Sweetgreen

Sweetgreen (legally Sweetgreen, Inc., stylized as sweetgreen, previously swɘetgreen) is an American fast casual restaurant chain that serves salads. It was founded in November 2006 by Nicolas Jammet, Nathaniel Ru, and Jonathan Neman. In August 2007, they opened their first store in Washington, D.C., three months after they graduated from the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University. Sweetgreen's corporate headquarters moved to the Los Angeles area from Washington, D.C. in 2016. , it had 221 stores in operation in 18 states plus the District of Columbia (11), including California (41), Colorado (6), Connecticut (2), Florida (10), Illinois (21), Indiana (4), Georgia (6), Maryland (7), Massachusetts (21), Michigan (4), Minnesota (4), New Jersey (5), New York (42), Pennsylvania (7), Texas (17), Rhode Island (1), Virginia (10), Wisconsin (2), with locations opening soon in Washington State. The CEO is Neman, and the company had over 4,000 employees as of 2016. History and financing Sweetgreen was founded in 2006 by Nicolas Jammet, Nathaniel Ru, and Jonathan Neman, all Georgetown University students at the time. The trio were disappointed with campus food options. Sweetgreen raised its initial $375,000 of startup funding from investors including the three founders' parents, Joe Bastianich, Seth Goldman, and Washington's Latino Economic Development Center. In 2013, it accepted a $22 million investment from Revolution Growth, a venture capital fund founded by Steve Case. In 2014, it received $18.5 million in investment from Revolution Growth. In 2015, it raised an additional $35 million in investment under the lead of T. Rowe Price with contributions from existing investor Revolution Growth. The company has raised over $95 million to date.