Retail

Online Appliances and Furniture Seller 1847 Goedeker Files for IPO

Jon C. Ogg

Published: April 22, 2020 3:35 pm

During the peak of the panic selling just a month ago, many investors were in the midst of bracing for the bear market to turn into a full blown stock market crash. There were fears that the window for initial public offerings was going to be closed for quite some time. In the wake of trillions of dollars of economic stimulus, now the stock market has recaptured more than half of its entire losses — and some IPO filings are starting to appear again.

A small home furnishings company called 1847 Goedeker Inc. has filed to come public in an initial public offering. Its common shares will trade under the “GOED” stock ticker without having selected which stock exchange it would use. ThinkEquity is the sole underwriter on its S-1 filing, and the deal may have been too small for most larger Wall Street firms to have joined the underwriting syndicate.

While no details were offered on the number of shares to be sold, nor on the day of trading or on the price range for an indicated stock price, the filing’s proposed maximum amount was $11.5 million or $12.218 million after adding in shares for the underlying representative warrants.

1847 Goedeker is a Missouri-based company that is a one-stop e-commerce destination for home furnishings from appliances to furniture to home goods and related products. The company dates back to 1951 and its filing said that it has evolved from a local brick and mortar operator in the St. Louis metro area to a large nationwide omnichannel retailer. The company has maintained its St. Louis showroom, but the filing indicated that over 90% of its total sales come through the goedekers.com site. The company offers more than 227,000 SKUs and the site is organized by category and product features.

The appliance category covering refrigerators, ranges, ovens, dishwashers, microwaves, freezers, washers and dryers is 1847 Goedeker’s largest revenue source. It carries about 22,000 SKUs from brands such as Bosch, GE, Maytag, Whirlpool, LG, Samsung, Sharp, Kitchen Aid and others. This appliances category was shown to have accounted for approximately 80% of 2019 sales and 76% of 2018 sales.

1847 Goedeker began selling furniture online in 2015 and it currently offers roughly 148,000 SKUs from over 340 furniture vendors. The furniture category accounted for approximately 15% of 2019 revenues and 19% of 2018 revenues.

Larger online home furnishings sellers cannot afford to ignore any competition, but 1847 Goedeker is still by and large unknown in the country. The company’s filing showed a net loss of $2.5 million in 2019, on total revenues of $47.6 million. 1847 Goedeker reported net income of $2.0 million in 2018, with total revenues of $56.3 million.

The company’s site allows for live chats or speaking with a representative by phone. Its IPO filing says:

We are focused on bringing our customers an experience that is at the forefront of shopping online for the home. We have built a large online selection of appliances, furniture, home goods and related products. We are able to offer this vast selection of products because our model requires minimal inventory. We specialize in the home category and this has enabled us to build a shopping experience and logistics infrastructure that is tailored to the unique characteristics of our market.

The IPO filing also contained its own ‘Coronavirus Pandemic’ update section. While there are stay-at-home orders impacting its showroom, with over 90% of our sales completed online and with its call center and warehouse/distribution operations up and running the local restrictions are shown to have not yet had a negative impact on the company’s operations. That said, the company does warn that its operations could be hurt under certain coronavirus scenarios.

This might not represent a grand re-opening of the IPO market, but as more filings begin to be seen it may represent at least some normalcy for the markets compared to a month earlier.