One startup is helping sales representatives make sure your favorite chips, gum and bottled water are ready to go at the local convenient store.
Shelvspace, a SaaS solution for the consumer packaging goods industry, today announced they closed on a $1 million seed round of funding led by Tallwave Capital with participation from high-profile* California- and Arizona-based investors.
In an interview with CEO and co-founder Dave Albertson, he said that Shelvspace is really about “speed, visibility of data, accountability and simplicity.”
While consumers are used to seeing products on the shelf at grocery stores, the process of selling those products to a retailer has it’s own set of complexity and pain points, Albertson explained.
“This has been an archaic and fragmented process for several years,” Albertson said.
In terms of acquiring data, traditionally representatives have relied upon brokers and distributors to provide information about what is happening at various locations. Unfortunately, the data ends up being weeks old-ultimately delaying the sales cycle.
Shelvspace has developed a unique workflow and real-time cloud solution so sales people have all the information at their fingertips to manage tasks such as promotional tracking, order management, compliance reporting, surveys, and more, as well as the ability to share photos of floor product displays with team members.
“We compare ourselves to the mobile Salesforce.com, but for the consumer product industry,” Albertson said.
According to Albertson, Shelvspace services over 16 regional brokers and four suppliers who collect data from over 250 sales reps in market. These representatives represent over 75,000 retail locations that generate over $1.4B in annual product sales.
The funds will be used “to fuel growth of early adoption and gain more marketshare as well as building out more capabilities within the mobile platform,” Albertson said.
Next steps for Shelvspace include adding more jobs by the end of the year as well as key integrations from industry data leaders and extend the Android platform.
Albertson said the support from the Arizona ecosystem has been an important factor in their success.
“We’ve had a ton of support from Arizona and the community getting Shelvspace off the ground,” Albertson said. “It’s great to see the Arizona angel ecosystem coming together to help us and getting the out-of-state investors connected in the same deal.”
Shelvspace headquarters in Arizona with regional sales in Philadelphia, San Francisco, and Chicago.
Read more about startups getting funded at AZ Tech Beat.
*In case you’re curious who was in the round, Shelvspace released the list of investors: Tallwave Capital and the AngelList Syndicates Fund; Clark Landry, founder of SHIFT; Sam Teller, co-founder of LA Launchpad; Sizhao Yang, co-creator of Farmville; Jon Roska, founder of Pet360; Mario Martinez, founder of 360 Vantage; Pat Sullivan, co-founder of ACT! and SalesLogix; Brad Jannenga, co-founder, WebPT, and many other high-profile angels.
Photos courtesy of Shelvspace
