Leading Nordic direct-to-consumer brand CAIA Cosmetics partners with Verdane to expand internationally

STOCKHOLM — Verdane, the Northern European specialist growth investor, has announced its investment in CAIA Cosmetics (“CAIA”), the online cosmetics company co-founded by media personality Bianca Ingrosso, to jointly build and develop the company with Ingrosso and CAIA’s management team.

All founding members of the CAIA team will remain with the company as it moves to expand its assortment of high-quality products, establish itself in new geographies and create an international community of CAIA customers. With a highly engaged and growing social media following of over 140 000, CAIA is one of the fastest growing and most-engaged beauty brands in the Nordics. The CAIA community plays a key part in the company’s success, with followers actively contributing to the company’s product development.

”Thanks to the partnership with Verdane, the CAIA team and I will be able to bring our vision of offering top-quality beauty products at affordable prices to an even greater community of people. I am so proud of what the CAIA team has created in a short space of time, and am very excited to bring on an investor that has made this journey a reality for other companies that I use in my life, like Safira, MatHem and Desenio. This is just the beginning,” comments Bianca Ingrosso.

CAIA was founded in 2018 by Bianca Ingrosso, her manager Vanessa Lindblad, and long-term beauty industry veterans Mikael Snabb and Jesper Matsch. The company has sold more than 600,000 products in over 30 countries, supported by the massive social media reach and engagement attributable to the brand and its founders.

The partnership will harness the strengths of both sides, building on Verdane’s extensive experience of supporting successful digitally native vertical brands and e-commerce businesses to grow CAIA into a full-service make-up offering present in several geographies.

Bianca Ingrosso is one of Sweden’s most admired personalities, with 1.1 million followers on Instagram, 351 000 followers on YouTube, a reality TV series (‘Wahlgrens värld’) documenting the lives and work of the Wahlgren Ingrosso family, and is one of the most influential style and beauty voices in the Nordics.

“We are pleased to welcome the CAIA team into the Verdane family. We are thoroughly impressed by the quality of CAIA’s products, and the founding team’s dedication. They have built a unique position for CAIA in the beauty market through high-frequency product launches, massive engagement on social media and by nurturing the CAIA community. We look forward to helping CAIA launch more top-quality make-up products, expand into adjacent categories and claim new markets,” comments Henrik Aspén, Partner at Verdane.

“CAIA is driving a quality revolution within cosmetics. Our products are made in the same factories as the most prestigious brands in the world, but we make them affordable to everyone since we cut out the middleman by selling directly to consumers. It’s clear from the way consumers have responded both in Sweden and Norway that CAIA’s products are something that have been missing from the market. By bringing Verdane onboard, CAIA now has one of Northern Europe’s most experienced e-commerce investors supporting our growth journey. We’re very excited,” comments Mikael Snabb, CEO and co-founder of CAIA Cosmetics.

The investment was made by Verdane’s SEK 3bn Edda fund.