A vibrant and forward-thinking furniture rental business, Furlenco serves city people looking for adaptable and fashionable living options. Furlenco, an Indian company, offers a large selection of kitchen, living room, and bedroom furniture in addition to necessary household appliances.
In this article, we explore the Furlenco business model and how the company makes money through its subscription-based rental services.
About Furlenco
In 2012, Ajith Mohan Karimpana created Furlenco. In October 2011, it began as “Rent Ur Duniya” before changing its name to Furlenco. Its products are thoughtfully chosen to satisfy the needs and preferences of modern lives. with addition to being ideal for families and young professionals who move about a lot, Furlenco’s products are also ideal for people who would rather not be constrained by the high expenses and obligations involved with buying furniture. Customers may browse, choose, and have their chosen furniture delivered and installed hassle-free thanks to the company’s user-friendly online platform.
With Furlenco’s subscription-based business model, clients can rent furniture for a variety of lengths of time, from months to years, depending on their needs. Without having to worry about ownership, this concept enables customers to continuously update or modify their furniture arrangement to suit their changing needs and preferences. Furlenco also provides customised furniture packages that are regularly updated to take into account customer preferences and the newest trends. Because customers are more likely to stick with a service that can easily adjust to their changing lifestyles, this strategy not only guarantees customer happiness but also improves customer retention.
How Furlenco Makes Money?
Furlenco’s revenue model is based mostly on these membership fees, which offer a consistent and reliable source of income.
Generating Revenue Through Subscription Fees– In order to keep the furniture in excellent shape, customers pay a monthly leasing cost that covers maintenance and upgrading services.
Generating Revenue Through Premium Charges- Through extra services like damage waiver policies and premium packages, which offer benefits like reduced tenure commitments and first dibs on recently introduced furniture lines, Furlenco further augments its revenue.
Generating Revenue Through Wide Variety of Products- Furlenco sustains a steady revenue stream by utilising a variety of product offerings and adaptable subscription plans, all the while always innovating to satisfy the changing demands of its clientele.
This concept helps the business reduce the depreciation risks usually connected with furniture while simultaneously optimising lifetime customer value.
USP of Furlenco
By incorporating sustainable practices into the sharing economy, businesses like Furlenco are setting the norm and advancing the much-needed circular economy and that is its main USP.
SWOT Analysis of Furlenco
SWOT Analysis of Furlenco
Strengths
Since 2012, Furlenco has built strong relationships with its clients, and as a result, it has been able to reach most of its potential market by offering fantastic home décor services.
Creating a Strong Dealer Community helps the sales staff explain the advantages of the items to clients and motivates the dealers to market the company’s goods and services.
Furlenco has been successful in cultivating a highly skilled workforce through training and learning initiatives. Furlenco invests a lot of money in the training and development of its staff, which produces a group of people that are not only extremely skilled but also motivated to achieve more.
Weaknesses
Furlenco has a distinctive marketing approach, but other new businesses and other well-known brands are also developing fresh approaches.
Furlenco’s potential for growth may be constrained by its concentration on particular demographics and geographical areas.
Poor customer service, especially with relation to order pickups and delays, has been noted by a few consumers.
Opportunities
Furlenco has the potential to investigate opportunities to expand into new consumer segments and geographical markets.
Lead generation and service promotion can be achieved by utilising social media platforms for targeted advertising, including sponsored advertisements and organic content.
Working along with other enterprises, like real estate firms or interior designers, can open up new growth opportunities.
Threats
With new competitors joining the market, the furniture rental industry is becoming more competitive.
Uncertainty in the economy might affect consumer spending and lower demand for luxuries like furniture rental.
Supply chain interruptions, including those brought on by world events, may affect product availability and delivery schedules.
Conclusion
The transformation of Furlenco from a start-up to a major force in the furniture rental industry is a perfect example of strategic innovation, customer-focused service, and flexibility. Furlenco is not only meeting customer expectations but also establishing the standard for the industry as a whole by continuing to place a high priority on adaptability, sustainability, and a flawless user experience. Furlenco is a shining example of how to prosper in a world where convenience reigns supreme and access surpasses ownership by genuinely comprehending and satisfying the changing needs of its clientele.
Furlenco is an Indian furniture rental company that offers stylish and adaptable furniture and home appliances for rent.
Who is the founder of Furlenco?
Furlenco was founded by Ajith Mohan Karimpana in 2012. It was initially launched as “Rent Ur Duniya” in October 2011 before rebranding to Furlenco.
What is Furlenco’s business model?
Furlenco operates on a subscription-based rental model where customers pay a monthly fee to use furniture and appliances. The model allows flexibility in rental duration, easy upgrades, and minimal ownership hassle.
Changing and moving is a part of life. With the rise in corporate culture, shifting has become more frequent among the youngsters.
Nowadays, people don’t settle in one place for their entire life. They tend to shift due to work, weather, or other reasons. When it comes to shifting, the first thing that gives a sense of stress is the shifting of furniture.
The process of furniture shifting can be prone to damage and also expensive. So, a great idea here is to rent furniture. This means you can keep and enjoy the furniture for as long as you like. Plus, you don’t have to worry about shifting, as you can return it.
In India, we have many furniture rental startups that make the process easy.
In simple words, furniture renting helps you to enjoy good quality furnishings without a long commitment. It helps you to adjust to changing living situations.
If you are someone who keeps on moving from one place to another, this is the perfect choice for you. Buying furniture and moving it every time you have to shift can be troubling. This can lead to damage to some high-end furnishings. Also, shifting furniture is quite an expensive process.
So, you can find furniture as per your preferences and need anywhere. Then you can make payments monthly or for a whole year. In this way, you can have the furniture without any lifelong commitment to it.
Furniture Rental Startups in India
Gone are the days when people would buy furniture and settle with it for the rest of their lives. The youngsters nowadays don’t like such sort of commitments with anything.
They like the concept of moving, changing, exploring. Youngsters nowadays keep on moving for work, exploration, or adventure. So, furniture renting startups is a new go-to platform for many.
These startups enable people to order furnishings online. People simply have to pay rent for the time they need the furniture. When their need is over, they can send it back. This no long-term commitment is what is contributing to the success of many startups.
The following are some of the startups for renting furniture in India:
Pepperfry
Pepperfry – Top Furniture Rental Startup in India
Pepperfry is an online platform for all kinds of home furnishings shopping. It was launched in the year 2011. Its founders are Ambareesh Murty and Ashish Shah. The startup has its headquarters in Mumbai, India.
Cityfurnish – Top Furniture Rental Startup in India
Cityfurnish, the e-commerce platform offers the facility of renting furniture. It was founded in 2015. Its founders are Neerav Jain, Saurabh Gupta, and Vinit Jain. The company is headquartered in Gurugram, Haryana, India.
Cityfurnish offers a wide variety of modern contemporary furniture. People can rent quality and durable furniture right from their homes. It offers services like free delivery and setup at home. They also offer free maintenance of the furniture.
An Indian startup, Cityfurnish not only offers services in Gurugram but also to other big cities.
Rentickle
Rentickle – Top Furniture Rental Startup in India
It is a startup for renting furniture. It launched in the year 2015. Amit Sodhi and Vineet Chawla are the founders. The startup has headquarters in Delhi.
The company’s main goal appears in its tagline. This is to help people turn their houses into homes. It has home furniture items, home furnishings, electronics, and other appliances on rent. The quality of the products offered here is exclusive with a wide variety.
This became so popular that it was able to gain more than 10,000 subscribers in its first two years. Since then, it has been a go-to stop for the people who wants to rent furnishings.
Furlenco
Furlenco – Top Furniture Rental Startup in India
This startup for renting furniture was founded in the year 2012. Ajith Karimpana is the founder of the Furlenco. The company has headquarters located in Bengaluru.
Here, people can rent a range of quality furniture like beds, dining tables, sofas, and also full room setup packs. The platform also offers great discounts on furniture to the customers.
Furlenco is in service in many metropolitan cities of India.
Furlenco- Furniture Rental Startup in India
Rentomojo
Rentomojo – Top Furniture Rental Startup in India
Another popular Indian platform for renting furniture is Rentomojo. It was established in the year 2014. Geetansh Bamania, an ex-IITM, is the founder of the startup. The headquarters of the company is in Bengaluru.
Rentomojo provides various categories of products. From furniture to electronics, the platform has everything for furnishing. The company also offers smartphones for rent.
The company provides services beyond Bengaluru as well.
Guarented
Guarented – Top Furniture Rental Startup in India
This is another popular startup in India for having furniture on rent. It was established in the year 2015. Its founders are Abhimanyu Dikshit, Harshwardhan Raikwar, and Prateek Agrawal. The startup has its headquarters in Bengaluru, India.
The company enables people can pay affordable prices and get durable quality furniture on rent. The idea is to cater to the needs of people who don’t want to own things. Also, the people who are always on a move or have troubles with finances.
On Guarented, you can find a great variety of beds, refrigerators, dining tables, mattresses, sofa, etc.
Voko
Voko – Top Furniture Rental Startup in India
Voko, the Indian startup for renting was established in the year 2016. Its founders are Bhuvnesh Sharma and Harsh Vardhan. Both of them were earlier employees at OYO. The company’s headquarters are in Gurugram.
The startup focuses on the needs of youngsters moving from one place to another. It has a variety of furniture, electronics, and other appliances. These include Television, fridge, beds, tables, etc.
Conclusion
With the advent of technology and digitalization, everyone wants everything on their phones. The lifestyle among the youngsters is getting more and more mobile. This mobility has given a boost to furniture rental startups.
The furniture rental startups enable people to find a variety right in their smartphones. They can browse from an endless range of variety and pay rent for it. These startups also offer discounts, free installation, and maintenance. In India, there is a rise in mobility and income among working professionals. This is an ideal atmosphere for furniture rental startups to grow more in the future.
FAQs
Which are the top furniture rental startups in India?
Top 7 Furniture Rental Startups in India are:
Pepperfry
Guarented
Cityfurnish
Rentickle
Furlenco
Rentomojo
Voko
Can we rent furniture from Pepperfry?
Yes, Pepperfry provides furniture renting service since 2017.
Which are the Indian start up dealing in online furniture sales?
Some of the top Indian Startups that deals in selling furniture are:
The whole millennial generation today is all about renting rather than owning! Right? Be it shared cabs, carpools, co-working spaces, or renting home accessories, millennials are up for it. And following that premise, IIT-Guwahati graduates – Manish S. Sugandhi, Shubham Jain and Aditya Sharma launched GrabOnRent in the year 2015. Read this article to know more about GrabOnRent founders, competitors, funding, growth, wiki, and future plans.
GrabOnRent attempts to promote optimal utilization of the products by offering flexible rental times. This means that you can rent the item either on an hourly, daily or monthly basis.
GrabOnRent is ideally a product rental marketplace that aggregates various vendors in the market who own brick-and-mortar shops for rentals to the buyers on the platform. The idea of the co-founders behind GrabOnRent is to provide accessibility of the home products like furniture and other categories to everybody irrespective of their capacity to buy it.
GrabOnRent helps its users in renting products online across 8 major categories namely furniture, appliances, eventsupplies which includes lights, sound systems, etc, bicycles, cameras, gaming consoles, party items like hukka, barbeque, etc, and adventure gear. Also, it essentially enables the renting of cool gadgets such as Pebble Smartwatch, Kindle e-book readers, and Hoverboards. GrabOnRent has a provision that allows the buyer to try the product before buying for a minimal amount.
GrabOnRent summer advertisement
GrabOnRent follows a clear methodological bucket system to address the concerns of a wide population like in India. These four buckets are as follows:
Discoverability – This bucket is all about creating awareness in the market and amongst the target market allowing them to browse the possible and available products on rent.
Quality Assurance in refurbished products – This bucket stands in the list to improve the ‘sticky-ness’ towards the service GrabOnRent is providing and also gain the loyalty of the suppliers who have recurring customers due to the consistently improved quality.
Convenience – This bucket includes online payment mechanisms (or COD) and effective logistics service, to and fro so that seamless experience can be provided to the consumers.
Trust – This bucket involves dealing with a much-specialized product rental firm against vendor forms the basic layer of trust apart from the combination of quality assured products and supreme customer service to the users of GrabOnRent.
GrabOnRent Logo
Things work pretty simply on GrabOnRent. All the users need to do is browse through the superiorly extensive array of products, then select the item they want to buy and go on to make the payment online towards the rent and security deposit. The item gets delivered to the user’s doorstep, without any further delay.
Each item at GrabOnRent passes through a very strict and stringent quality check before getting shipped to, therefore, ensure the best of services to the users. Post usage, the item gets picked up from the doorstep and the security deposit is returned online after verification and quality check of the used item.
GrabOnRent has essentially tapped into the market that is being brought by the constantly shifting millennials of the current generation. These millennials do not care that much about putting down roots as the generations before them.
Moreover, this saves them a lot of money as well so obviously, this seems like a better option to them. On GrabOnRent’s website, the users can rent products as per their convenience, be it for an hour or a day or even for months and years. The interesting part is that both refurbished and new products are listed on this website.
GrabOnRent – Founders and Team
The founders of GrabOnRent are Manish S. Sugandhi, Shubham Jain and Aditya Sharma.
GrabOnRent – Founders
Shubham Jain is the Co-founder and CEO at GrabOnRent. An IIT Guwahati graduate, Shubham has earlier co-founded Trip Engineers. Before GrabOnRent, he was working with Perdix Business Solutions as the Head of User Experience.
Aditya Sharma is the Co-founder and CTO at GrabOnRent. Again, graduated from IIT Guwahati, Aditya was a senior R&D Engineer at Hewlett-Packard before launching his current venture.
Manish S. Sugandhi, Co-founder of GrabOnRent – This venture is not Manish’s first. Before this one, he had co-founded Perdix Business Solutions and was a Business Analyst at Flipkart. And Manish is also an IIT- Guwahati graduate.
Everything around GrabOnRent started during one of the founders’ own crises moments. And that’s exactly when the idea for GrabOnRent struck them. So it happened so that they had to organize a barbecue for a party one evening, and they ended up having a tough time just to find out where to rent it from.
And they finally decided to buy a new one because there seemed to be no way they could avail it on rent. This particular experience drew the founders closer to the tremendous amount of hassles people face while renting objects, and this triggered a new idea.
GrabOnRent – Startup Launch
“As the idea for GrabOnRent started taking shape and we were drawing out a plan of action, we had some reservations – what should be our target group, should we launch a fully functional product or a hacky one, which categories to start with, should we introduce an app-only model or an app-website model, etc”, says Shubham Jain, co-founder of GrabOnRent.
The founders then finally decided to keep the ever-increasing questions aside and they moved forward to launching their venture. Hence, GrabOnRent was launched with two preliminary categories in Bangalore. And to reach out to the target audience, the team started distributing pamphlets and as a result of which they also got the first few clients in the first week itself. All of this was followed by the fairly good inflow of orders, positive customer feedback, and guidance from industry leaders, GrabOnRent paved its way forward to the successful journey of building a startup.
Grab On Rent competes with other startups in the space like Rentomojo, Rentwala, Rentongo, Rentmasti, RentSher, etc. However, GrabOnRent is perceived to have only two of these startups as its real competitors. They are Furlenco and Rentomojo. Grab On Rent considers these two as competition for the simple reason that these startups have huge amounts under their kitties. Amongst these, Furlenco is into the opulent furniture segment and Rentomojo is dealing with furniture and appliances and both of these hold inventory whereas GrabOnRent doesn’t.
GrabOnRent – Funding and Investors
The funding amount of GrabOnRent stands at $3 million.
Date
Stage
Amount
Investors
June 2016
Seed Round
$1 Million
IvyCap Ventures, Unicorn India Ventures
June 2017
Venture Round
–
IvyCap Ventures, Unicorn India Ventures
April 2018
Venture Round
$2 Million
IvyCap Ventures, Unicorn India Ventures
GrabOnRent is funded by 2 investors – Unicorn India Ventures and IvyCap Ventures.
GrabOnRent – Growth
Serves more than 35,000 customers
The average ticket size of INR 1800
The average rental duration is about 12 months
Team size of 103 across four cities
Currently active in four cities- Bangalore, Hyderabad, Mumbai, and Gurugram.
Sells more than 500 unique products across 8 different categories
“Moving ahead, some of our plans are – We are strongly focused on expansion, and have immediate plans to launch our services in Pune, NCR region and Chennai. We wish to increase awareness about our platform and have more and more people use our services for renting purposes. Our target is to have around 2 million customers by the end of 2020″, concluded Shubham Jain, co-founder of GrabOnRent.
However, sadly GrabOnRent Shut down their operations in September of 2020. It might have been due to their inability to raise more funds, being ahead of their time or them losing the trademark infringement case by GrabOn It could be a culmination of all three.
GrabOnRent – FAQs
What is GrabOnRent?
GrabOnRent helps its users in renting products online across 8 major categories namely furniture, appliances, eventsupplies which includes lights, sound systems, etc, bicycles, cameras, gaming consoles, party items like hukka, barbeque, etc, and adventure gear.
Does GrabOnRent own the products?
GrabOnRent doesn’t own any of the items. It is a marketplace, wherein based on the customers’ choice it collects the product from the vendor and delivers it. After the completion of rental tenure it returns the product back.
Who is the founder of GrabOnRent?
The founders of GrabOnRentare Manish S, Sugandhi, Shubham Jain and Aditya Sharma.
What is Rent-to-Own?
Rent-to-Own is a specially designed program. Wherein You can try the products by using them on rent and if you love them so much that you can’t live without them, purchase them from GrabOnRent at special discounted prices that are pre-defined.
Is it better to buy or rent furniture?
Buying your own furniture is an expensive process, requiring a high amount of money that requires to be paid up front. Whereas the key benefit of renting furniture is the fact that only a negligible amount is paid up front, with a reasonable rent to be paid monthly.
Has GrabOnRent Shut down?
Yes, unfortuntely, GrabOnRent has to shutdown operation in September of 2020.
Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by CityFurnish.
Furniture, appliances and interior equipment adds life to any space be it a home/ office/ gym or a restaurant. These units besides keeping space organized, makes our lives easy and efficient. However, owning high quality, well designed, highly efficient furniture and appliances could cost you a fortune.
Solving this issue is a Gurugram based startup, CityFurnish. With CityFurnish, one can own high quality furniture and appliances based on affordable rental subscriptions, rather than spending a fortune on buying them. CityFurnish provides a wide array of products within the domain of furniture and appliances on rental subscription. Here is a how CityFurnish is making a mark for itself in the Indian furniture rental Industry.
Read about CityFurnish Founders, Competitors, Growth, Funding, Business Model, Revenue, Awards etc.,
CityFurnish (CityFurnish India Pvt Ltd.) provides products ranging from furniture, furnishings, consumer appliances and fitness equipment on rental subscription. Besides offering high quality rental products for residential purpose, the company also has an accelerating presence into the commercial and hospitality segments
CityFurnish’s vision is to be a benchmark in the country’s Furniture Rental Industry. The brand is currently servicing Delhi NCR, Bengaluru, Mumbai, Pune, Gurgaon, Ghaziabad/Noida and Hyderabad and plans to expand its business soon.
The key focus area for CityFurnish founder, Neerav Jain is to drive the Company towards growth by way of strengthening the brand and by leveraging upon inherent strengths of the business, offering a one stop solution to customers for their complete furniture and furnishing needs.
This is how CityFurnish Works-
Customers can choose from the variety of products, packages and add-ons available, if there is no package catering to your needs; you can make your own package by adding the individual items in your cart.
Customers need to make an advance payment for one month and provide some documents for the KYC process.
Once the payment is done and documents are provided, the products will be dispatched within a period of a maximum of 72 hour.
CityFurnish is revolutionizing the furniture industry by providing quality furniture and home appliances on easy monthly rental. Renting furniture is the new way to live, and is easy on the pocket. Other benefits of renting furniture are that you don’t need to be stuck with the same old furniture for years and hence, get a chance to renovate the home quite often, as and when one desires. You can also change the furniture according to your needs and not have to deal with the hassle of buying/selling, shifting and relocating.
CityFurnish’s products are crafted in their own state of the art manufacturing facility based in Rajasthan and are thoughtfully designed to provide utmost comfort.
Furniture and Appliances Industry Details
The Indian Furniture Market is anticipated to register a CAGR of 13.38% during the forecast period i.e. 2018-2023. The market is expected to reach USD 61.09 Billion by the end of 2023. Further, the India furniture market is anticipated to achieve a Y-o-Y growth rate of 14.30% in 2023 as compared to the previous year.
The technological advancements such as availability of high speed internet networks such as 4G and spiked absorption of smart gadgets is boosting the e-retail sector in India. These advancements further provide ease to the customers to buy furniture through online channels. Additionally, the growing online furniture selling companies are creating a great boost to the furniture industry.
While, the total furniture market is $20 billion and growing at 15% YoY, Rental market currently is valued at $6 billion in India. The team at CityFurnish estimates that in the next five years the total market for rental furniture would be above $20 billion in India.
Neerav Jain (CEO) and Saurabh Gupta (CTO) are the foundersof CityFurnish.
In a career spanning 3 years, Neerav worked in various key positions at Climpex Furniture and his family business Chandra shekhar Exports before founding CityFurnish. Neerav has extensive experience in furniture industry in managing sales, marketing and Business management (B2B and B2C) and formulating strategies for growth with an overall business perspective.
Neerav Jain (CEO) and Saurabh Gupta (CTO)
Saurabh Gupta, is the co-founder and CTO of CityFurnish. He completed his M.Tech from IIT Roorkee. Before joining Neerav Jain as the Co- founder at CityFurnish, he worked with Vodafone and Amdocs and has experience spanning 10 years. Saurabh is a skilled technology professional and possesses expertise in digital marketing.
Currently CityFurnish has a team of 100+ member across 7 cities. Work culture is value driven to provide value to their customers. At present, they are hiring aggressively and aims to have 200+ staff by end of 2020.
Neerav hails from a family of furniture-makers in Jodhpur, and thus he had a fair idea about the furniture market. One thought – which was the absence of an alternative to buying expensive furniture for short term had struck Neerav and had not left him until he finally established, CityFurnish. He along with his team has conducted, 200+ interviews to validate the idea. Receiving positive response, CityFurnish took the shape of reality.
When we started, almost 99 percent of people in India bought furniture. Renting and subscription was a very niche category because it was looked down upon as a compromise on either product or service. We were trying to change that perception and influence user behavior. We did not want our customers to feel inferior for renting furniture- said CityFurnish founderNeerav Jain
Neerav wanted to explore the rental space that had picked up in India. Mainly, with the increasing salaried young adults living away from their hometowns and moving houses regularly. For such individuals who are constantly on the move, owning the necessary furniture like beds, sofas, tables not only makes a dent in their bank account but also makes city-hopping harder. Hence, to encash upon such population of the community, Neerav worked upon creating a platform for rented furniture.
When we started, we were more focused on acquiring customers. Now, we want to retain more. So, we are offering a 30-40 percent price benefit to renewing customers. We have also launched a free relocation service for customers who are moving cities in the middle of their subscriptions.
CityFurnish started with just 50 rentals (or subscriptions) in Gurugram. Since then, the startup has grown to about 12,000+ live subscriptions in three years, with a presence in Delhi-NCR, Bengaluru, Mumbai, Pune, Gurgaon, Ghaziabad / Noida and Hyderabad.. It has also set up 8 fulfillment centers in 7 cities.CityFurnish offers furniture for a minimum rental tenure of 3 months. As the tenure increase, the rental per month reduces, to make it affordable for user in long run.
CityFurnish – Name, Tagline and Logo
The name CityFurnish intends to highlight the company’s prime target audience along with the core service they are providing. It also stands for the commitment of the team at CityFurnish to furnish any city for their users – hassle free and affordably.
‘ Renting Sets You Free’ is the tagline of CityFurnish.
CityFurnish Logo
CityFurnish – Business Model and Revenue Model
The CityFurnish Business Model underwent a slight change to increase customer retention. Initially, CityFurnish followed hotel booking model. This model included asking people for a start date and an end date for renting. As a result, most of the users subscribed for a short period. Now, they have moved to a Netflix-style subscription model, and that has helped them increase customer retention from 35 percent to more than 52 percent.
CityFurnish has packages suiting wide sections of the community ranging from students, family to corporate setup. These packages are priced on the basis of monthly subscriptions. The basic packagestarts atINR. 900/monthand goes up to INR 4500/month.
The unique feature about CityFurnish that sets it apart from its competitors is their end-to end services. Besides designing and manufacturing its own premium furniture, CityFurnish, unlike many of its peers also controls the end-to-end value chain from product sourcing to fulfillment and delivery. It even services installation and maintenance requests from customers.
“We not only have in-house designers and manufacturers, but our team also provides the ‘wow’ factor for customers. For instance, our delivery boys will roll out the dining mats or tuck in the bedsheets. There is no third party involved, and we control the entire user experience.”
A premium service comes at a premium cost, of course. An average monthly subscription for a 2BHK flat costs about INR 4,000-5,000 on CityFurnish. However, prices fluctuate city-wise due to regional factors.
Home furniture accounts for over 60percent of CityFurnish’s subscriptions. Since recently, its commercial customers have been growing with shared workspaces gaining ground in India. Its current clientele consists of large corporates like Toyota, Indian Oil, and Samsung, as well as local startups
CityFurnish – User Acquisition
For the first 100 customers, CityFurnish used techniques like interview at metros and office hubs, expat meets, broker channel etc. Later on, they have adopted broker tie ups; referral marketing; expat Partnerships; relocation and moving company partnership as strategies to expand their scope and reach among their customers. Besides these strategies, CityFurnish also released coupons regularly to both retain their customers and get new customers.
In India furniture market is pretty big. However, 90% of the buyers prefer offline shopping furniture due to trust deficit about the quality, which is a big challenge for any furniture renting startup. Nevertheless, Neerav’s family legacy in furniture making and his experience in the domain has helped him create sophisticated, elegant and quality furniture and thereby, provide CityFurnish customers a “superior experience”.
At the service end, providing white glove delivery experience involved lot of operations challenges. However, CityFurnish was able to overcome the same by training and organizing workshops for its installation and delivery team.
CityFurnish – Funding and Investors
The CityFurnish funding has seen it raise a total funding of around $5.2 million till date.
CityFurnish raised close to $600,000 from Times Group-owned Brand Capital, and a few undisclosed angels. CityFurnish also received $150,000 from Y-Combinator against 7 percent equity stake. In its latest round of funding, CityFurnish raised $5 million in June 2019.
Here are details of funding received by CityFurnish:
Date
Stage
Amount
Investor
June 2019
Series A
$5m
Paul Buchheit, Soma Capital, Venture Highway, Steve Chen
March 2019
Seed Round
$150K
Y Combinator
July 2016
Seed Round
$600K
Brand Capital
December 2015
Seed Round
–
–
CityFurnish – Advisors and Mentors
CityFurnish by the virtue of its wide scale of operations and gaining popularity has the best of the market as their advisors and mentors. One of the prominent mentor include, Youtube Cofounder – Steve Chan, who is also one of CityFurnish’s investors.
Early in 2019, CityFurnish became one of the four Indian startups to be shortlisted by Y Combinator (the top see accelerator in the US) for a 12-week programme. Under the programme, in exchange of a 7 percent equity stake, CityFurnish gained mentorship, funding, and access to top investors in Silicon Valley.
CityFurnish – Competitors
In the furniture rental market the main competitors of CityFurnish are Furlenco and Rentomojo. Like any domain, it faces little competition from the unorganized sector side, which constitute players like Sab Rent Karo, Rent Macha and FlatFurnish among others.
Nevertheless, the team at CityFurnish is confident about their business having only growth in future. They believe that their unique amalgamation of technology and product which is entirely focused on fulfilling customer need, is what sets them apart. Since the startup manufactures and designs their furniture at their own facility in Jodhpur, it provides them tremendous advantage over their competitors. By having control over the quality and cost of their products, the rental startup is able to manage inventory at more than 95 per cent efficiency than its major competitors and at the same time enable a faster collection of their payments.
With more sticky customers, revenues are looking up as well. CityFurnish claims that it has hit an ARR of $3 million and its revenues are increasing 100 percent year-on-year. Subscribers, meanwhile, are growing 20 percent month-on-month with a 3 percent churn (those who drop out).
CityFurnish has set a target of 70,000+ subscribers by 2021, with an ARR of $8 million. The company has achieved profitabilityand plans to double it’s turnover by end of 2020.
As far as product range is concerned, the startup is planning to expand towards kids’ furniture. At present, their product categories include home and office furniture, consumer durable and appliances, electronics, and fitness equipment. It will launch kids’ furniture shortly as it sees it as a prospective high-growth vertical.
“We see it as a perfect subscription category because kids tend to outgrow furniture every 1-2 years. Hence, it makes more sense to rent than to buy. We’re trying to bring depth and variety to it.”
For expansion along these lines, the startup aims to focus on the population of age group 24-38. CityFurnish plans to be the first firm in renting of furniture from India to start operation across the Globe.
Frequently Asked Questions – FAQs
Who founded CityFurnish?
Neerav Jain and Saurabh Gupta are the foundersof CityFurnish.
What can you rent on CityFurnish?
You can rent anything from home furniture to appliances to office furniture and finess equipment on Cityfurnish.
Is CityFurnish a subscription based model?
Yes, CityFurnish currently follows a subscription-based model.
Purbalee Dutta
