Polyvore

Polyvore
Web address polyvore.com
Available in English
Owner Yahoo
Launched February 1, 2007
Alexa rank
 Increase 1195[1]

Polyvore is a community-powered social commerce website headquartered in Silicon Valley, California. Community members curate products into a shared product index, and use them to create image collages called "Sets". Active Polyvore communities exist in the areas of interior design and artistic expression, and in the primary area of fashion. Polyvore opened an office in New York City in August 2012. In August 2012 Polyvore was receiving 17 million unique monthly visitors, a number which grew to 20 million in May 2014.

Polyvore was initially funded in three rounds by six investors, including initial investors Benchmark Capital and Harrison Metal, and Matrix Partners and DAG Ventures as lead investors in later rounds. It was acquired by Yahoo on July 31, 2015.

History

Polyvore started as a prototype developed by Pasha Sadri in August 2006. Jianing Hu and Guangwei Yuen joined Sadri to form the founding team, which launched of the first version of the website in 2007.[2] Polyvore Inc. was formed in August of the same year. The company received US$2.5 million in series A funding from Benchmark and Harrison Metal in December 2007.[3]

In August 2009, Polyvore reached four million unique visitors, 150 million pageviews a month, and received US$5.6 million in series B funding led by Matrix Partners, alongside previous investors Benchmark Capital and Harrison Metal Capital.[4][3]

The New Yorker profiled Polyvore in March 2010, calling it a “fashion democracy” and a “world of virtual Anna Wintours”. At the time, Polyvore received 6.6 million unique visitors.[5]

Polyvore reached profitability in 2011, with Colleen Taylor of GigaOm stating, “Polyvore’s product-first strategy seems to be paying off: an eighth of Polyvore’s audience comes back to the site more than 100 times per month.”[6] For that same year, Polyvore was named in Entrepreneur Magazine’s 100 Most Brilliant Companies list,[7] and as number 29 of Time Magazine’s 50 Best Websites.[8]

Polyvore received US$14 million in Series C funding from DAG Ventures, Goldman Sachs, Matrix, and Vivi Nevo in January 2012,[3][9] bringing its total venture capital-backing to $22 million as of January 2012.[3]

Shortly afterward, in February 2012, Polyvore partnered with CoverGirl to launch "Polyvore Live", a live-streamed fashion show during Mercedes Benz Fashion Week, that showcased the collections of four alumni from the Fashion Institute of Technology, Lauren Bagliore, Vengsarkar “Ven” Budhu, Sergio Guadarrama, and Dana-Maxx Pomerantz.[10] That same year, Polyvore was named by Fast Company as number 28 of its 50 Most Innovative Companies of the year.[11]

In August 2012, Polyvore opened its first New York office, in SoHo, with Mayor Michael Bloomberg issuing a personal welcome: “By opening an office here, Polyvore is joining the growing group of tech companies who recognize that the benefits of being in New York City are irresistible, regardless of where a startup began.”[12] In November 2012, the company launched its inaugural iOS app, and Polyvore's website achieved a 19 million monthly unique visitor count.[13]

By May 2014, over three million members had downloaded the Polyvore iPhone app and the company was reporting 20 million unique visitors per month; in that month, the company launched its first Android app.[14]

On July 31, 2015, Yahoo and Polyvore announced that Yahoo would acquire Polyvore for an undisclosed amount to augment its e-commerce operations.[15] According to Eric Jackson, manager of hedge fund SpringOwl, Yahoo purchased Polyvore for $230M.[16]

Leadership

Polyvore was envisioned as a product and service by Pasha Sadri in August 2006. He was soon joined by Jianing Hu and Guangwei Yuen to perform necessary programming, and the trio launched of the first version of the website in 2007.

In its first year of creation, Jess Lee, an early Polyvore fan and user, emailed Sadri with a set of product suggestions, and, as Sadri explained in 2013: "The email was unlike any feedback we’d ever gotten ... It was a two-page-long analysis, detailing ‘this is broken, we can fix it this way.’"[17] In a July 2013 feature in Wired, Lee described herself as an "obsessive user" prior to her recruitment, and described her interest and motivation: “Influencers in fashion right now are a cliquey club in New York that’s very hard to get into,” making it hard for others to shape the trends.[17] Lee joined the company within nine months of her first visit, would rise through the ranks to become CEO,[17] and is now listed as a founder of the company.[3] Lee played a roll in attracting its eventual buyer, Yahoo, as she had business relations with the company's present CEO, Marissa Mayer, who had recruited her during her period at Google.[15]

At the time of its acquisition, Lee was listed as Co-Founder and CEO, Pasha Sadrias as Co-Founder and Director, Arnie Gullov-Singh as COO, and Guangwei Yuan and Jianing Hu as Co-Founders.[2]

Traffic

In August 2012 Polyvore was receiving 17 million unique monthly visitors, and as of July 2013, traffic of 20 million visitors per month.[17][12] In May 2014, the company was reported to be receiving 20 million unique visitors per month.[14] Hence, between August 2009 and May 2014, the number of monthly unique visitors increased from 4 million to 20 million.[4][14]

References

  1. ↑ Alexa.com (2015). "Alexa Web Traffic: Polyvore.com -". Alexa Internet (online, December 3). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  2. 1 2 Bloomberg.com (2015). "Internet Software and Services: Company Overview of Polyvore, Inc.". BloombergBusinessweek (online, December 3). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 CrunchBase.com (2015). "Polyvore Company Profile". CrunchBase (online, December 3). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  4. 1 2 Siegler, M.G. (2009). "Polyvore Looks Stylin' In This New $5.6 Million Round Of Funding". TechCrunch (online, August 18). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  5. ↑ Jacobs, Alexandra (2010). "Fashion Democracy: The World of Virtual Anna Wintours.". The New Yorker (print and online, March 29). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  6. ↑ Taylor, Colleen (2011). "Now Profitable, Polyvore Strikes a Pose as Top Fashion Site". GigaOm (online, June 9). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  7. ↑ Wang, Jennifer (2011). "How Polyvore Became a Trend-Setter in Social Shopping". Entrepreneur (online, May 23). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  8. ↑ McCracken, Harry (2011). "The 50 Best Websites of 2011". Time (online, August 16). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  9. ↑ Rao, Leena (2012). "Virtual Styling And Fashion Community Polyvore Raises $14M From DAG Ventures, Goldman Sachs And Others". TechCrunch (online, January 23). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  10. ↑ Hussain, Nadia M. (2012). "The Official Blog of Polyvore—News, Trends, Tips and Tricks: Polyvore and COVERGIRL Present Polyvore Live!". Polyvore.com (online, January 16). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  11. ↑ Schomer, Stephanie (2012). "28: Polyvore, For Turning Everyone Into A Fashion Editor". Fast Company (online, February 7). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  12. 1 2 Taylor, Colleen (2012). "Fashion-Focused Startup Polyvore, 17M Monthly Uniques Strong, Opens Up NYC Office". TechCrunch (online, August 10). Retrieved 3 December 2014.
  13. ↑ Taylor, Coleen (2012). "Style Site Polyvore Debuts Its First Ever iPhone App, Touts Cash Flow Positive Operations". TechCrunch (online, November 27). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  14. 1 2 3 Perez, Sarah (2014). "Style-Focused Community And Shopping Service Polyvore Arrives On Android". TechCrunch (online, May 9). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  15. 1 2 Brandom, Russell (2015). "Yahoo Acquires Fashion Commerce Site Polyvore". The Verge (online, July 31). Retrieved 3 December 2015.
  16. ↑ Kosoff, Maya (2015). "Hedge funder slams Yahoo: It is unacceptable to pay $230 million for zombie companies run by former Googlers". Business Insider (online, Dec 14). Retrieved 5 January 2016.
  17. 1 2 3 4 Tate, Ryan (2013). "How One Startup Found Success by Making an Obsessive User Its CEO". Wired (online, July 25). Retrieved 30 August 2014.

Further reading

External links

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