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| Dec 4, 2012 |
1stdibs announces investment, reflects on progress
Boh staff
By Staff

1stdibs has raised a cool $42 million to fuel the company's international expansion, marketing and adoption of new technology. The investment round was led by Index Ventures (Skype investor) and Spark Capital (Twitter, Foursquare, and Tumblr).

In November 2011, 1stdibs raised $60 million from eBay investor Benchmark. Since then, the online marketplace has tripled its presence in Europe with the acquisition of Online Galleries in September, which added over 200 UK dealers, as well as dealers in Belgium, the Netherlands, and France. An additional 30 dealers in Italy and Spain are scheduled to join in December.

Next month, the company plans to unveil a redesign of the site making it easier to search and buy online.

1stdibs CEO David Rosenblatt, who joined as CEO last November, has completed recruitment of a top leadership team including:  Allis Ghim, VP Global Sales and Dealer Operations, previously led eBay's APAC export business; Adam Karp, CMO, formerly in senior roles at FreshDirect, Barnes & Noble, and American Express; Ross Paul, CTO, previously VP of Engineering at MLB.com; Richard Pham, CFO, Former VP at Shutterfly; Xiaodi Zhang, formerly Director of Buyer Experience at eBay and Senior Product Director at Gilt Groupe; and Carmine Bruno, (no relation to Michael Bruno) Managing Director of 1stdibs UK, Former Managing Director, Online Galleries Limited.

The company released the following figures demonstrating its growth over the last year:

• The gross merchandise volume of goods reported sold by 1stdibs dealers will exceed $650 million in 2012, up 30% from $500 million last year. 

• 1,700 dealers are on the 1stdibs platform today, up from 1,200 dealers one year ago.

• 3,000 objects are now catalogued each week. 9,000 unique items are sold each month, up from 7,000 per month reported at the beginning of this year. 

Fifteen perecent of total sales in the luxury goods industry are directly generated by digital media, according to a report on the digital luxury experience, released by McKinsey & Company on behalf of Altagamma, the Italian luxury goods association. In 2011, worldwide online sales of personal luxury goods reached $8 billion, growing three times faster than the total personal luxury goods market, and will reach $19.35 billion in 2016.

"We have been closely following how 1stdibs has established itself as a trusted brand and the premiere marketplace for luxury goods," said Todd Dagres of Spark Capital. "By enabling vintage luxury dealers to transition from foot traffic to online sales without missing a step, 1stdibs is the hub that is serving the huge consumer demand for rare and collectable objects."

Index Ventures General Partner Danny Rimer and Spark Capital General Partner Todd Dagres will join General Partner Matt Cohler of Benchmark, which invested in both rounds of funding, on the 1stdibs Board of Directors.

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