Oui Open, Europe’s largest online marketplace for short-term retail spaces, and its US counterpart Storefront have merged to create the first truly international marketplace for pop-up stores.
Through the merger, the combined entity will become “the largest provider of short-term retail space globally with a presence in Europe, Asia and North America”. Since their formation, the companies have helped more than 4,000 brands, including Target, Google, Samsung and Etsy, to open temporary retail stores.
The new platform (which is accessible from www.thestorefront.com) now offers access to spaces in leading retail cities around the world, including New York City, Paris, London, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, and Amsterdam, and features more than 10,000 listings, representing around 30m square feet of retail space.
Oui Open co-founder and CEO Mohamed Haouache, who succeeds Erik Eliason as CEO of Storefront, said his business had been seeking a partner “whose passion about the short-term retail market matches ours and we have finally found that in Storefront.”
The merged company will now be able to offer more opportunities for brands and retailers wishing to expand internationally, said co-founder of Storefront Tristan Pollock. “Expanding to Asia and Europe is a top priority for many of our US brands,” he said.
“The ability to use a single service to find premium retail spaces for pop-up stores in cities around the world is something many brands have requested. This new entity will make retail accessible across three continents and will democratise the concept of the pop-up store,” Pollock added.
Oui Open was founded by Mohamed Haouache, Adrien Kerbrat and Matthew Greenwell in January 2014 and has participated in a number of prominent accelerator programs such as Season 7 of NUMA Paris, Season 8 of Microsoft Accelerator Paris, Season 3 of Welcome City Lab (Paris&Co), and the 2016 Techstars New York Startup Accelerator Program.
Storefront was founded in 2012 and has worked with more than 3,000 stores for rapidly growing startups (Square, Jawbone, Indochino, Etsy), global brands (Google, Target, Nike, Mahindra), and even Kanye West.
