ThirdLove Should Be Close to Profitable This Year, Says CEO Zak

ThirdLove, an online bra retailer that had been growing quickly before the pandemic, should be close to profitable this year, said its CEO, Heidi Zak. 

Her forecast follows a difficult period when shoppers, stuck at home to avoid coronavirus contagion, scaled back on clothing purchases even if they could buy them online. In March, “we had to rethink our business model pretty quickly,” said Zak in an interview at The Information’s Women in Tech, Media and Finance conference on Wednesday. “It was really about making sure we were running the business profitably.” 

The San Francisco startup this spring cut staff and took out a government loan. It also talked to potential investors about raising money at a valuation only slightly higher than its last round, according to people familiar with the matter. It’s not clear whether ThirdLove abandoned those fundraising plans; Zak declined to comment. More recently, Zak said that special purpose acquisition companies, investment vehicles that raise capital to acquire a business, had approached ThirdLove.