Research and analysis of 163 consumer and retail-retail startups (defined as companies who make products and companies who facilitate how consumers get those products), that were founded and exited (acquisition or IPO) in the 2010s.

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#TL;DR

The Exit

Companies more often exited via an M&A (154 of the 164, 94%) than an IPO.
There were 13 unicorns in total (6%) and at least one unicorn in each category; The Personal Care & Cosmetics category had the most unicorns with 4.
On average, it took most companies a little under 5 years to exit, however, the length of time it took a company to exit had no impact on exit value.

The Raise

Raising a lot of money did not necessarily mean a company’s exit value would be higher: 79% of the companies raised less than $50 million in total funding before exiting.
Seed rounds consistently ranged between $1 – 2M but subsequent rounds varied by category.
VCs and Angels were involved in 78% of investment deals across all categories.

The Founders

On average, companies with fewer than 3 co-founders had a better return on raised capital.
A majority of the startups were founded by male founders (66%) or white founders (76%).
On average, all-female founding teams generated a higher exit value than their male counterparts and all-white founding teams raised almost 5 times more (on average) capital than their non-white counterparts.