A new business growing out of lock-down is seeking to help people with their home furniture purchasing journey.
Founded by Irish/Australian couple Deirdre McGettrick and Ray Wright, ufurnish.com is an innovative, market leading furniture search engine, reinventing the way furniture and furnishings are searched, discovered, compared and shopped online.
Bringing together hundreds of thousands of products from 100+ of Britain’s best furniture retailers, ufurnish.com is connecting consumers to large and small furniture retailers, all on one website. This means consumers can easily search and shop known and unknown retailers within the furniture market, eliminating the fear of missing out on undiscovered items.
Deirdre recalls, “We found the experience of furnishing our home very frustrating and disconnected. Working long hours, the last thing we wanted to do in the evenings was trawl websites to find the right chaise sofa bed or nest of tables, especially as we kept having to repeatedly input the same search criteria on every furniture website we found.”
In addition to helping consumers have a simpler discovery experience when shopping for furniture, the company is also helping retailers to bring their brand and products to the masses.
Research discovered 93% of consumers browsed multiple retailers before making a purchase. The platform eliminates the need to individually search retailer after retailer by bringing search onto one website.
The site currently works with a large variety of trusted retailers including; John Lewis, Dunelm, The French Bedroom Company, My Furniture, Furniture Village, Habitat, Maisons Du Monde and Made.com, and are looking to continually expand their furniture retail partnerships as part of their long- term strategy.
“The way people shop for furniture has been relatively unchanged despite technological advances in other sectors”, says Deidre.
Spotting the opportunity in the market, and encouraged with the movement of purchases transitioning from in store to online, the founders both quit their corporate jobs in London to develop the business.
Having experienced the cumbersome search process first hand, they both came to the conclusion that there had to be a better way to save and compare furniture, which is where the idea for ufurnish.com was born.
Ray and Deirdre found it hard to keep track of products they liked across multiple websites and they found themselves stuck in a rut of lists, URL links, spreadsheets, and screenshots.
“We used Rightmove to find our home online and it was simple. Why didn’t a similar solution exist for finding the furniture that would go into our home?” Deirdre asked herself.
The goal of ufurnish.com is to build a community of shoppers who use the website as their first port-of-call for home furniture search, connecting them with retailers and their vast selection of products.
Ray explains: “It’s all about providing people with maximum choice and the ability to find the right product with ease and enjoyment.”
Powered by its sophisticated, easy to use search engine, products on ufurnish.com are presented by furniture type, enabling consumers to receive bespoke results as they apply filters based on their style and budget specifications.
Through its enhanced website feaures shoppers are able to favourite products and receive value added notifications like sales alerts and retailer promotions. In addition, the site provides home interior inspiration and practical furnishing advice with top tips, style guides and design inspiration. Once consumers are ready to purchase, one click takes them directly to their desired product on the retailers website.
It has taken over a year of working with consumers and furniture retailers, both large and small, to create ufurnish.com. Ray explains that “In order to deliver an innovative and market leading product, we had to truly understand the challenges and limitations that both consumers and retailers have. We didn’t want to launch without a substantial range of products covering all aspects of the home and we had to be sure we could deliver that in the simplest way possible.”
ufurnish.com launched with 100+ retail partners and the website will hit the market with just over 500,000 products to bring the most comprehensive level of choice to people in the easiest way possible.
