Houzz, a web-based internet community for home design, architecture and remodeling, is making its first acquisition today. The company, which was last valued at $2.3 billion in 2014, is buying gardening and home advice site GardenWeb from NBCUniversal. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.
Houzz quickly gained popularity in the past five years amongst consumers as the go-to destination to find ideas for anything related to home design. Users could not only access ideas for their home and decorating inspiration, but can also connect to the builders, manufacturers and designers behind each photo.
Last year, the company started to bring additional revenue by launching a marketplace where users could buy the furniture they were looking at on the site. Houzz says it now has over 35 million monthly unique users (up from 25 million in the Fall of 2014), 90 percent of whom are homeowners.
Houzz says that the addition of GardenWeb gives Houzz users access to over 2.8 million discussion threads, over 14 million discussion posts, and nearly 400 discussion topics for home and gardening enthusiasts.
GardenWeb was initially acquired by NBCUniversal in 2006 as part of the media company’s purchase of iVillage for $600 million.
For Houzz, the acquisition builds on the site’s existing community, including forums around advice on furniture and design recommendations, and allows Houzz to deepen its foothold in another area around home design–gardening.
Houzz, which has raised over $200 million in funding from the likes of Sequoia Capital, DST Capital, and Kleiner Perkins, is putting some of its capital to use with an aggressive marketing push. The company’s first TV ads appeared this month.
