You can’t walk outside your door in San Francisco these days without seeing some tech worker or VC wearing a pair of Allbirds[1]. The eco-friendly wool shoes have taken over the tech world since the startup’s launch a mere 18 months ago. Now, it plans to expand globally and develop new materials beyond its signature merino wool.
Allbirds has a good amount of capital to go there as the company just raised $17.5 million for its Series B funding, adding a total[2] of $27.5 million to work with now.
Tiger Global Management led the round and, as you may be able to tell from the hedge fund’s other bets, Allbirds intends to use those connections to spread its wings internationally.
Tiger Global has its fingers in several Asian countries, with affiliates in Hong Kong, Singapore, Bangalore and Melbourne, places where co-founder Tim Brown would like to start selling the product.
Other participants in the round include Elephant, and existing investors Maveron and Lerer Hippeau.
The sustainable shoe startup has also set its sights on research into more environmentally friendly materials to expand the product line. Allbirds currently manufactures the product in Malaysia, with material sourcing coming from what I’m told is the same type of sheep Armani ships to Italy to make its wool suits.
Brown played it coy when asked which new materials he was looking at but did add that, as great as he thought wool was, it had its limits.
“We’re focused on the idea of comfort and comfort is different when it’s raining, when it’s snowing. Comfort is different when it’s 110 degrees and you’re wearing wool,” Brown told TechCrunch. “Wool is a miracle material but there’s other materials...