Wayfair LLC is a U.S.-based multinational e-commerce company. The company—formerly known as CSN Stores—began selling furniture online in 2002, and now sells many other home furnishings,luggage, toys, and pet items from over 11,000 brands. Headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, Wayfair also has warehouse and corporate locations elsewhere in the United States, and in Australia, Germany, Ireland, and the United Kingdom.

 

History

2002 to 2006:

Entrepreneurs Niraj Shah and Steve Conine founded Wayfair in August 2002 – then as just a two-person company with a makeshift headquarters in Conine’s nursery in Boston, Massachusetts. Both Shah and Conine hold bachelors of science degrees from Cornell University. The pair had run two previous companies—Simplify Mobile and iXL, a global consulting firm—before starting Wayfair.

 

As of February 2013, Shah is the Chief Executive Officer of the company, and Conine is the Chairman and Chief Technology Officer.

 

Originally known as CSN Stores (the name deriving from a mix of Shah and Conine’s initials), the company began with a single website, racksandstands.com, which sold media stands and storage furniture.

 

In 2003, the company added patio and garden goods suppliers along with three online stores and over a dozen employees and relocated the headquarters out of Conine’s house and into an office on Newbury Street, in Boston.
 

 

Over the next two years, the company expanded its catalogue to include home décor, office, institutional, and kitchen and dining furniture and materials, home improvement goods, bed and bath materials, luggage, and lighting. In 2006, the company earned $100 million in sales for the first time.

 

2007 to 2010:

For the next four years, the company expanded aggressively and exponentially both in the U.S. and in international markets.

 

In 2008, CSN Stores began shipping to Canada and selling in the United Kingdom, and opened an office in London. In the same year, the Boston Business Journal ranked the company the #1 fastest growing private ecommerce company inMassachusetts, and the #4 fastest growing private company overall.

 

In 2009, the company expanded to Australia and Germany.

 

In 2010, the company relocated to its current headquarters, occupying 10 floors of 177 Huntington Avenue. At the end of that year, the company launched Joss & Main, a members’ only private sales online store.

 

2011 to present:

By 2011, CSN Stores owned over 200 online shops, largely niche shops for specific products, like cookware.com, strollers.com, and everyatomicclock.com, etc. In an effort to scale, to direct traffic to a single site, and to unify the aesthetic of the company, Shah and Conine decided to rebrand CSN Stores as Wayfair.

 

To market the new brand and to increase its expansion, the company raised US$165 million funding from four investment firms: Battery Ventures, Great Hill Partners, HarbourVest Partners, and Spark Capital in June 2011.

 

Wayfair.com launched on September 1, 2011 As of July 2012, Wayfair had consolidated all of its niche websites, with the exception of Joss & Main and AllModern, into Wayfair.com. In August 2012, Wayfair launched Wayfair Supply, a single destination for Wayfair's business, government and institutional customers.

 

As of today, Wayfair is the second largest online housewares and furnishing retailer in the United States, and the 50th largest online retailer in the United States. The company earned $380 million in revenue in 2010, and over $500 million in 2011. 

 

Current stores and services

Wayfair

Wayfair sells the entire catalogue of all former niche sites of CSN stores. This includes furniture, home décor, kitchen and dining products, bed and bath products, patio and garden goods, home improvement products, recreational goods, and baby and children’s toys and furniture.

 

AllModern

AllModern sells modern furniture and modern home goods, which opened in 2007. Products sold at AllModern are from many top designer companies, including Missoni, Herman Miller, Knoll, Philippe Starck, Vitra, and Steelcase. Many of AllModern’s products are also available at Wayfair.

 

Joss & Main

Launched in 2010, Joss & Main offers limited-time sales on a variety of products. Shoppers must be members of Joss & Main in order to view events and make purchases. Sales are released, typically from three brands a day, at 11 a.m. ET each day, and usually last for 72 hours.

 

Wayfair Supply

Wayfair Supply caters to businesses, governments and schools, selling commercial-grade furniture, office supplies and other related goods. The site allows customers to shop by industry or product type.

 

Locations

As of today, Wayfair has seven locations across the globe.

1. Global Headquarters: 177 Huntington Ave., Boston, Massachusetts. Over 700 employees, about 75% of the entire company, works in the headquarters. The founders, human resources, marketing, engineering, finance, customer service, and other departments primarily work there.

2. Warehouse and Customer Service Center: Ogden, Utah. Acquired in 2011, this location manages shipping to the western part of the United States. The Ogden location is transitioning to also become Wayfair’s primary customer service center.

3. Warehouse: Hebron, Kentucky. Also acquired in 2011, this location manages orders across the contiguous United States.

4. European Operations Centre: Galway, Ireland.

5. United Kingdom Office: London, England.

6. German Office: Berlin, Germany. The Berlin office manages buying, merchandising, and logistics for German business.

7. Australian Headquarters: Sydney, Australia. In September 2011, Wayfair purchased the Australian home goods retailer, buyster, and converted it to Wayfair.com.au in July 2012. 

 

Culture

Wayfair has adopted a largely informal culture. All ten floors of its headquarters have an open floor plan, a deliberate choice of Conine and Shah to encourage collaboration and to foster employee openness. Not even Shah or Conine has his own office; they have desks in the midst of all other employees The company also issues a very loose dress code, with employees dressing in everything from business casual to flip-flops. Shah and Conine advocate a strong “work-life balance” in their employees. In December 2011, Wayfair was ranked the 19th best place to work in the United States by Glassdoor,[and in August 2012, the same publication ranked Wayfair #18 for work-life balance.
 

The company encourages growth and exploration by its employees, and offers many classes through Wayfair University – an internal program that includes classes ranging from career planning to software tutorials to yoga.
 

The company's Engineering team maintains a blog.

 

Awards & Accolades

2012

• Ranked No. 19 on Glassdoor.com's 50 Best Places to Work Employee's Choice Awards.

• Ranked No. 50 of 500 on the Internet Retailer 500 by Internet Retailer magazine

• Ranked No. 18 on Glassdoor.com's 25 Best Places for Work-Life Balance.

 

2011

• Named "Private Company of the Year" by Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council.

• Ranked No. 51 of 500 on the Internet Retailer 500 by Internet Retailer magazine

• Named to Boston Business Journal's Pacesetters list of the fastest-growing private companies in Massachusetts

 

2010

• Ranked No. 61 of 500 on the Internet Retailer 500 by Internet Retailer magazine

 

2009

• Ranked No. 63 of 500 on the Internet Retailer 500 by Internet Retailer magazine

 

2008

• Named to the 2009 Hot 100 by Internet Retailer magazine

• Ranked No. 492 on the Inc. 500 list of fastest growing companies in the United States by Inc. magazine

• Ranked No. 69 of 500 on the Internet Retailer 500 by Internet Retailer magazine

• Ranked No. 4 in Top 60 Pacesetters for the fastest-growing private companies in Massachusetts by the Boston Business Journal

 

2007

• Ranked No. 147 on the Inc. 500 list of fastest growing companies in the United States by Inc. magazine

• Ranked No. 107 of 500 on the Internet Retailer 500 by Internet Retailer magazine

 

Company Rating: 3.8

 

CEO Approval: Niraj Shah, 96%

Bottom Line: A very fast-moving, young company, it's easy to get caught up in the number of things Wayfair is trying to do. But the company treats its employees well and still offers equity to its employees.

 

Employee Feedback:

"Short individual and interesting projects gives responsibility to take the project from the beginning to the end. Very open environment where people are willing to share information and help out."

 

"The pay is low. It is right in Boston, so you are paying to commute or live in the city. The pay should be higher to reflect this, but it is something that they are working on."

 

"Great coworkers, young community. The company tries to provide group building activities by giving cash ever month to go out with your group. Generally a good attitude around the office, except it is a tolling position when you're getting yelled at so there is definite negativity as well."