Williams-Sonoma, Inc. is an American publicly traded consumer retail company that sells kitchenware and home furnishings. It is headquartered in San Francisco, California, United States. The company has 625 brick and mortar stores and distribute ...

stores in the United States and Canada. However, the partnership ended in October 2017, with Leesa replacing Casper. In January 2018, Casper opened temporary nap pods inside of seven

Indigo Books and Music Indigo Books & Music Inc., known as "Indigo" and stylized "!ndigo", is Canada's only major English-language bookstore chain. It is Canada's largest book, gift, and specialty toy retailer, operating stores in all ten provinces and one terr ...

locations in Canada. In February 2018, Casper's first permanent store opened in New York City. In April 2018, Casper announced that they would be opening stores in four Canadian provinces over twelve months, beginning with two

locations in spring 2018. In June, they announced a partnership with the

Hudson's Bay Company The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC; french: Compagnie de la Baie d'Hudson) is a Canadian retail business group. A fur trade, fur trading business for much of its existence, HBC now owns and operates retail stores in Canada. The company's namesake b ...

to begin selling Casper products at 16 Hudson's Bay stores, 26

Home Outfitters Home Outfitters (known as Déco Découverte in Quebec; originally called Bed, Bath & More) was a Canadian retail home decor chain, owned by Hudson's Bay Company, that sold bedding, towels, houseware Household goods are goods and products used w ...

stores and thebay.com in Canada. In July 2018, Casper announced the launch of the Dreamery, a “physical sleep experience” that will let city dwellers book 45 minutes of downtime in one of its nine private rooms. The concept store was located just behind its Manhattan flagship in Greenwich Village. On July 13, 2018, Casper announced they are now available to try and purchase at

Nordstrom Nordstrom, Inc. () is an American luxury department store chain headquartered in Seattle, Washington, and founded by John W. Nordstrom and Carl F. Wallin in 1901. The original Wallin & Nordstrom store operated exclusively as a shoe store, a ...

Controversies

In April 2016, Casper

sued - A lawsuit is a proceeding by a party or parties against another in the civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today. The term "lawsuit" is used in reference to a civil actio ...

three mattress review websites which had written negative reviews of Casper products. According to the lawsuits, the websites steered potential customers of Casper products to competing mattress companies, which Casper claimed is a

deceptive advertising False advertising is defined as the act of publishing, transmitting, or otherwise publicly circulating an advertisement containing a false claim, or statement, made intentionally (or recklessly) to promote the sale of property, goods, or servic ...

practice. The lawsuit against one of the review websites, Sleepopolis, was resolved after Casper financed its acquisition.

References

External links

* {{authority control 2014 establishments in New York City American companies established in 2014 Retail companies established in 2014 Internet properties established in 2014 Online retailers of the United States Companies formerly listed on the New York Stock Exchange Privately held companies based in New York City Retail companies based in New York City Mattress retailers of the United States 2020 initial public offerings 2022 mergers and acquisitions Private equity portfolio companies

History

Retail presence

Controversies

See also

References

External links