In 2017, three friends were frustrated that they couldn’t find good-quality, accessible, and affordable ergonomic office setups.

So, they decided to come up with their own!

In 2022, their ergonomic chair and standing desk brands brought in over $9.7M in revenue and were sold for an estimated $8.8M after just 4 years.

🔥 The early days

Joshua Chan, Damon Lye, and Jun Kiat Tan were classmates-turned-friends who were really interested in business.

Joshua and Damon started an electronic gadget e-commerce business in 2014 and a skills training business in 2016 while they were at university, but that didn’t last.

In 2017, they started ErgoTune and EverDesk along with Jun Kiat when Damon wanted to buy a standing desk, and got annoyed at the long wait times for quotations and the high prices for ergonomic work furniture.  

⭐️ Learning the craft

None of them knew much about furniture, so they started by sourcing materials from China, Malaysia, Taiwan, and Vietnam.

They set up their first warehouse in Joshua’s house and went through a series of trial and error before launching their products using a pre-order model.

Within their first week, it was a hit!

🧠 Early struggles

They made $5,200 in sales. It was amazing, and proved there was a market that really wanted their products.

The problem? They had zero inventory and still didn’t have enough $$$ for the minimum purchase order from a manufacturer.

So, they tried to raise some cash and told their customers that the sale “went so well that they are out of stock” and promised them a 40% discount if they wait 6 weeks, and offered a refund if they didn’t want to wait.

Thankfully, customers stayed.

🌏 Global expansion

Fast forward to when COVID hit, and the brands’ growth exploded. In 2021, their brands saw 150% revenue growth, hitting over $9.6M in revenue that year.

20,000 units of their ergonomic chairs were sold that year, and they also expanded to Australia!

💰 Just got acquired

In 2022, e-commerce aggregator Una Brands acquired both brands for an estimated $8.8M, making it one of the largest acquisitions of Singapore-based D2C brands.

Una Brands plans to make their ergonomic products available on Amazon and to boost their offline presence through showrooms.

ErgoTune and EverDesk hope to be the best in the region and expand to other regions and markets with Una Brands' help.

And they're doing just that. After launching in the US in 2023, they launched in the Philippines this year.

‍

Note: Numbers are in USD and are sourced from public figures.