Wakefit was jolted awake at the end of March 2025, when it was still in losses for FY25. Since then, the company has done a 180-turn to even get to listing with a profit on its books.

So is Wakefit well and truly awake now? That’s too early to conclude. But ask founders Ankit Garg and Chaitanya Ramalingegowda, and they are confident that Wakefit’s next big moves will only compound profits. 

To achieve this, the mattress and furniture company is turning to quick commerce and entering the home decor space. Neither is an ideal solution for Wakefit’s problems, but both have an upside that is hard to ignore. So will these two bets finally put the question of profits to sleep? 

The Need For Speed

First, a step back. The sleep solutions and furniture company swung into profits of INR 35.5 Cr in the first six months of FY26 from a loss of 35 Cr at the end of FY25. 

The profits did not prevent questions about its high valuation ahead of the listing, especially when it was looking to raise at a price-to-earnings ratio of 85x, well above listed peers such as Sheela Foam, which reported INR 1377 Cr revenue in Q2 FY26, nearly double of Wakefit’s revenue of INR 780 Cr.

This is the typical concern around VC-backed startups, but in the run-up to the IPO, Wakefit’s founders were confident of keeping the profitability going steadily and of unlocking long-term value. 

In an interaction with Inc42, Ramalingegowda emphasised Wakefit’s focus on “sustainable, profitable growth” rather than hyperscaling. The cofounder said the company is steadfast on core capabilities like backward integration, omnichannel synergy, and customer-centric innovation. 

According to Ramalingegowda, Wakefit’s journey from mattresses to bed linen and pillows to furniture has gone step by step with the same strategy of steadily building supply chain, manufacturing capabilities, and consumer trust. 

The same will hold true for the next journey as quick commerce and home decor become its focus areas. But it is undoubtedly a growth lever given that Wakefit is trying to push the agenda somewhat. It wants to own the supply chain in quick commerce and that may be a bridge too far. 

Taking A Punt On Quick Commerce  

With everything from air purifiers to laptops being sold on quick commerce, Wakefit would have been compelled to think about this channel even if the IPO was never on the cards. The company’s smaller products have made their way to dark stores where Wakefit competes with the likes of Frido and The Sleep Company.  

But owning the quick commerce channel is something no other furniture player has done. At the moment, Wakefit is planning to own the complete value and supply chain for its mattresses through quick commerce, but these plans are in the pilot stage. 

“We sell some of the merchandise like pillows and bed sheets on Blinkit or Instamart. We are also contemplating in-house if there is a way that we can build a mattress quick commerce using our own supply chain. We will also control our warehouses and on-ground delivery fleets,” cofounder and CEO Garg said.

The 10–60 minute fulfilment will be first tested in select postal codes in Bengaluru. “We will be the first mattress company to experiment with an in-house quick delivery model and then further decide on scaling the same,” he added. 

Execution will be a key, but with Wakefit’s store network getting denser, the 10-minute to 60-minute delivery timeline seems feasible. It’s not even a question of whether the company needs this particular model to scale. It can rely on its existing fleet and capabilities to manage the quick commerce channel without investing overwhelmingly. 

For Wakefit, quick commerce is a discovery tool, with low-ticket items introducing the brand and, in turn, building trust for larger purchases. Garg and Ramalingegowda see it gauging consumer response without premature scaling. If there is better than expected demand, perhaps separate infrastructure may be considered or the company may look to add a dedicated quick delivery fleet, but at the moment, it is using existing infrastructure, which minimises risks such high logistics costs and warehousing losses. 

Aiming At The Home Decor Market 

Over time, Wakefit will look to bring its home decor play on to the quick commerce channel as a funnel for high value categories like furniture. 

So the home decor business is the other side of the quick commerce coin for Wakefit. 

The Bengaluru-based company is looking to increase its share of the customer wallet, essentially targeting repeat buyers and high engagement because of the heavy SKU churn in home decor and seasonal trends that seem to work for such categories in particular. 

It must be noted that Wakefit is but a drop in India’s home solutions market, which is expected to hit INR 3 Lakh Cr by the end of next year. The company has shown its resilience in the mattress game, but home decor is a longtail category with a huge unorganised segment and high competitive churn even in the organised segment. 

Home décor items such as vases, planters, wall clocks, garden furniture, curtains, tabletop linen will be the biggest focus. 

Ramalingegowda believes cross-category purchases are an essential part of the flywheel and extending the customer lifetime value. Having seen this purchasing behaviour in mattresses and furniture, Wakefit believes it can repeat the magic for the home decor vertical.

“We believe that we want to be that design destination from a home perspective. And we have to make sure that our catalogue has a decent depth. The quality that we’ve delivered in mattresses has to be delivered to our consumers not only in product but in services. In the furnishing category, there is a design play that comes handy,” the cofounder added.

But he is also cognisant of the fact that Wakefit has to keep churning designs at a certain speed and build its supplier network. Which is why, this is perhaps the last big bet for Wakefit for a long time. 

“We believe that mattresses, furniture and home decor categories will be good enough for us to keep us engaged for at least the next three years,” Ramalingegowda added. 

Wakefit Goes Omnichannel On Its Own Terms

At first glance, the decision to enter the quick commerce channel seems counterintuitive, but so did physical retail at first for online-first brands like Wakefit. In some ways, it’s a return to basics, if anything. Quick commerce is now letting companies shed some of the retail burden within their channel mix. 

Wakefit’s approach, however, departs sharply from traditional retail models. The stores are owned and operated by the company, but critically, they are asset-light. Inventory is also limited to display units, with fulfilment happening from a separate warehouse. 

Operationally, Wakefit set up its own factories before venturing into retail with its owned stores.  This strategy has delivered results. “The first year when we went from online to retail in 2022, we opened 10 stores. We saw an uptick in premium products sales via offline with the average ticket-size 1.5 times more than online transactions. The overall user retention and customer lifetime value have helped us understand this space better.” 

Offline now contributes roughly a third of Wakefit’s revenue, despite the channel being around for only about two-and-a-half years. 

But this model has to be fine-turned for quick commerce, which would require faster restocking of inventory and there could be frequent stockouts of products that converge with specific buyer trends. Warehouses may not be able to always steadily fulfill the high demand in metro areas and in quick commerce, this is a key attrition point, which is why most platforms have graduated to dark stores. 

Whether this is changing again is uncertain — Swiggy Instamart opened its first store in Gurugram just a few days ago. Is this a sign of quick commerce converging with offline retail? In that case Wakefit would seemingly have an edge over other rivals. 

But these potentialities will play out over the course of the next two quarters. In the interim, Wakefit needs to refocus on financials, fundamentals and profitability. The first results post its listings will be a critical litmus test. 

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