Amify is moving on up in Cincinnati as it readies to debut a new — and much larger office space — three years after first opening its “HQ2” in the city in 2019.
The tech startup, which helps brands like Procter & Gamble and Energizer optimize their sales on Amazon, is relocating its Cincinnati headquarters from East Walnut Hills to Longworth Hall downtown.
Click the gallery above to take a look inside Amify's new HQ2.
The new office, at 9,000 square feet, will allow Amify to continue to grow its local team. Cincinnati, in three short years, has surpassed in count the team at Amify’s original HQ, located in Alexandria, Va., a Washington, D.C., suburb. Of the company’s current 98 employees, a majority, or 60, are based in Greater Cincinnati region.
Amify founder and CEO Ethan McAfee told me the company plans to hire 20-30 more people locally this year. Amify first planted roots in Cincinnati in 2019, starting with a warehouse near Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport, then with an office in East Walnut Hills a few months later.
The growth in Cincinnati has been strategic, he told me. He called the move a "seminal moment" for the company.
“For me, this really signals how far we’ve come, but also how far we can continue to go,” McAfee said. “Cincinnati has been great to us, and it’s been the ‘yin’ to our ‘yang’ in Washington, D.C. D.C. has good tech talent, but what D.C. doesn’t have is clients and this level of marketing and logistics.”
The new "HQ2" — a play on Amazon's second headquarters on the East Coast — is expected to officially open Feb. 1, although some employees have already started working from the space. Amify first announced its relocation plans to Cincy Inno in December.
The office, located on Longworth’s fifth floor, was renovated in 2017 by Zillow Group, part of a multimillion-dollar investment following its acquisition of local startup darling Dotloop in 2015.
Amify made its own upgrades but is largely absorbing best-in-class amenities in terms of networking and access. Employee perks include a fully stocked kitchen with catering three times per week, several large conference rooms and huddle space to facilitate collaboration. Amify has named the rooms after popular Cincinnati neighborhoods and attractions, including the Banks, Northside, Pendleton, Over-the-Rhine and Washington Park.
Christine McCambridge, senior vice president of delivery, said Amify will continue to operate under a hybrid model, but the company wanted to give employees a space that would feel like home — with room to grow.
“When we were all in the (old) office, it was literally standing-room only. We didn’t have enough desks or space in general,” McCambridge said. “This space gives us the opportunity to expand, not only in this office, but in the building itself. That’s one of the things I’m most excited about, as clients ask us to do more and more, is to have more space to do that.”
Amify, founded in 2010, bills itself as a turnkey "Amazon-as-a-service" provider. That means the company helps brands market themselves and their products with advertising and content, but it also provides warehousing and manages Amazon storefronts, oversees inventory and demand planning, as well as customer service and returns.
The company recently tripled its warehouse space in the region, with a new 30,000-square-foot building in West Chester. That facility will replace the warehouse near CVG.
The move was also tied to the company’s overall growth, McAfee said.
Amify is riding an e-commerce boom driven largely by the Covid-19 pandemic, but he said more and more brands are looking to sell directly to consumers online.
“It’s very hard to predict the future, but we still believe that Amazon and e-commerce is fairly early stage,” McAfee said. “E-commerce is only 20% of total retail sales, meaning 80% of the time, people are still buying at brick and mortar. I think in five years, it’s going to be maybe 40% online.”
To date, Amify has raised $5.8 million, all in a Series A in 2019, which included participation from local seed-fund CincyTech. While Amify has lots of runway, McAfee didn’t rule out another round sometime in 2022.
"We're starting to get our name known in the industry more and more, and more and more brands are going to want to work with one of the market leaders,” he said.
