Stitchwood raises $400K angel round led by Powai Lake Ventures and angel investors

Sunday July 05, 2015 , 3 min Read

Tangramme Furnishing Solutions Pvt. Ltd., the parent company that runs customised furniture startup, Stitchwood, recently announced that they had raised $400K in an angel round from members of Powai Lake Ventures and a few individual angel investors.

Stitchwood, founded by IITB-IIMA duo Ajit Shegaonkar and Vikas Nair, provides customised furniture based on customers' requirements. They had earlier raised $100K in their seed round from Ajeet Khurana (who also participated in the current round) and other investors.

Read their startup story here: Mumbai-based Stitchwood plans to be an online alternative to the local carpenter

Stitchwood has observed that even though they also offer a 'ready catalogue' of furniture, people have varied tastes and generally don't buy whatever is available directly off the shelf. So to cater to the customers' varied needs, they provide multiple services.

Customers can either design their own couch through the customisation tools on their platform or upload images they find on the internet or from any other source and request for a similar piece of furniture. They can then convey their specific requirements over email, chat or a phone call. Through their visualization feature, Stitchwood provides a virtual reality model of the new furniture in their existing room so that customers can visualize it.

Alternatively, customers can also request for a free on-site visit, where carpenters visit their homes and make recommendations. Stitchwood found that there were equal takers for both offerings. Some people had very clear ideas about what they wanted and were satisfied with the virtual reality models shared with them. Ajit added:

People are not necessarily focussed on getting us to their house and many are satisfied with virtual models as well, for others we provide on-site visits. In terms of revenue, we are seeing a 100% month-on-month growth. We have also been able to quadruple our revenues in the past few months.

Stitchwood currently offers a three-week guarantee of service and also offers exchange offers on old sofas. Ajit added,"This is what we have picked up on: people like to get rid of their old stuff and unless they do so, or place their old furniture somewhere else they aren't able to think about their new furniture requirements. So we are offering to help them in that regard."

Most of their orders are from Mumbai and Pune. Stitchwood has also catered to customers in different parts of the country for ticket sizes beyond one lakh as they can afford to take care of the necessary logistics and deliver anywhere for those order volumes. In the past few months, they have had multiple orders of ticket sizes in the range of two lakhs from Delhi and other cities.

Ajit confirmed that this funding round will mainly be used to enhance their technological capabilities and also for marketing and operations. They are currently a team of 13 and plan to expand to 25 in the next three to four months and the focus will be on strengthening the backend logistics team. They plan to focus on digital and social media marketing to reach out to a wider audience. While they have ensured that their website is mobile-friendly and provides a similar experience, they are also working on a mobile app to be launched in the next quarter.

Website: Stitchwood

Home and furnishing e-commerce has also picked up in India with many startups and companies doing well. Some of the notable names in this segment are Pepperfry, homehero, Urban Ladder, and FabFurnish.

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