Made.com wins Online Retail Award

Made.com, the designer furniture supplier founded by 2010 Young Guns Ning Li, Chloe Macintosh and Julien Callede, has won the Online Retail awards in the Home and Home Improvement category, the second year in a row in which the firm has collected the award.

The awards, which celebrate accessible and innovative propositions in the online retail sphere, described Made.com as a ‘genuinely fascinating experience’ for consumers, citing the site’s ease of use, attractive design and unique business model as reasons for the accolade, as well as praising the firm’s growth in the last 12 months.

Made.com was founded in April 2010 after former investment banker  Ning Li saw the potential in selling designer furniture directly from manufacturers to consumers as opposed to through High Street stores, eliminating the considerable price mark-up involved and saving consumers up to 70% on the price of furniture, as well as giving designers the opportunity for wider exposure.

Together with COO Julien Callede and Creative Director Chloe Macintosh, the business raised £2.5m of investment and since then has grown at the rate of around 20-30% per month. The business has 80 staff, with 20 working in Shanghai where the manufacturers are based, and they deliver an estimated shipping container’s worth of goods to customers every day.

Founder and CEO Ning Li commented: “Obviously we are very thrilled to win the award – the team has been working very hard over the past year to realise our vision to change the way furniture works and this is another step to achieving that.

It feels like forever since we started but really we’re still in our infancy. The next couple of years will be focused on optimisation of our offering in the UK, especially in customer service, and we’re also looking to expand into another European country very soon – watch this space!”