Have you ever imagined how long it takes to furnish a new apartment? Most renters and homeowners spend countless hours coming with the design. In some cases, some hire interior designers and home decors. Then they have to take the painful weekend trips to furniture stores like IKEA to find ideal furniture to match the design before final furniture assembly. Instead of the do-it-your self furnishing, why not hire the experts to do the work for you so you can spend your quality time with friends and family? Enter Oliver Space, a tech startup aimed at beautifully furnish your home quickly and easily with one low monthly cost.
Today, Oliver Space announced it has emerged from stealth with $6.8 million in seed funding round to fuel multi-city expansion. The startup officially launched its service in the San Francisco Bay Area. The funding was led by Mayfield Fund, with participation from Abstract Ventures. Other backers include notable angel investors include Jana Messerschmidt and April Underwood (Hashtag Angels); Julia & Kevin Hartz (Co-founders and CEO at Eventbrite); Michael Ovitz (Founder of Creative Artists Agency); Eric Wu (CEO of Opendoor) and various Uber executives.
Founded in 2019 by Chan Park, 32, Former Head of Expansion and General Manager of Uber Asia, Oliver Space aims to remove decision paralysis and difficulty of design, exhausting trips to IKEA, and long order wait times, instead giving users back their valuable time. What sets Oliver Space apart from other companies is the hyper-personalized, concierge-like experience in the design process.
As someone who had moved over 25 times himself, Park realized what people need is not just the flexibility of not owning, but how to design their space and what items to choose without having to hire an interior designer. Oliver offers everything from furniture to rugs to even plants and pillows and helps customers put them together to create a beautiful space with moodboards, video calls and more.
“As our desires and expectations for a well-designed living space have only increased, there has been no change in the drudgery and hassle required to attempt to create that environment for young families and professionals,” said investor Rishi Garg, a Partner at Mayfield Fund. “Chan’s vision of a world free of wasteful and painful IKEA trips and moving boxes, with flexible, well-designed spaces available for all at the push of a button, has captivated us from the beginning and we’re proud to back him and his team on such an important journey.”
With Oliver Space, customers collaborate directly with the Customer Experience team to decide on the layout and design of their space providing provides one-on-one, personalized concierge services. Oliver then delivers and assembles all of the furniture within a matter of days, at convenient times for the customer. With a low monthly subscription, customers end up paying a fraction of the retail price for their items, without having to spend money upfront to furnish their space. This model gives back the customer the flexibility to decide down the road if they want to keep their furniture for a lifetime or have Oliver Space take it away when they’re ready to move again.
“The feeling of home is something that everyone deserves, regardless of whether you plan to be there for 6 months or 6 years. I had just accepted that if I moved around so much, it wasn’t worth it to invest in nice things for my space. The thought of picking out new furniture for each move that fit my apartment, coordinating the logistics of delivery and assembly around my busy schedule, and the high upfront costs didn’t make sense when I didn’t know where I would be in one year,” Park said.
