DEQOR: Coding You An Interior Designer

People are selling CDs the same way they’re selling couches — and that just doesn’t make sense to me. So DEQOR is in the retail e-commerce space to change that and be the first company that is focused on home goods and the experience that needs to happen around it.

By Minna Wang

Design isn’t an easy thing. You might think a zebra-striped sofa would go with that neon sign you bought at the thrift store last week, but it’s not until you get them delivered that you realize they clash with each other — and those mint green curtains your mother gave you last year. Or, on a smaller but no less horrifying scale, maybe you wore brown shoes with your black slacks last week. You’ll have to deal with that second issue on your own (and believe me, it is an issue), but, thankfully, a Utah e-commerce startup is working on solving that first one for you.

“We want to code an interior designer’s brain into our shopping experience — that’s how we think about it,” says Tim Dilworth, president and CEO of DEQOR. “People are selling CDs the same way they’re selling couches — and that just doesn’t make sense to me. So DEQOR is in the retail e-commerce space to change that and be the first company that is focused on home goods and the experience that needs to happen around it.”

DEQOR’s site is reflective of what’s become the classic, well-designed retail e-commerce website — carefully chosen white space, promises of free shipping and best price guarantees, and more categories under “Living Room Seating” than you knew existed. But what sets it apart is an unassuming link at the bottom of the page — the DEQOR Concierge.

“Our concierge service differentiates us from our competitors. When customers call in, we’ll identify their needs, put together a list of products that fit their style, and then help them go through that list,” explains Tim. “We run that all the way through to logistics — we’ll help coordinate when it gets to them, how it gets to them, and make sure it all goes smoothly.”

Sure, every e-commerce store has customer service. Heck, they might even have live chat. But this is where DEQOR has a leg up: Tim and his team hire interior designers to be the company’s customer service agents. So every time you talk to someone on the phone or get a reply to your email, you’re talking to a trained interior designer.

“We’re in the process of taking all that knowledge in our designers’ heads and building technology around that,” says Tim. “Our roadmap for 2016 is to create software that answers the questions our customers have within the shopping experience, so they won’t even need to call us.”

With over 20 years of industry experience, Tim’s a veteran of the retail e-commerce space, and since he founded DEQOR in November of 2014, the company’s seen nothing but growth, both in terms of revenue and merchandise partners. A quick search on DEQOR shows 1,299 results for bar stools — good luck sifting through that with your neon-sign, zebra-print sense of style. What Tim and his team envision for next year is a two-part process to match you with your perfect barstool, to help you narrow that 1,299 to 30 or 40.

“The first step is building functionality into the site that takes a very broad assortment and narrows it down as quickly as possible into your own individualized boutique. That takes identifying the barstools you’ll be interested in and getting those in front of you,” Tim says. “Part two is when you start looking at those barstools one-by-one. People have questions like, ‘What kind of bar stool should I need, exactly?’ and we want to integrate that content into the product page, so your questions will be answered as you’re shopping. You won’t have to bounce out to other sites to find answers or reviews.”

Although interior design will probably never be an easy thing, it’ll definitely be a lot easier with your personalized, electronic DEQOR concierge later this year. But don’t worry, if you prefer a little more of a human touch to help you search through 2,000 chandeliers or 1,500 mirrors, there’s still a real-life interior designer customer service agent waiting for you.

Published 1/25/2016