Dive Brief:

• Good Eggs, the online delivery service for organic foods, won $21 million in funding in a round led by Index Ventures.
• The move comes as the company — which operates as a kind of digital farmers market in San Francisco, Los Angeles, New Orleans, and Brooklyn — makes plans to expand to new markets. 
• The new funding follows an $8.5 million round last fall led by Sequoia Capital.

Dive Insight:

There are few sections of the food industry that are as competitive as online delivery. Some of the biggest names in business are in that space: Amazon, Google, Walmart, etc. There would seem to be little room for anyone else.

But Good Eggs' business model is quite different from those of other players. And it's one that has worked before in an industry that seemed to have little room for innovation. Good Eggs functions as a portal, where consumers come to shop. But more importantly, farmers and artisan producers come there to sell. Good Eggs creates the marketing copy, takes the photos, handles billing and delivery and everything else that isn't directly related to food production. In other words, it lets farmers be farmers, without having to also be salesmen. The whole thing is shockingly similar to Etsy, which is also an Index Ventures investment.