ERLANGER, Ky. — Deco USA said it has acquired the key assets and intellectual property of Uma Home Décor for an undisclosed sum.
The company, which is now doing business as Deco Marché, is now owned by a private equity firm called Navigate Partners and is being led by Dan DeVries, president and COO. DeVries had been chief operating officer at Uma for the past year, according to his LinkedIn profile, and with UMA for the past five and a half years. Former Uma CEO Andy Stein is no longer with the company.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Deco USA acquired Uma Home through a UCC Article 9 sale. Article 9 of the Uniform Commercial Code addresses secured transactions of personal property, agricultural liens, promissory notes, consignments and security interests, according to Investopedia.
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UMA had been looking for a buyer for about the past four months, according to Shalini Patel, vice president of marketing and customer success.
Deco Marché will carry largely the same assortment of furniture, lighting, mirrors, wall décor and home accents as Uma. In a release, it described itself as “a next-generation home furnishings platform, combining curated global design with enterprise-ready infrastructure.”
“Retailers need partners who operate at the speed of digital commerce,” said DeVries in a release. “We pair design intelligence with enterprise-grade execution. This is more than a product company; it’s a launchpad for retail growth.”
Deco Marche will be a much more “touch-driven” business, said Patel, and will rely on artificial intelligence more to automate content, optimize assortments and enhance delivery through predictive analytics. It will continue to source globally. Its main factory partners are in India, Indonesia and Vietnam.
Sean Slack, who worked for Uma in the past, has returned to the company as director of product development.
The company has closed Uma Home’s showroom in Dallas but will likely be at Las Vegas Market in July, according to Patel.
It is moving operations from Uma’s former base in California to Erlanger, Ky., a more central U.S. location that can offer one to two-day delivery and better shipping rates to its retail customers, many of whom are on the East Coast, Patel said.