Brazil's first e-commerce for homes generates more than R$100 million in sales after two years of launch

An estimate by the Brazilian Association of Electronic Commerce (ABComm) points out that e-commerce should exceed the R$ 200 billion barrier in the country by 2024. With that in mind, a Smart Space – Brazil's first home store, has signed a partnership with theVTEX, cloud-based solution for online trading, to build the first e-commerce of steel frame homes and construction items. Since its launch two years ago, The brand's e-commerce has already generated over R$ 100 million in sales.

With a projected revenue of R$500 million this year, The Smart Space projects that e-commerce will move about 12% of the amount. Despite the relatively low range, Fernando Scheffer, founder of the brand, explains that the purpose of the tool goes beyond trade itself, passing through the significant improvement in the form of consumption by buyers.  

We created the format with the aim of changing the way houses are sold in Brazil. We were able to find a solution that allows us to improve the customer experience and add several new features to the purchasing process.. Since this is an extremely complex product marketing, And that often the consumer will only buy once in a lifetime., e-commerce appears as a tool capable of improving the customer's decision journey, and not just in the final transaction., explain. 

The proof of this process is reflected in the figures. Only in the first half of 2024, More than 40,000 people visited a physical store of the brand after being impacted by e-commerce. Furthermore, 16% of the projects sold in the period had the purchase journey started in the digital medium. 

It is also worth mentioning that more than half (55%) of customers who shop online end up opting for the Pick Up Store option, in which they collect the products directly in one of the 38 physical stores of Espacio Smart scattered throughout the country and in Paraguay, speeding up and optimising the material delivery process. According to Scheffer, A lot of this audience ends up doing cross-selling., in view of acting with complex architectural and engineering specifications within the projects

Most of the time the customer does not buy some item needed for the complete solution, as ribbons, of a kind used in motor vehicles, Screws, etc., And you end up buying these items in the physical store., at the time of withdrawal. This possibility, In addition to increasing the average ticket of our omnichannel customer, It also helps to build customer loyalty and extend lifetime value (LTV)., add the founder

A predictable and entertaining work

Among the benefits that justify improvement in the customer journey is the predictability that the solution provides to the project. With integration via API of calculators capable of setting prices for structures such as roofs, floor, linings, wall, the customer is able to receive budgetary accuracy for materials and labour. 

Moreover, through AI technologies, augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) plugged directly into the VTEX platform, the buyer can draw, build and visualize virtually the design of your home in a predictable and safe way, Coming very close to the "dream house" model.

When we talk about buying a house, It's usually something "unfunny"., boring and unpredictable. What we're doing is transforming the shopping journey., which is extremely important and of high added value, in an entertainment, where the buyer can explore immersive technologies, sensory, IA, 3D, Metaverse, SUN, RV, BIM to make the construction of the residence pleasant and predictable for the client, added Rodrigo Brandão, Marketing manager of the Smart Space