Squarespace

Squarespace, Inc. is an American website building and hosting company which is based in New York City, United States.[1] It provides software as a service for website building and hosting, and allows users to use pre-built website templates and drag-and-drop elements to create and modify webpages.

Squarespace, Inc.
Type of businessPrivately held company
Type of site
SaaS-based hosting platform
HeadquartersNew York City, New York
Area servedWorldwide
Founder(s)Anthony Casalena
CEOAnthony Casalena
IndustryInternet
ProductsWebsite builder and hosting service
Employees1,143 (2021)
URLwww.squarespace.com
RegistrationRequired; subscription needed for certain features.
LaunchedJanuary 2004 (2004-01)

In 2004, Anthony Casalena founded Squarespace as a blog hosting service while attending the University of Maryland, College Park. He was its only employee until 2006 when it reached $1 million in revenue. The company grew from 30 employees in 2010 to 550 by 2015. By 2014, it raised a total of $78.5 million in venture capital; added e-commerce tools, domain name services, and analytics; and replaced its coding backend with drag-and-drop features.

Company history
Current Headquarters of Squarespace in Manhattan

Casalena began developing Squarespace for his personal use while attending the University of Maryland.[2][3] He started sharing it with friends and family members[2] and participated in a "business incubator" program at the university.[3]In January 2004, he launched Squarespace as do it yourself/drag and drop website builder for the public,[3][4] with a $30,000 seed fund from his father,[5] a small grant from the university,[6] and 300 beta testers who paid a discounted rate.[3][7][8][9] At that time, Casalena was the company's sole developer and employee, and worked out of his dorm room.[3][8]

By the time Casalena graduated in 2007, Squarespace was making annual revenues of $1 million.[4] He moved to New York City, began hiring, and had 30 employees by 2010.[4][9] That year, Squarespace received $38.5 million in its first round of venture capital funding led by Index Ventures and Accel Partners,[10] enabling it to hire more staff, continue to develop its software,[11] and double its marketing budget.[2] From 2009 to 2012, it grew an average of 266% in yearly revenue.[12] In April 2014, it received another $40 million in funding.[13][14] By 2015, it had reached $100 million in revenue and 550 employees.[4]

Squarespace purchased Super Bowl advertising spots in 2014,[15][2] 2015,[16] 2016,[17] 2017[18] and 2018.[19] Its 2017 ad won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Commercial.[18] In 2017, it signed a sponsorship deal with the New York Knicks to add the Squarespace logo to their uniforms.[20]

After the Unite the Right rally in 2017, Squarespace received a petition with 58,000 signatures and removed a group of websites for violating its terms of service against "bigotry or hatred" towards demographic groups.[21][22] In 2017, it raised an additional $200 million in funding, boosting its value to $1.7 billion.[23] This funding was earmarked for reacquiring interests from investors.[23]

In 2018, Squarespace partnered with the Madison Square Garden Company to launch the "Make It Awards", which award $30,000 to entrepreneurs (4 winners, totaling $120,000).[24]

In January 2021, the company filed paperwork for a stock-market listing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).[25][26][27]

Corporate affairs

Leadership

Squarespace is managed by CEO and Founder Anthony Casalena. Other key executives are:[28]

  • Nicole Anasenes, Chief Financial Officer & Chief Operating Officer
  • Andrew Bartholomew, Senior Vice President, Strategy
  • John Colton, Senior Vice President, Engineering
  • Raphael Fontes, Vice President, Customer Operations
  • Natalie Gibralter, Vice President of Product, Consumer Products
  • Mary Good, Chief People Officer
  • David Lee, Chief Creative Officer
  • Kinjil Mathur, Chief Marketing Officer

Product / business model

As of 2016, Squarespace had hosted more than one million websites.[4] Its users employ pre-built website templates, and a variety of drag and drop widgets to add elements such as text and images.[11] Its developers also create custom templates that are sold to users.[11] On-screen instructions walk users through things like search engine optimization and setting up e-commerce.[4] It's services are in direct competition with WordPress.com,[29] Wix.com,[30] and other digital website building agencies.[31]

Squarespace was initially built for creating and hosting blogs.[7] E-commerce features, such as an integration with Stripe for accepting credit card payments, were added in 2013.[32] In 2014, more commerce features were added; a mobile version of the service was released; a separate facility was added for developers writing custom templates and features;[33] and a logo-creation app was introduced in partnership with icon designer Noun Project.[34]

In 2011, Squarespace was upgraded to version 6, with new templates, a grid-based user interface, and other enhancements.[11] Version 7, which went live in 2014, replaced its coding backend with a drag and drop interface,[35][36] and added integration with Google Apps for Work and Getty Images.[14] In 2016, Squarespace started selling domains, putting it in more direct competition with GoDaddy;[37] and added an analytics dashboard[38] and PayPal integration.[39]

References
  1. "Squarespace Offices / A+I". ArchDaily. 2018-07-31. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
  2. Cole, Samantha (May 21, 2014). "How Squarespace's CEO Pivoted to Scale for Millions". Fast Company. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  3. Lohr, Greg (April 23, 2004). "University of Maryland Student in a Class by Himself". Washington Business Journal.
  4. Clifford, Catherine (April 22, 2016). "How Squarespace Went From a Dorm-Room Project to a $100 Million Web Publishing Platform". Entrepreneur. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  5. "UMD Alumnus Company Squarespace to Run Inaugural Big Game Ad". UMD Right Now :: University of Maryland. 2014-02-01. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
  6. June 30, Dan Patterson in Innovation on; 2016; Pst, 10:22 Am. "How Squarespace became a multimillion dollar publishing giant". TechRepublic. Retrieved 2021-01-30.CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  7. "How Squarespace became a multimillion dollar publishing giant". TechRepublic. June 30, 2016. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  8. Caumont, Andrea (September 13, 2004). "Squarespace Lets Users Manage Multi-Page Web Sites". The Washington Post.
  9. Evelyn Rusli (July 13, 2010). "Squarespace Raises $38.5 Million From Accel, Index Ventures". TechCrunch. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  10. "Squarespace Raises $38.5 Million From Accel, Index Ventures". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
  11. "Squarespace 6: Rebuilt From The Ground Up To Take On WordPress, Tumblr And Everyone Else". TechCrunch. October 21, 2011. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  12. "Fast 50". Crain’s New York Business. October 7, 2013.
  13. Zipkin, Nina (2018-02-15). "The Founder of Squarespace Explains Why You Don't Want to Raise As Much Money as Possible". Entrepreneur. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
  14. Warren, Christina (October 7, 2014). "Squarespace Ramps up its Tools to Compete with Wordpress". Mashable.
  15. "UMD Alumnus Company Squarespace to Run Inaugural Big Game Ad". research.umd.edu. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
  16. Stampler, Laura (January 28, 2015). "This Super Bowl Ad Purposely Wants to Put You to Sleep". Time. Retrieved January 26, 2018.
  17. "Key and Peele turn Squarespace's Super Bowl ad into an event". USA TODAY. January 1, 2016. Retrieved January 26, 2018.
  18. "Squarespace's Super Bowl Ad With John Malkovich Wins the Emmy for Best Commercial". AdWeek. Retrieved January 26, 2018.
  19. Poggi., Jeanine (January 31, 2018). "Squarespace's Super Bowl Ad Is Just Keanu Standing on a Motorcycle". AdAge. Retrieved February 13, 2018.
  20. Soshnick, Scott (October 10, 2017). "Knicks Team Up With Squarespace for Patch Sponsorship Deal". Bloomberg.com. Retrieved February 13, 2018.
  21. "Website host Squarespace to remove a 'group of sites' after violence at Charlottesville white nationalist rally". Washington Post. August 17, 2017. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  22. "Squarespace won't host your racist websites, either". CNET. July 23, 2014. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  23. Vynck, Gerrit De (December 14, 2017). "Squarespace Raises Funding at $1.7 Billion Valuation". Bloomberg.com. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  24. "The New York Knicks and Squarespace Announce Second Annual "Make It Awards" – The Madison Square Garden Company". www.themadisonsquaregardencompany.com. Retrieved 2019-08-16.
  25. "Squarespace Says It's Filed Confidentially to Go Public in U.S." Bloomberg.com. 2021-01-27. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
  26. Staff, Reuters (2021-01-27). "Squarespace confidentially files for stock market listing". Reuters. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
  27. "Website-building company Squarespace confidentially files to go public". Business Insider. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
  28. "Our Team". Squarespace. Retrieved 9 January 2020.
  29. "Squarespace vs. WordPress.com: Which Is Best for Easy Website Creation?". PCMAG. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
  30. Brussel, Joe Van. "Best website builder for 2021: Squarespace, Wix and more compared". CNET. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
  31. "The Difference Between Squarespace and a Web Design Agency". Whitehat Blog. 2016-09-09. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
  32. Summers, Nick (February 14, 2013). "Squarespace Adds Commerce Tools To Its Website Builder". The Next Web. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  33. Novet, Jordan (April 16, 2014). "Don't forget about website runner Squarespace. It just raised $40M". VentureBeat. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  34. Brownlee, John (January 22, 2014). "Squarespace Makes Designing A Logo Dead Simple". Co.Design. Retrieved February 13, 2018.
  35. Nudd, Tim (October 20, 2014). "Squarespace's Radical Update Is Like a Blank Canvas. So Its New Ads Are, Too". Adweek.
  36. Rhodes, Margaret (October 7, 2014). "The New Squarespace is a UX Dream that Eliminates the Backend Entirely". Wired.
  37. Ungerleider, Neal (April 15, 2016). "Now Competing To Be The Master Of Your Domain: Squarespace". Fast Company. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  38. Ha, Anthony (June 14, 2016). "Squarespace introduces new analytics for its commerce-focused customers". TechCrunch. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  39. "Squarespace businesses can now accept PayPal". The Next Web. November 1, 2016. Retrieved February 13, 2018.
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