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Co-founded by industry insiders Christiane Lemieux (founder of DwellStudio, sold to Wayfair) and Britt Bunn, The Inside revolutionizes how consumers approach infusing fashion into their homes. Below is our recent interview with Christiane Lemieux, CEO and Founder at The Inside:
Q: What is The Inside?
A: The company sells on-trend home furnishings featuring exclusive designer fabrics and patterns of all kinds, offered at affordable prices and the ability to customize combinations. It features a rotating roster of high profile collaborations with fashion designers, artists and more. Pricing starts at under $100 for accessories such as pillows and many furniture options such as chairs and ottomans are under $500.
Q: What makes The Inside so special?
A: The company is disrupting the $150B home furnishings market by solving the major pain points consumers feel in traditional furniture shopping. The style and prices reflect direct-to-consumer value, the transaction experience is seamless, and a simple drop ship model replaces expensive and long-lead white glove shipping. The Inside is pioneering “digital design” a radically more efficient process that brings product to market faster than ever before and allows the company to offer customers a broader, bolder range of design. All of its imagery is created using VR ready 3D rendering techniques and the company only works with partners who manufacture on-demand within 2-3 weeks, so it carries no inventory, moves fast, can take unconventional design risks.
Everything is made-to-order, shoppers can choose any fabric style on shapes including slipper chairs, headboards, beds, ottomans and removable wallpaper. The company features collaborations with fashion designers, industry insiders and influencers that expand the definition of design and lean into its mantra, #beyondthebeige. This Fall the brand will introduce products from Christene Barberich, the founder of Refinery29, Katherine Carter of the interior design platform Homepolish, Victoria Smith of popular blog SFGirlByBay and Sezane, the French fashion brand.
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Q: What are the founder’s backgrounds?
A: Christiane Lemieux is the CEO, co-founder and creative force behind The Inside. The Parsons grad launched DwellStudio and sold it to Wayfair, where she was the Executive Creative Director. She wrote the critically acclaimed design books Undecorate and The Finer Things and has hosted “Ellen’s Design Challenge” and “Overhaul.”
Britt Bunn is the COO and co-founder of The Inside. Her past experiences include working at One Kings Lane and Bain & Company by way of Stanford Business School and Harvard College.
Q: What made them start The Inside?
A: Co-founder Christiane Lemieux knew there must be a way to deliver the compelling exclusive design and selection we produced at DwellStudio but at the prices and total addressable market we reached at Wayfair. In most marketplaces, the online search algorithm serves up the same beige chair over and over again and underestimates consumer taste. They deserve more. By applying huge advances in technology to the space, The Inside strips out many of the traditional costs associated with the business of home. We deliver value, inspiration and more importantly design to our customer in unprecedented ways.”
Q: Can you walk us through the process of getting funding? Where did you start? What should would-be design entrepreneurs know about the process?
A: The funding process started with singling out consumer focused investors. We diligently looked for people that would be strategic, add value and truly understand the complexities of this business. We were able to pull together a very thoughtful group of institutional investors like Corigin, who has deep real estate experience and Lerer, who brings media to the table. These along with strategic individuals like Susan Lyne and Maxwell Ryan are the type of syndicate we believe is the way to go for companies at our stage.
Q: What will you use the funding for?
A: The new funding will be used to service new customers, build the team, continue to develop its proprietary visualization technology and expand into new categories. The company recently released removable wallpaper and has plans to launch a sofa program by Q4; in time The Inside looks to infuse pattern and fashion to serve the whole home with bedding, tabletop, decorative accessories and more.
Recommended: Q: Who is your typical buyer? Who is your intended buyer?
A: Both consumers and interior designers are our market. We are targeting people who love design and want a personal and original interior space.
Co-founder Britt Bunn reflects on the market opportunity. “Almost 70% of Millennials plan to buy a home in the next five years, we already represent 40% of all furniture purchases and we are looking to shop online. But for the most part, the market hasn’t kept up with our needs: the high-quality selection, affordability, and seamless purchasing experience we are used to from other online verticals. Even in the Pinterest and Instagram age, we lacked a brand of our own. So The Inside was born. The Inside is the next gen home furnishings brand.”
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