Diet meal delivery Diet Chef scoops £1.5m from LendingCrowd

Diet Chef, the Scottish diet food home delivery start-up, has raised £1.5m via early-stage peer-to-peer lending platform LendingCrowd.

Launched in 2008 by Andrew Veitch and Kevin Dorren, Edinburgh-based Diet Chef claims to be the largest diet meal delivery business of its kind in the UK with 150,000 customers and turnover of £15m for 2014.

The funding will facilitate a management buy-out by the founders.

LendingCrowd co-founder and chief executive, Stuart Lunn, said the deal represented “a great opportunity for the investors on our platform to get involved in funding a really exciting company”:

“Many high street banks still don’t cater well for high-growth firms or small and medium enterprises in sectors with specific funding needs. We can offer a competitive and straightforward package with the backing of the 1,300 investors on our platform.”