LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--StackCommerce, the leading commerce and content platform for digital publishers, announced today that it has acquired The Fascination, the fast-growing discovery and commerce marketplace for direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands. The move follows last year’s acquisition of BrandCycle, the premium affiliate marketing and influencer network, furthering the company’s mission to build an all-in-one commerce solution for content creators of all sizes. This latest acquisition adds unique, premium DTC brands to existing shops and affiliate offerings for publishers, a big step toward Stack's mission.
Launched in 2020 as a platform for new and emerging brands to be discovered and purchased, The Fascination quickly established itself as the curated marketplace and media partner of choice for trending brands like Keeps, Native, Brooklinen, Leesa, CUTS, and The Ridge. Of the 1,000+ brands that have applied to work with The Fascination, it currently features around 200 brands on the site, which are personally tested and curated by the team.
The Fascination, named one of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Retail Companies of 2022, has seen its traffic grow 25% per month recently. Joining StackCommerce gives the brand the financial and operational backbone to scale while maintaining its outstanding customer experience and content. It’s already widely popular with merchants, and the vastly increased exposure from becoming part of Stack’s network will make it the number-one outlet for anyone looking to sell DTC. The acquisition provides The Fascination and its top-tier brands access and distribution to 200+ leading digital media publishers.
With the addition of The Fascination, publisher and brand partners at StackCommerce can now opt in to new CPC and whitelisting opportunities, bolstering Stack’s fast-growing performance media division, StackMedia. And the increased ability to produce in-depth product reviews based on extensive testing provides an exciting new way to present brands to readers. Built on Shopify tech, the marketplace enables Stack to integrate more seamlessly with sellers on the platform.
For shoppers, the marketplace offers the ability to search by values that matter to them, like sustainability, diversity, and more. And knowing that the in-house team has personally tested products helps consumers purchase with confidence and establish deeper trust.
“I’m so proud of the team at The Fascination who, in just over a year, have created one of the most important places for discerning shoppers to discover and buy the most talked-about new culture-defining brands,” said David Wolfe, co-founder and CEO of The Fascination. “StackCommerce gives us the kind of exposure to consumers that it would have taken us years to build.”
“The Fascination has built out a well-curated collection of quality-proven DTC brands and premium content that will now be accessible to all of Stack’s publisher partners, bringing us another step closer to being the go-to commerce solution for anyone with an engaged audience,” said Karl House, President of StackCommerce. “We’re really excited about the product discovery, SEO expertise, impeccable design, and trendsetting energy the team brings to the table and can’t wait to see how consumers respond to these new brands.”
The Fascination was advised by Kaleo Legal. Latham & Watkins acted as legal advisor to StackCommerce.
About The Fascination
The Fascination, is a curated online marketplace where consumers discover, research, and shop top emerging, mission-driven brands. Launched in late 2020 by the co-founders of Leesa Sleep, David Wolfe and Matt Hayes, The Fascination helps consumers cut through the clutter to discover high-quality brands and products that align with their values. The Fascination features 200+ top emerging and established brands across direct-to-consumer, including: Allbirds, Burrow, Warby Parker, Caraway, Keeps, Daily Harvest, Brooklinen, CUTS Clothing, and Maude, among others. Learn more at TheFascination.com.
About StackCommerce
StackCommerce is the leading commerce + content platform. For consumers, we help them discover and purchase products directly on the news and content sites they visit daily. For merchants, we provide unmatched exposure through shoppable articles and product features on the world’s largest media outlets. For publishers, we power white-labeled e-commerce shops with on-site checkout for over 1,000 publishers including Yahoo!, CNN, Hearst, Mashable, NY Post, TMZ, MarketWatch, and many more. TPG’s Integrated Media acquired a majority stake in the company in December 2020, StackCommerce acquired BrandCycle in December 2021, and Stack was named one of the Built In Best Places to Work in Los Angeles in January 2022. Learn more at StackCommerce.com.
