Meet O.school: the place for accurate, thoughtful, and judgement free sexual wellness content

O.school is taking a new approach to sexual wellness content and with their new acquisition of PleasureBase, sexual wellness toys and product marketplace. The founder of O.school, Andrea Barrica, built O.school because of the dearth of quality websites, forums, and blogs surrounding sex and sexual wellness. O.school has built a website, email listserve, and now a product platform for users to seek information and products surrounding sexual wellness that is grounded in science but encourages curiosity and acceptance. Through their media and content platform, O.school brings measured value by capitalizing on understanding their users and using customer data in a thoughtful way.

Why we Invested?

When Andrea Barrica looked to the internet for sexual wellness information, she realized a gap in the market. At the time it seemed that there were two extremes – porn and WebMD. She wanted to create a place where users could be curious, learn, and understand sex but also know their information was accurate and based on science. From that vision, O.school was born and users followed, with a current 250k MAU. The theme of data backed sexual wellness, is why O.school’s acquisition of PleasureBase makes sense. PleasureBase from its inception, was on a mission to create a streamlined, review backed, value-based shopping experience for sexual wellness. The current shopping experience for sex toys is completely overwhelming with – 328k search results. PleasureBase and now O.school, is bringing simplicity to the sex toy shopping experience.

While the content is key, O.school’s B2B offerings are what sets the team apart and highlights their importance in the sexual wellness community. O.school offers sexual wellness brands an opportunity to advertise on both the O.school website, and email newsletter at much lower CPC rates vs. traditional social media and content outlets. Sexual wellness key words have been plagued by extremely high CPC rates which eats at the possibility of further innovation. Secondly, O.school offers customer insight packages for sexual wellness companies to purchase. Unlike other industries that have ample data and customer insight resources, the sexual wellness industry lacks customer data that it can use for targeting, and product changes.

What differentiates them in the market relative to competitors?

While there are many sex toy, and sexual wellness content companies – none combine the two in the same way that O.school does. O.school’s sex product platform and their sexual education content positively amplifies each other’s progress. O.school’s education platform and Orgasm Order form (that indicates customer preferences) will inform the types of products on the marketplace. Similarly, the purchasing habits from consumers will inform what type of content makes sense for the education platform. Thus, both parts of O.school will be hyper focused on the end user and the end user’s preferences. Another distinguishing factor O.school has in comparison to its competitors is the trust users have with the brand. This trust is evidenced by the fact that over 70% of O.school users have completed the Orgasm Order form and built by honest, thoughtful, and accurate content since 2016.

Why the founder/CEO is amazing, more about the rest of the team?

Andrea Barrica built O.school to fill the gap in the sexual education industry and bring the world sexual education content that was relevant, science backed, and shame free. She has a deep passion for sexual wellness education which complements her previous entrepreneurial and venture capital background. Andrea brought on Lance Marks, former CEO of PleasureBase, to manage the integration of the two platforms and lead the product function at O.school. Previous to O.school, Lance worked in investment banking, business development, and data analytics.

How Coyote Ventures met the team, progress they have made since we invested?

Jess and Andrea met when O.school was in its early days. In fact, O.school was part of the original inspiration behind Coyote Ventures thesis! Based on the combination of O. School’s unique content, distinction from competitors, and multiple revenue drivers, Coyote Ventures Team decided to lead O. School’s seed round.

How the company is advancing the conversation around sexual wellness?

Due to the sexual education offerings for millions in the US and beyond, many don’t know where to start when it comes to understanding their sexuality and sexual wellness. O.school is providing curated content for millions that want sexual education by finding the sweet spot between the unrealistic expectations of porn and the clinical feeling of medical websites. This also extends to sex toys and sex products. O.school’s new platform, due to the acquisition of PleasureBase, brings simplicity, an emphasis on community, and data to buying sex toys.

Going forward: Vision of the Company

While the O.school platform has started with sex toys, the team knows that there are many other parts of our health that have been stigmatized and undereducated. The team envisions expanding its product offerings in other taboo areas like women’s healthcare, aging, and beyond to ensure the best user journey and experience no matter the topic.