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Cue the Curves
Techstars '22Techstars '22Evanston, US · 2 known investors
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Cue the Curves offers clothing and fashion products designed for plus-size women and girls. The company focuses on helping plus-size customers build confidence through apparel that fits their needs.
Also known as CTC
Founders & leadership
Investors · 2
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Company profile
researched Sep 2026Cue the Curves is a social shopping application built specifically for plus-size fashion. The app lets users enter their size and style preference to surface apparel brands that carry their size, browse a catalog of brands with listed size ranges (spanning numeric sizes such as 10–32 and letter sizes such as 1X–6X), and discover outfit ideas organized around aesthetics and "vibes." A community layer lets users share their own looks in what the company describes as a positive, supportive space, and the site maintains a style dictionary for users still defining their aesthetic. The company states that more than 250 brands are shoppable through the platform, including Torrid, Ashley Stewart, Good American, Savage X Fenty, Nordstrom, ASOS, Anthropologie, Abercrombie & Fitch and Athleta, and it solicits submissions from users for brands not yet listed.
The company also runs a brand-facing side of the platform positioned around community-building and customer insight. It offers participating plus-size brands product feedback and co-creation with dedicated customers, a notifications channel for new releases, and user-generated content from top customers for marketing use. Cue the Curves additionally recruits a content creator community through an application on its site.
Founding story
Founder Charlotte Oxnam, an engineering student at Northwestern University, started Cue the Curves out of her own difficulties shopping as a plus-size person, citing experiences such as finding only four dresses she could try on while shopping for her senior prom. She began the venture as a fashion blog in 2019; as readers responded with accounts of its impact, she concluded the concept should become a platform, and later built it into a mobile app and online community.
Business model
Cue the Curves operates a consumer-facing social shopping app that is free for shoppers to join and directs them to third-party plus-size apparel brands. Alongside the consumer product, the company markets a brand-side offering, inviting plus-size brands to set up demos and use the platform for customer feedback, product notifications and user-generated content.
Traction
The company states more than 250 brands are shoppable on the platform and lists a large brand directory on its site. It completed the Techstars Chicago Accelerator's 2022 summer cohort, won the $150,000 VentureCat grand prize in 2023, and has been covered by Women's Wear Daily, CBS Mornings, Business Journals, The Curvy Fashionista and Northwestern University.
Latest developments
After winning the VentureCat grand prize in mid-2023, the founder graduated early and moved to working full time on Cue the Curves, with plans to launch new app features.
▸Full profile — market position, technology, go-to-market, geography, history
Market position
Cue the Curves positions itself as a shopping and community platform built specifically and exclusively for plus-size fashion, aggregating brands that other general retail discovery tools do not filter for extended sizing.
The platform is dedicated exclusively to plus-size fashion, so every brand and item surfaced is available in extended sizes — the company frames this as eliminating the experience of finding an item only to discover sizing stops at large. It combines size-filtered brand discovery with aesthetic-based style inspiration and a moderated positive-only community, and positions itself as helping users build confidence rather than only completing transactions.
Technology
The product is a mobile app plus a website with a size-and-style matching tool that recommends brands fitting a user's stated size and aesthetic, a searchable brand directory annotated with size ranges, style inspiration pages and community posting features.
Go-to-market
User acquisition has drawn on the founder's blog audience, press and podcast coverage, influencer events and a content creator community program. Media exposure includes Women's Wear Daily, CBS Mornings, Business Journals, The Curvy Fashionista and Northwestern University, plus the podcasts Peach, Please!, Expand the Curve and aSweatLife, and an international Microsoft Windows 11 ad campaign featuring the founder. On the brand side, the company uses a "set up a demo" / "schedule a demo" sales motion.
Plus-size women and girls seeking clothing in their size and style, and plus-size apparel brands seeking customer community, feedback and user-generated content.
Geography
The company is based in Evanston, Illinois, in the United States, with ties to Northwestern University and the Chicago startup ecosystem; it held a launch event in Los Angeles in late 2022 and lists brands from the US and international markets.
History
Charlotte Oxnam launched Cue the Curves in 2019 as a fashion blog while a student at Northwestern University, with support from the university's Farley Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, The Garage and the Propel program for women founders. In March 2022 Oxnam appeared in an international Microsoft Windows 11 ad campaign, which increased the blog's reach. In summer 2022 she was accepted into the Techstars Chicago Accelerator — one of 12 teams chosen from more than 300 applicants, and the program's first full-time student participant — and used the three-month program to rebrand the company and launch a mobile app. A launch event with plus-size fashion influencers was held in Los Angeles in late 2022. In May 2023 the company won the $150,000 grand prize at Northwestern's VentureCat competition, beating 24 other semifinalists after winning the Consumer Products and Services track.
Compiled by commissioned research from 8 cited public sources — announcements, filings, and press listed under research sources below.
Key figures
latest reportedCompany-reported or press-reported figures, each dated to when it was claimed — not independently audited.
Related companies · 2
Companies working in the same space as Cue the Curves.
Timeline · 5
launches, deals, and filingsCue the Curves took first place at Northwestern University's annual VentureCat startup competition, winning the $150,000 grand prize after also winning the Consumer Products and Services track. The company was selected from 25 semifinalists; the total prize pool exceeded $325,000.
$150K source ↗
Founder Charlotte Oxnam appeared in an international advertising campaign for Microsoft Windows 11, which drove awareness of the Cue the Curves platform.
Founder Charlotte Oxnam was accepted into the Techstars Chicago Accelerator after a multi-round application process, becoming the first full-time student in the program. She was one of 12 selected from more than 300 applicants for the three-month 2022 summer cohort.
Cue the Curves held a launch event in Los Angeles in late 2022 attended by plus-size fashion influencers.
During the Techstars program, the company rebranded and launched a mobile app that lets users search for size-inclusive clothing from brands and find style inspiration.
Dated company events from announcements, filings, and press; legal rows summarize public dockets and regulator releases.
▸Research sources · 8
primary sources listed
- Cue the Curvescuethecurves.com · web
8 public sources were cited for this profile; the first-party ones are listed here.
Frequently asked questions
- What does Cue the Curves do?
- Cue the Curves is a social shopping app built exclusively for plus-size fashion discovery and community.
- Who are Cue the Curves's investors?
- Cue the Curves's investors include Techstars, Dorm Room.
- Where is Cue the Curves headquartered?
- Cue the Curves is headquartered in Evanston, US.