Furnisystems — on a quest to move the furniture market online

When experts get tired of the drawbacks of existing technological solutions, it makes sense to build their own tools. This is exactly what FIRSTPICK’s accelerator participants, Furnisystems did — they developed a powerful e-commerce platform that is capable of moving furniture businesses online without much friction. What is their story and how will their solution transform the market? Learn by reading our quick interview.

Tell us about your startup. What is?Furnisystems about?

Our product is an?e-commerce platform for the?furniture industry. We provide an e-commerce website and an administration panel for furniture dealers and factories. Our platform adds configurators for all types of furniture (sofas, beds, tables,?and?lights), while the admin panel is optimized for easy product management and commercial offer generation.

Our platform has a?significant?technical depth and all the necessary e-commerce plugin functionality?—?Google Analytics, Facebook pixel, HotJar,?payment providers,?emails, SEO,?etc. The technological stack is optimized for very fast page loading speed, and the data is stored as a Graph for future data exchanges between factories and dealers.

What problem?does Furnisystems solve?

84% of the?furniture market is still offline.?As furniture store owners, we have experienced that it is?because?furniture is configurable —?you can change dimensions/fabric/materials for nearly every product). Architects, designers,?and?homeowners?are very specific?—?often,?the choice needs to be tailored?according to?the unique interior design?ideas. We analyzed the current purchasing habits in physical stores and created a platform automating the physical process.?We want to bring the market ONLINE!

Tell us about your competition, please.

Our product is tailored for two verticals:?e-commerce and?manufacturing.

On the?e-commerce vertical, we have Shopify, WooCommerce, Magento, PrestaShop,?and many others. We provide the same service,?but?we niche our product to have a competitive advantage in the furniture industry.

On the?manufacturing vertical, we aim to provide a digital catalog for factories and an interface to manage orders. Here,we have competitors such as pCon, Clippings, and Nfinite?—?they focus on solutions with 3D technologies, while we aim to provide a cheaper alternative not involving 3D models.

When did you launch,?and how did it go?

We?officially?launched in March 2023. So far,?we have been introducing our product to factories and dealers, and we are onboarding our first clients (May). Right now,?we are in the process of optimizing our sales and onboarding processes.

What are your main achievements so far?

We have our first clients in Lithuania that have been using the system for more than a year. They helped us to polish the product. We introduced our product at?the?Milan furniture fair, so currently, we are onboarding the first clients?that we met there?—?companies from Portugal and Italy. Our current active sales focus is in the Netherlands and Denmark.

Are there any challenges you have to overcome?

We need to polish our sales pitch?and?value communication. If we manage to get 1 hour to show our solution?—?the sale usually converts. But if we get a meeting for only up to 15 minutes, we still struggle to communicate the value, even though the value points are clear:??increase in revenue through online exposure and more efficiency from workers through automation of sales tasks. Often,?the clients struggle to see what it will look like in their daily routines.

What are your plans for the next year?

We plan to onboard 50-100 companies as clients, showing our traction and product market fit. Our aim is to establish a working sales and onboarding process. After our milestones are achieved, we will be raising another funding round to scale our product sales across the EU.

Bonus question: what makes your startup special?

Our team?are?hardcore e-commerce developers that have been using?Shopify/Magento/WooCommerce platforms and plugins in developing 1000+ projects for other clients. We know the ins and outs of e-commerce tools,?and we coded?everything that we couldn’t have on other platforms?into ours!?Our?main goal was to?build an?easy-to-work-with?and well-developed technical solution. And we?achieved this?—?we?reduced?the time it takes to upload a sofa with all configurations from 3 hours to 10 mins! The things we missed in other platforms, our love,?and niching this product to the furniture market make it super unique and a real problem solver for companies in this industry.

Visit?Furnisystems’s?website?to?get to know their product, and don’t forget to follow the team on?Linkedin.

Or speak to the team directly about collaborating with them: [email protected]

Learn more about FIRSTPICK’s accelerator?here.