Wholesale marketplace Faire survived the ‘fog of crazy valuations.’ Now, it’s eyeing an IPO

Phil Wahba here. Faire, the online wholesale market, is eyeing a potential IPO in the next 12 months, after surviving the perils that come from pressure on Bay Area tech darlings to grow, grow, grow. 

“It was like the fog of war or the fog of crazy valuations, and the tech industry collectively losing its mind,” co-founder and CEO Max Rhodes tells Fortune. “We got a little addicted to vanity metrics to pump growth.” 

Now, Faire has re-engineered itself with a healthier business model for the long haul.

Faire was mostly recently valued at $5.2 billion last November in a $100 million tender offer. That’s less than half its peak valuation of $12.6 billion in May 2022, when its heady rise attracted eager investors. (The company had been valued at $1 billion just 18 months prior.) 

The problem Faire ran into, Rhodes recalls, is that the pursuit of fast growth was causing questionable decision-making that could have jeopardized Faire down the road.

The company, whose name means “to do” in French and evokes trade shows, operates as a digital marketplace to connect independent retailers and independent brands. Its platform is similar to Shopify in that it powers smaller businesses’ ecommerce, and democratizes technology once reserved for larger retail players. The brands that list goods on Faire—in categories such as decor, food, beauty,........

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