- Online media company Some Spider Studios announced it has acquired a parent-focused media company called Fatherly
Online media company Some Spider Studios announced it has acquired a parent-focused media company called Fatherly. This acquisition will further increase Spider Studio’s market share in the space. And going forward, Some Spider Studios is also rebranding to Some Spider Family.
The executives of the Some Spider Family brand will oversee the company’s parental brands like Scary Mommy and The Dad along with Fatherly. And Some Spider’s Cafe politics brand will be led by Preet Bharara. Bharara is known for previously serving as the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York from 2009 to 2017. And he is the brother of Some Spider founder and CEO Vinit Bharara — who is known as the co-founder of Diapers.com (acquired by Amazon.com for $500 million). A couple of years ago, I did a profile piece about Some Spider on Forbes.com.
“We want to continue rolling up in the parenting category,” said Some Spider CEO Vinit Bharara via AdAge. “We want to find businesses that parents are passionate about, across all points in the parenting lifecycle and across all aspects of life, whether at home or at work.”
According to AdAge, Some Spider and Fatherly saw a combined $35 million in revenue last year. And now the combined entity expects to see $50 million in profit by the end of the year. This deal was made in all-stock, but the terms were undisclosed. The Scary Mommy brand alone has been profitable for the past four years and hit $6 million in profit last year.
Vinit and Fatherly CEO Michael Rothman knew each other for about four years. And Rothman pointed out that he admired the way that Vinit Bharara built Some Spider into an identity-based media company defined by brands that people care about. Rothman previously worked as an executive at Thrillist. Simon Isaacs is also a founder of Fatherly.
The Fatherly brand raised about $6 million in funding and Some Spider raised a total of $20 million. Of Some Spider’s $20 million, Vinit Bharara and Diapers.com co-founder Marc Lore put in $10 million. Lore now works for Walmart after selling his next company Jet.com to the retail giant for $3.3 billion in 2016.
Fatherly also pointed out that it was built with search and email first. And Scary Mommy and The Dad were built with social media and engagement plans first. There will be little redundancy between the brands.
