As families across America prepare to celebrate Mother's Day this Sunday, Alison Stern is looking beyond the day of gratitude.
Stern just completed a $10 million commitment to Mother Ventures, a debut early stage fund focused solely on mothers as consumers.
“In the United States, mothers are responsible for 85% of household purchases and have $2.4 trillion in purchasing power,” Stern (pictured below) told TechCrunch. “When you look at the numbers, you see that mothers are the buyers. They are actually a very unique economic engine.”
Stern, a mother of two, is leveraging her spending power by backing startups that reflect the needs of modern mothers. Since launching Mother Ventures two years ago, she has already invested $4 million in 13 startups. Her portfolio includes Coral Care, an instant pediatric specialist appointment for children with developmental delays, and Tin Can, a popular Wi-Fi-enabled “landline” designed as a retro-style phone for children.
Prior to launching her own fund, she co-founded Tubular Labs, a social video analytics startup, which she helped grow to $25 million in annual recurring revenue before being acquired by private equity in 2023, and served as an operating partner at The Chernin Group (TCG), a consumer-focused growth equity firm.
Part of TCG's investment policy included backing companies that serve “unique audiences with overlooked spending power,” such as Barstool Sports, which originally targeted Boston sports fans, she said.
Image credit:Mother Ventures
When Mr. Stern set out to launch his own fund, he recognized the Mothers market as a similarly underserved market with the potential for superior returns. “I felt like being a mother was the ultimate niche that wasn't really a niche,” she said.
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Stern convinced Tony James, former president and chief operating officer of Blackstone and current chairman of Costco's board, to back Mother Ventures as an anchor LP. Other supporters of the fund include Jessica Rolfe, founder of child development startup Loveberry, as well as female executives at Netflix, Rent the Runway, and Sesame Street.
She argues that millennial and Gen Z mothers expect a different set of products, from on-demand transportation services like Zum, to DoorDash's prepared meal delivery, to fintech tools like Greenlight that allow parents to instantly fund their children's debit cards.
“We want healthy things. We want subscriptions. We want digital communities,” she said.
But Stern doesn't want his fund to be perceived as one that invests solely in childcare technology. “This is a consumer fund and we are focused on mothers because it allows consumers to expand our betting range,” she said.
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