How The Roost Leveraged Onport to Revolutionize Home Furnishing

Background

The Roost is a UK-based curated furniture marketplace designed to simplify the process of furnishing homes with its unique visualization tool and a highly selective supplier network.

The Roost allows customers to design, visualize, and purchase furniture from multiple brands in a seamless experience.

The Roost’s mission is to make home decoration stress-free, sustainable, and enjoyable, all whilst minimizing return rates to support its growth and ability to better serve its customers.

Will Plowden | Founder

The Challenges

• Manual Operations: At launch, The Roost onboarded suppliers manually, working with spreadsheets to manage product inventories, pricing, and orders. This time-consuming process was unsustainable as the marketplace scaled.

• Limited Automation: Stock and order tracking were managed manually, leading to inefficiencies and occasional mismatches, such as showing out-of-stock products as available.

• Vendor Experience: While The Roost focused on providing a superior customer experience, the backend for suppliers lacked similar sophistication. This limited growth potential and supplier satisfaction.

• Scalability Concerns: With a growing catalog of over 13,000 products and plans to onboard more suppliers, The Roost needed a solution that supported long-term growth without overwhelming operational resources.

Why Onport?

The Roost chose Onport for its robust multi-vendor automation capabilities, particularly its ability to:

• Automate stock updates and order processing across multiple suppliers via APIs.

• Streamline onboarding, enabling suppliers to seamlessly integrate all their systems, in particular Shopify.

• Provide flexibility for scaling, with tailored pricing and support solutions of varying sizes and complexities.

Implementation Highlights

To meet the growing demands of their marketplace, The Roost integrated Onport’s automation features to streamline key operations. Find out the main highlights below:

API-Driven Integration

Onport automated The Roost's supplier connections, replacing manual spreadsheets with seamless API integrations.

Vendors can now sync inventory and pricing in real-time, reducing errors and saving time. “When we launched, I spent weeks behind a spreadsheet, cleaning data and updating stock manually" explains founder Will Plowden.

Improved Vendor Experience

Suppliers now process orders through their usual systems, with The Roost’s branding maintained throughout the customer journey.

“We’re still very curated with who we work with, but thanks to Onport, we can onboard the best brands quickly and efficiently” further shares Will.

Enhanced Scalability

Shipping updates and tracking details are automatically shared with customers. “We wanted to provide an exceptional experience for suppliers, just as we do for our customers."

"Onport helped us achieve that by automating processes and eliminating friction.” says Will.

Results with Onport

After integrating Onport, The Roost saw significant improvements in efficiency and growth. Explore below the measurable results that are positioning The Roost for continued success:

Efficiency Gains

Automating manual tasks allowed The Roost to focus on strategic initiatives, such as improving the visualization tool and expanding product categories.

“The time we’ve saved is immeasurable and we can now spend it on growing the business in meaningful ways.”

Reduced Return Rates

The industry average return rate for furniture is typically 20-25%. The Roost’s return rate stands at just 2.7%, thanks to its visualization tool and curated marketplace approach.

“One of the main reasons we built The Roost was to tackle the high return rates in the furniture industry, and our visualization tool has made a huge difference.”

Faster Vendor Onboarding

The time to onboard a new supplier dropped from weeks to hours, enabling a curated yet dynamic marketplace. “We’ve been able to grow from 20 to 75 brands seamlessly. It's a testament to how transformative Onport has been for us.”

Support for Growth

The Roost is positioned for further expansion, including international markets. “The scalability Onport provides is invaluable, it’s built to grow with us.”

Scalability & Flexibility

Onport’s ability to grow with The Roost ensures it can support the marketplace’s evolving needs, from Black Friday sales automation to cross-border expansions.

“Onport was a game-changer for us. It automated processes that previously took weeks and allowed us to onboard suppliers effortlessly. This partnership has been instrumental in scaling our marketplace.”

Advice to Aspiring Marketplace Founders

Will Plowden shared his top five tips for new marketplace founders:

• Research Thoroughly: “Understand your industry and competitors before diving in. The first thing you need to do is research, speak to as many people as possible and gather data—it will shape your entire approach.”

• Start Lean: “Build an MVP to test the market and gather customer feedback. Don’t go all in at the start, test the waters with a lean approach and iterate based on feedback.”

• Automate Early: “Tools like Onport and Shopify can save time and resources, enabling focus on growth. If you’re still relying on spreadsheets, stop, automation is the key to scaling effectively.”

• Adapt to Feedback: “Listening to customers led me to add vintage and secondhand categories. You need to be ready and willing to pivot, customers will tell you what they want—you just need to listen.”

• Stay Focused: “Scale thoughtfully, prioritizing quality over quantity when onboarding suppliers or expanding offerings. We’ve intentionally stayed curated to keep our marketplace high-quality and aligned with our vision.”

The Future

As The Roost continues to grow, it plans to leverage Onport’s capabilities for cross-border expansion and further automation, ensuring a scalable, customer-centric approach.

“We’re just getting started. With Onport as a partner, we’re ready for whatever’s next.” - Will Plowden, Founder at The Roost.