New York-based men’s activewear brand Ten Thousand recently announced a $21.5 million Series A raise and a partnership with Life Time, North America’s premier Athletic Country Clubs and omnichannel Healthy Way of Life Brand. The funding round and partnership underscore Ten Thousand’s strong following, differentiated positioning, and rapid growth. Provenance led this investment with participation from Fernbrook and Alfa. And this syndicate joins existing seed investors, including Dave Gilboa (co-founder of Warby Parker), Blue Scorpion, and Elizabeth St Ventures.
Along with the funding announcement, Ten Thousand also announced a three-year partnership with Life Time Athletic Country Clubs that will make them the exclusive men’s training apparel brand of Life Time’s Dynamic Personal Training (DPT) team and its Studio, GTX, Alpha, and Ultra Fit classes, and will sponsor select Life Time events as well as deliver exclusive products and in-club activations.
A central point of emphasis within the partnership will be Run Strong, Ten Thousand’s take on running that has ushered in a new breed of hybrid athletes who train to improve physical strength, endurance, and mental fortitude. Ten Thousand has been at the forefront of this new movement in the fitness and training space and have already hosted Run Strong activations at this year’s Life Time Miami Marathon and Chicago Half Marathon. Participants were encouraged to wear weight vests and do push-ups and burpees throughout the race, raising over $10,000 for the Life Time Foundation. Ten Thousand plans to expand on this success by adding Run Strong divisions at other organized races and hosting Run Strong community events throughout the year.
KEY QUOTES:
“As lifelong athletes that consistently struggled to find adequate training gear, we started Ten Thousand to build what we were looking for in the market — a streamlined assortment of no-nonsense, premium gear that could take us through any and every training session. By only using the highest quality materials, obsessing over the details, and working with elite hybrid athletes to design, develop, and test every product, Ten Thousand has become the go-to performance brand for serious athletes. The result is purpose-built gear that is made to last. As a business we’ve not only seen significant growth on a consistent basis, we also have one of the highest repeat customer rates in the industry. With this new investment and our partnership with Life Time we can shift the business into high gear by growing our team, investing in more inventory, exploring retail, larger partnerships and new marketing channels.”
“As our repeat rate shows, once a customer tries Ten Thousand, they stick with Ten Thousand. And now with this funding we’ll be able to reach even more new customers through both continued digital marketing as well as further channel expansion. The funding will also help us better keep up with customer demand – which has been one of our biggest challenges to date. When we set out to raise our Series A we quickly saw Provenance as an ideal partner. We had built relationships with their team over multiple years and knew they were unique in how they combine data-driven decision making with unmatched brand, product and operational expertise. We have every intention of becoming a household name and this funding along with the new partnerships will play a big role in helping us get there.”
— Ten Thousand Founder and CEO Keith Nowak
“There’s an authenticity and seriousness to Ten Thousand that is sorely lacking from so many of the other activewear start-ups. In an incredibly short period of time they’ve established themselves as a true best-in-class brand and are in pole position to take advantage of the massive opportunity in the market to become the next great American activewear brand. We’re very excited to help fuel that growth.”
— Anton Romash, Ten Thousand Board Director and principal at Provenance
