Stitch Fix’s Katrina Lake Proved Innovation In Retail Is Still Possible In An Amazon World

In 2017, big retail industry bright spots outside of Amazon have been few and far between. That made the rise of Stitch Fix that much more surprising — and the unfortunately rare leadership by a female founder and CEO in Katrina Lake that much more refreshing. The growth arc of the data-driven online retailer — from launch to IPO in six years — seemed like the model, modern-day VC success story. Except that’s not exactly the case. For a company of its size at such a young age, Stitch Fix raised relatively little venture capital, forcing it to become profitable earlier than most, and fund much of its growth from cash flow. This was decidedly not the most common path taken by many fast-growth consumer-facing startups. “We treated every single dollar that we got very preciously,” Lake previously told Recode, “because it was very hard to raise every single one of those dollars.” Read more at Recode.