When Amanda Zuckerman went shopping with her mother to furnish her freshman year dorm room at Washington University in St. Louis in 2009, they went to more than five different stores to find stylish twin XL bedding and other products. “There were a lot of juvenile designs and ‘bed in a bag’ solutions that left no room for creative expression,” says Zuckerman, now 27. The Zuckermans realized there wasn’t one place to easily find everything needed to make her dorm feel personal and homey, and that it would be easier to shop online. Their frustrating shopping experience would inspire Dormify, now a multimillion-dollar company headquartered in Manhattan.
Amanda Zuckerman, the co-founder of Dormify. Photo by Alexandra Wolf
Although the duo discovered the need for Dormify early on, they let the idea sit while Zuckerman settled in on campus. “I was just starting school. There was a lot going on. I had to like, live my ‘freshman year life.’” But she started a blog because, “we knew we were onto something.”
Friends and friends of friends wrote for their college-focused decor blog. “This then became our proof of concept that people cared about dorm room decor,” Zuckerman says. By 2012, the co-founders — Zuckerman, her mother Karen Zuckerman, and friend Stephanie Kimel — started to manufacture textiles, build an e-commerce website, and create products.
Today the 15-person Dormify team works out of this showroom and office on 31st Street and Fifth Avenue. One wall is lined with bookshelves filled with pillows. Multiple bedroom setups display bedding and wall options from feminine to boho-chic. Accessories like avocado-shaped ornaments and a neon unicorn LED light hang on another wall. The kitchen offers bowls of lollipops and candy. By 9 a.m. employees are at their desks, communicating with customers who can email, chat, call or FaceTime with stylists or come to the showroom.
Zuckerman, the creative director, is wearing a white t-shirt under a houndstooth blazer, clutching a coffee mug that says “Nap Queen.” On the wall behind her, signs declare “Future = Female” and “Kinda Wanna Workout. Kinda Wanna Eat Pizza.” Later Kimel, 32, the chief merchandising officer, joins the conversation, wearing a gray turtleneck and a black baseball cap that says “Dormify.”
But back in 2012, the founding team met continuous rejection. “No one would work with us. Shocker. We didn’t have a website. We didn’t even have a business card,” Zuckerman says. Textile companies accustomed to working with traditional mass retailers didn’t think Dormify’s direct-to-consumer business model would work.
Finally, a vendor in China agreed to supply them and the team started testing products, starting with posters, then bedding. At the time the co-founders all worked remotely, with Zuckerman still in her Washington U dorm, using her marketing and graphic design courses and campus life to guide her business decisions.
“The other half of the story is that my mom owns a creative agency that she started over 30 years ago, so we had this huge advantage of using her resources in order to get off the ground,” she says. The co-founders started the business with their own money then raised a $2.125 million seed round in 2013. They declined to disclose their exact revenue, but said they are a multimillion-dollar business.
Kimel and Zuckerman grew up in Potomac, Md., and went to the same high school. After Kimel graduated from George Washington University, she worked for HZDG, Karen Zuckerman’s agency in Rockville, Md. Kimel gave the Zuckermans advice about college, and “from there it was a natural progression to join forces with them to help launch Dormify,” she says.
Zuckerman credits her parents’ entrepreneurial background — they co-founded HZDG — with giving her the confidence to start her own company. “I definitely learned a lot about hard work and dedication and passion,” she says. “The initial barriers someone would have of the fear of doing something on their own were eradicated by having this experience growing up.”
She also had a model for how to own a business with a family member. “You’d think the challenge would be drawing boundaries between our work lives and our personal lives, but we’ve found real harmony here,” says Karen Zuckerman, 55, by email.
“Naturally, one of them says ‘Oh, my mom is totally the decision-maker on this’ or vice versa,” says Kimel. She and Zuckerman live and work in Manhattan, while Karen Zuckerman works remotely from Washington D.C.
In November, Dormify announced a $3.45 million series A investment led by American Eagle Outfitters Inc., a brand it has partnered with for three years. The founders plan to use the new funding to host more pop-up shops (it hosted three this summer, staffed by college students), explore using artificial intelligence for customer service, and develop new products, including more decor for men.
Although Dormify has raised funding, it always faces a threat from competition. Startups like Dorm Decor and Room 422 and big companies like Bed Bath & Beyond, Walmart, Target, and JCPenny also offer dorm room products, bedding sets, and design inspiration. College and graduate students are projected to spend an average of $942.17 each, totaling $55.3 billion, on back-to-school shopping, according to a 2018 survey by the National Retail Federation and Prosper Insights and Analytics. Of the nearly $1,000, they are expected to spend an average of $109.29 on dorm or apartment furnishings.
Jaclyn Turner, an editor at Home Furnishings News, thinks Dormify stands out because it understands what students want and designs products specifically for them. When people shop at mass-market retailers, they come to campus with the same thing as many of their classmates, Turner says. “College students want things that are more unique and personalized, and I think Dormify has a lot of customization options,” she says.
Logan Weinstein, a sophomore at Pennsylvania State, learned about Dormify from her older sisters. “They carry everything you need, and I did not have to go from store to store to create my look,” says Weinstein by email. “The stylists in the Dormify Style Studio were very helpful since they were currently in college and had a lot of tips on how to save space.”
Students and parents can also shop at the Manhattan showroom. They make appointments online and fill out a style quiz before coming to free meetings with stylists. Zuckerman and other team members will remake all the beds and set up the showroom based on each student’s preferences.
Though the offices often feel bustling, with students browsing through the pillows, art, and bedding, today the back-to-school frenzy has slowed and the office and showroom are calm.
Zuckerman excitedly shows a colleague new bedding, puts her Nap Queen mug in the sink, and gets back to work.
