Miki Agrawal founded Thinx

Miki Agrawal founded Thinx, the maker of age-inclusive underwear aimed at menstruating women. She is also the founder and former CEO of Fashion to Figure, an online retailer for plus-size women; she left that company in October 2013. During her tenure at Fashion to Figure, Miki grew sales from $0K to $14MM in just two years and became a fierce advocate for body positivity. Her advocacy continues through her recent speaking engagements on entrepreneurship and innovation.

1. Personal Life

Miki Agrawal was born in San Francisco, CA. She graduated from San Francisco State University (SFSU) with economics and psychology degrees. She then went on to obtain her MBA degree from the University of California, Berkeley.

After graduation, Miki spent several years as a business consultant and, shortly after that, joined the start-up that would eventually become Fashion to Figure (FTF). While running FTF, she became the second-largest individual shareholder of the publicly traded company. In 2010, she sold her stake in the company for $5 million and left it shortly after.

2. Career

She began her career at the Economic Opportunity Institute, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the quality of life for low-income families. One of her first projects at EOI was becoming the managing editor of the publication “Parrying with Elbows,” which explored the issue of racial disparities in Silicon Valley.

In 2006, Miki co-founded Fashion to Figure. The company aims to provide premium fashion at affordable prices for full-figured women. They offer sizes from 16 through 28 and have over 7,000 styles with a proprietary Fit-to-Flare™ cut that is attractive without being revealing.

3. Thinx

Miki Agrawal decided to start her own company after graduating from SFSU with an MBA and a degree in psychology. She was immediately attracted to the idea of designing underpants for women who were overweight or felt self-conscious about their bodies in public places.

Her mission to create age-inclusive underwear coincided with the launch of a new product line called Thinx, which she called “the panty revolution .”She took her idea to VCs based in New York. Within six months of launching, the company got over $3 million in funding from investors such as Alibaba, Sequoia Capital, and former Vogue China Editor-in-Chief Mr. Adam Katz Sinding.