London shaving service Cornerstone seals £3.5m investment deal adding e-commerce advisor William Reeve

Men’s shaving supplier Cornerstone has secured £3.5m worth of investment run by private equity firm Calculus Capital, and e-commerce investor William Reeve as an advisor.

Providing UK customers with British skincare products and German-engineered razors via an online subscription service, the company has confirmed today (August 7) that it has closed a £3.5m investment and has the backing of William Reeve who has worked with Graze, Zoopla and Paddy Power.

With a current overall total of £8m investment, Cornerstone is the brainchild of young entrepreneur Oliver Bridge, whose frustration with uncomfortable, expensive wet shaving combined with his hatred for toiletries shopping, led to the idea of high-quality products and shavers delivered straight to consumers’ doors.

Bridge, who launched the company in June 2014, commented: “I’d always hated shaving - it was painful, cost a fortune… Finally, one day I just thought, there has to be a better way to do this, and I set about finding a way to make it combine great products with a subscription service.”

With £10k of his own savings and a £5k startup loan, Bridge went on to raise £1m from a crowdfunding campaign in July 2015 with Cornerstone, seeing his customer base grow from zero to 140k with an expansion of 27 staff members at the company’s London headquarters.

Private equity firm Calculus Capital has a strong record of backing growing British businesses like Cornerstone; with 18 years of experience in SME investing, the company can provide support for such companies.

Roshan Puri, who works at Calculus Capital, said: “Cornerstone is disrupting the men’s shaving and toiletries market. We have been extremely impressed with the company’s obsessive focus on ‘the customer’, acquisition and management.

“Oliver and the senior team at Cornerstone have shown their ability to deliver significant business growth and build a well-run organisation, capable of using third-party investment to deliver strong returns.”

Cornerstone boasts an impressive list of experienced investors, including former chairman of Jack Wills, Will Hobhouse, to Quidco’s CEO Andy Oldham, and ex-president of Levi Jeans, Joe Middleton.

Winning ‘Best Razor’ award in 2015/16 along with Oliver selected as a Forbes 30 Under 30 in late 2016, Cornerstone has grown with the male grooming industry which is now worth $6.7m (£5.1m) in Europe.

The company is set to expand its range of products throughout the remainder of 2017, including the addition of new toiletries like shampoo and dental care, which Oliver describes as “an assault on the men’s aisle at Boots - we don’t think men should have to shop for, even think about shopping for toiletries - we’re here to fix that.”

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