Navigating the balance between starting a company and finishing an engineering degree can end in some sleepless nights.
At least that's what Charlotte Oxnam has found as a current Northwestern University student and founder and CEO of Cue the Curves, a social shopping app for plus-size fashion. But set to graduate this summer and now armed with $160,000 of non-dilutive capital, Oxnam is ready to pursue her passion full-time.
Cue the Curves took home first place on Wednesday at VentureCat, Northwestern University's annual student startup competition. Since launching as an app last September, it has gained more than 1,800 organic users.
The company started as a personal blog for Oxnam.
"I realized that every other shopping platform that I tried never felt like it was meant for me because I never saw women who looked like me," she told Chicago Inno. "I have struggled with finding clothing that made me feel comfortable in my own skin, and I wanted to create a brand based off of a woman's own personal style versus being stuck with the one or two things that come in their size."
She said part of her inspiration comes from the realization that 67% of women in the U.S. are plus-size, yet only 8% of major clothing brands today offer plus-size clothes.
Through Cue the Curves, Oxnam wants to ensure that women finally have a space they can shop for whatever they want.
She plans on capitalizing on the momentum from VentureCat to go after a pre-seed round, and her goal is to hit 50,000 users in the next 12 months.
VentureCat is open to Northwestern students of all levels.
The student startup competition launched in 2014. It was ranked sixth in the top 20 U.S. University entrepreneurship competitions by Times of Entrepreneurship.
The competition has awarded more than $1.6 million in non-dilutive capital since launching in 2014. Since its launch, 165 student-founded businesses have participated, of which 11 have been acquired/sold. Its past participants have secured more than $1 billion in funding and created more than 2,600 jobs, with combined valuations exceeding $2.5 billion.
Zeester, a fundraising and events platform for nonprofits, won second place in the competition, taking home $50,000. BMImmune, a cancer therapeutics biotech company, was third, winning $25,000.
Cue the Curves was a semifinalist in the 2022 VentureCat competition.
