Hastko was founded by two women to solve a design gap in women’s sportswear; its €3 million raise tests whether that founder-market alignment can scale into premium US retail.
Hastko, a French brand that makes seamless sports bras, shorts, and underwear for women, has raised €3 million (about $3.4 million) to support expansion into the United States, including pop ups and shop in shop placements in premium department stores. The round is small by European athleisure investment standards (Berlin’s The Icon League, for comparison, raised €15 million). Its significance is less the check size than the question it tests: can a brand built around a specific physical design failure in women’s sportswear scale into crowded, mainstream US retail?
Where seams became a business case
Hastko was founded in 2017 by Joséphine Bigo, a former marketing director for a ski brand, and Aurélie Moinier, who worked in graphic design and advertising. The founders built the company around a specific complaint: seams on sports bras, shorts, and underwear, worn in direct contact with sensitive areas, can injure female athletes during high repetition movement. According to co founder Aurélie Moinier, some customers have sent the founders photos showing chafing and, in some cases, bleeding caused by seamed garments.
That is a design gap argument with real commercial weight. After two and a half years of research, the company says it developed a manufacturing process using ultrasonic welding and silicone or tape lamination, rather than the seamless knitting techniques more common in athletic apparel. It produces products through specialist manufacturing partners that can run the process.
That approach sits at the center of Hastko’s pitch to investors: a technically defensible product in a category where the founders argue existing sportswear brands, including Lululemon and Alo Yoga, have not fully addressed seam related discomfort.
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From B2B to premium retail
Hastko spent its first three years selling B2B before moving into direct-to-consumer retail. It says it now has a presence at endurance events including the Paris Marathon, the Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc, and the Asics SaintéLyon. The brand reports 50 percent growth between its last two fiscal years and says online sales have been doubling month-over-month over the past three months (figures supplied by the company that have not been independently verified).
Hastko is currently sold in France, Benelux, and Germany, with entry into the Nordics, Italy, and Spain planned within six months, alongside a new seamless running-specific collection. The US expansion will lean on physical retail formats such as pop-ups and department store corners, plus shop-in-shop placements.
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How will Hastko scale?
The harder test is not capital but execution. Hastko’s founders point to frontline retail hesitation about selling technical intimate products, particularly among male sales staff who, according to Moinier, underestimate customers’ willingness to discuss fit and injury.
The brand’s manufacturing approach, dependent on specialist partners rather than standard seamless knit production, is also a scaling constraint. Capacity, not brand awareness, is likely to be the limiting factor if US demand materializes as hoped. A €3 million round can fund market entry. It does not, by itself, resolve whether a technically complex manufacturing base can supply premium US retail at volume.
