The event planning platform is North America’s go-to resource for in-person event planners. The Series A funding will be used to meet the surge of demand from enterprise customers.
MONTREAL — Planned, the all-in-one event planning platform that is simplifying the experience of planning corporate events, today announced the close of a successful Series A funding round with capital investments of $18 million. The round was led by Drive Capital, with participation from Outsiders Fund, THCAP, and N49P.
Planned, which first launched in 2018 and had momentum as a business at the start of 2020, reduced its headcount from 48 to 12 while its customers discontinued all in-person events due to the Coronavirus pandemic. The team used 2020 and 2021 to double down on their vision for an all-in-one event planning platform. Co-founders Marc-Antoine Bonin and Emeric Noël and the Planned team rebuilt the platform with the goal of making event planners’ lives easier.
“Initially, the COVID lockdowns were a devastating blow to the business, and we thought about pivoting to a virtual event solution, but we believed we were the right team to build the best platform for planning in-person events,” said Bonin, the CEO of Planned. “We started to see COVID as an opportunity for us to do something that no company has successfully done before, and that creates a product built to make the entire experience of planning an event easier.”]
The Planned platform provides planners with a “single pane of glass” for sourcing, managing, and invoicing vendors. Invoice payments flow through Planned, allowing Planned to serve as the single vendor for a corporate event. The feature significantly reduces the time planners spend onboarding new vendors to the enterprise.
Event spaces listed on Planned include unique venues like airplane hangars, museums, restaurants, and local event spaces. Larger, traditional corporate venues, like hotels and convention centers, are also listed on the platform.
“What makes Planned so special is its laser focus on making its users’ lives easier,” said Masha Khusid, Partner at Drive Capital. “Plenty of companies have started in this space, but none of them have done the upfront work to simplify the experience of event planning like the Planned team has.”
As COVID-related restrictions were lifted in the U.S. and more recently Canada, Planned’s challenge has become keeping up with demand. Sales on the platform increased 400% from Q4 to Q1 and today more than 25,000 vendors and supplies have Planned profiles to attract business from Planned’s enterprise users.
“We couldn’t be more excited about the momentum we’re seeing,” said Emeric Noël, Co-Founder, and CPO of Planned. “This is what we dreamed about in 2020 when we made the decision to keep building for a post-COVID future. We’re committed to bringing back the thrill and excitement of in-person events.”
ABOUT PLANNED
Planned is an event planning platform launched in 2018 by Marc-Antoine Bonin and Emeric Noel. Planned helps in-person event planners book everything they need for their events while providing visibility and control to managers. Users can browse and book from a curated portfolio of thousands of venues and vendors across North America. The platform makes it easy for companies to source, compare, and book suppliers like event spaces, caterers, equipment, A/V, entertainment, and more. For more information, visit planned.com.
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