If you stop and think about it, the category of home furnishings and home design is one of the most daunting to take online. As much as we have come to take the success of companies like Wayfair and One King’s Lane for granted, think of the logistics involved in a digitally native business that sells sofas, dining room tables and beds. And what about white glove service, damages and returns. Complicating things, any home furnishings retailer is required to serve two masters: the trade and the retail consumer. To put it mildly, not for the faint of heart.

On this episode of The Medium Rules, host Alan Baldachin sits down with Christiane Lemieux, founder and CEO of The Inside, the direct-to-consumer home furnishings brand focused on made-to-order, customizable, affordable furniture with a high design, contemporary aesthetic. Prior to starting The Inside, Christiane founded the extremely popular home furnishings/lifestyle brand Dwell Studios, sold to Wayfair in 2013. Alan and Christiane engage in an entertaining, informative and lively conversation in which they go deep under the hood of the current online retail environment for home furnishings, covering logistics, media, customer acquisition and design. Christiane also walks through the highs and lows of her 20+ year career as a design entrepreneur, author and philanthropist, including her start as a curator for the landmark 90’s home furnishings brand Portico, through the founding of Dwell and its sale to Wayfair, her time at Wayfair and lessons learned, and finally to the launch of The Inside in 2016 in collaboration with Kirsten Green and the team at Forerunner Ventures. Christiane also talks about her new book project on entrepreneurship and what makes entrepreneurs tick. We hope you’ll tune in, listen and watch this great conversation.

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