Castlery Doubles Back Into Stores — and Queensland Grew 80 Percent

Queensland sales grew roughly 80 percent year on year after Castlery opened a showroom there — the sharpest number yet in the Singapore furniture brand's second attempt at Australian physical retail. Leah Howatson, GM of international markets, disclosed the figure to Inside Retail as the company opened its third Australian showroom in three years.

The return is a reversal of a deliberate retreat. Castlery closed its original Sydney store in 2019 to sell online only. "It was a destination, but we didn't have the brand awareness to pull the people in," Howatson said. "We were paying for the space without getting the foot traffic."

What changed since 2019?

The pandemic first vindicated the all-digital bet, but the math shifted. "Towards the tail end of Covid, digital marketing was becoming more expensive, and customers were really craving that return to physical," Howatson said. Castlery tested the waters with a pop-up at the Moore Park homemaker centre before opening a permanent 576-square-metre space there in June 2024.

Melbourne is the latest move: a 448-square-metre showroom on Yorkshire Street in Richmond with 17 room sets, its interiors inspired by the State Library Victoria reading room. The business behind it now employs more than 500 people worldwide and has sold over a million pieces of furniture. Howatson expects Melbourne could see growth of 30 to 40 percent.

The company measures showrooms by geographic performance rather than channel, which keeps its online and offline teams from competing. "Even if some of the people that used to transact online are going into the showroom now, I'm okay with that," she said. "Customers choose how they want to transact; that's success for me." Australian states with a showroom now sit at roughly 60 percent online and 40 percent offline, versus 70 to 80 percent offline in Singapore.

The stores also reach shoppers the website couldn't. "We started to get older audiences who were also unhappy with the traditional offerings but weren't comfortable yet buying online," Howatson said of the recliner and larger sofa launches. "It's so hard to communicate online the sit of a sofa, because it's the height, the depth and the softness. It doesn't translate."

Is repeat business the real prize?

With more than 60,000 Melbourne homes already furnished with its pieces and a decade in Australia approaching, Castlery is chasing the second purchase. "You buy a sofa every seven years, so what do you come back and buy?" Howatson said. The company has doubled its SKU count in recent years, launched its first mattresses and bedding, and grown outdoor, accent chair and accessories ranges — all feeding a loyalty program she called "the cherry on top." Castlery reports double-digit repeat customers, many returning within months of their first delivery.

The Tan France collaboration, two years in the making, extended the range further. "We didn't want just to put someone's name onto something; we wanted to really co-design it with them," she said. Two more collaborations are in the pipeline, the next landing in July or August next year.

Where next?

A fourth Australian showroom is on the cards, on no particular schedule. "We are very selective, so we'll just wait until the right location comes up. We don't have an urgency or a deadline by which we want to get there," Howatson said. "The success of stores in Australia has made us much more confident to go global as well."

Co-founder Declan Ee has previously targeted showrooms across the top 10 global English-speaking cities over the next three to four years, with the United States already accounting for about 70 percent of global revenue. The company is now building a dedicated retail team and point-of-sale product to develop showroom managers. "Online marketing is much quicker to turn on, turn off and get good creatives, but having retail, if we do it right, creates a better moat around the business," Howatson said.