What is Reverb? Reverb Review

Reverb is an American e-commerce platform open to global users, where sellers can sell musical instruments, accessories and other equipment.

About Reverb

Sellers can only sell products at a fixed price. Reverb also provides several ways to promote products, such as "Reverb Bump". Bump Listing is mainly located at the top of certain pages or in a prominent position, with higher exposure.

Currently, there are more than 1 million buyers and 345,000 sellers on Reverb, with more than 960,000 products sold, 2.2 million registered users, and 94 million annual visits.

The site, which allows anyone to create a free listing for musical instruments and other related equipment, has also sold instruments and related equipment from popular artists such as Wilco, Green Day, BILly Corgan, and Ray Lamontagne.

Business Model

Reverb charges sellers a 3.5% commission and a small credit card processing fee.

Reverb’s customer service team is about 85% musicians, and the company also provides informational content, such as demonstration videos and how-to articles, to drive traffic to its site.

Financing

In November 2013, Reverb raised $2.3 million in funding from investors including Cheap Trick's Rick Nielsen, Lightbank co-founders Brad Keywell and Eric Lefkofsky, Cracker's David Lowery and Camper van Beethoven, Silicon Valley entrepreneur Eric Ries, and country music star Brad Paisley.

In January 2015, it raised another $4.2 million, and then in December of that year announced an additional $25 million led by global growth equity investor Summit Partners.

In August 2017, the company announced an additional $15 million in funding from 65 investors, including PayPal co-founder Max Levchin, Silicon Valley investor Roger McNamee, former Twitter COO Adam Bain and Shutterstock CEO Jon Oringer.

Development History

David Kalt founded Reverb in 2013, shortly after he acquired the musical instrument store Chicago Music Exchange.

- In August 2016, Reverb hired its first local employees in the UK, France, and Australia. In the same month, the company launched its mobile app outside of North America. Within a year of expanding into Europe, the company saw a 700% increase in users in the region and a 300% increase in sales in the region.

- In August 2017, Reverb was ranked #18 on the Inc. 5000 list of fastest growing private companies, with a 3-year growth rate of 12,327% (2013-2016).

In December 2017, the company projected full-year sales of nearly $400 million. At the end of the same year, the company launched Reverb LP, a platform for selling records, and Reverb Foundation, a nonprofit initiative.