Ceased operations and liquidated (Dec 2023) via an Assignment for the Benefit of Creditors, after a 2015 sale to QVC/Liberty and a 2023 sale to Regent.
The rise & fall
8 moments · 2009–2024
The key moments, with employee sentiment along the way.
2009
🌱
2009
Founded in Seattle
Mark Vadon and Darrell Cavens, fresh off Blue Nile, build a flash-sale site pitching daily deals to moms.
Fast Company
Nov 2013
📈
Nov 2013
IPO at $2.6B — the hottest e-commerce debut of its era$2.6B
Goes public in November 2013 and the stock soars from there; flash sales look unstoppable.
SEC filing
2014–15
2014–15
Slow shipping, fast Amazon
The deal-of-the-day model and weeks-long shipping lose ground to Prime; growth stalls and the stock slides.
Fast Company
2015
🤝
2015
QVC's parent buys it for $2.4B$2.4B
Liberty takes it off the public market below its IPO price — and growth keeps fading inside Qurate.
SEC filing
May 2023
May 2023
Qurate hands it to Regent
The fading brand is sold to a private-equity firm known for buying distressed retail names.
Fast Company
2023
💬
From the inside · Glassdoor reviews, 2023
Glassdoor reviews chart the slide in brutal detail: employees counted five layoff rounds, and the mid-2023 cuts came with 15 minutes' notice — no severance, no PTO payout, health coverage lapsing within weeks. Staff told the shutdown would come in February were let go before Christmas.
Dec 2023
🪦
Dec 2023
Liquidation — joins the Unitard Club 💔
Ceases operations via an Assignment for the Benefit of Creditors — the quiet way out, ten years after the $2.6B IPO.
Fast Company
2024
2024
The name sells for scraps
Beyond Inc. picks up the Zulily brand out of the wreckage and relaunches it — a shadow of the original.
Reuters
$2.6Bof peak value erased · 14 years
💬 entries paraphrase anonymous, unverified reviews posted publicly on Glassdoor ↗; dated facts carry their source.
How it happened
Zulily was a flash-sale site pitching daily deals to moms and one of its era's hottest IPOs, going public in November 2013 at about $2.6B. Its deal-of-the-day model and slow shipping lost ground to Amazon; QVC parent Liberty bought it for $2.4B in 2015, growth kept fading, and Qurate sold it to private-equity firm Regent in May 2023 before Zulily liquidated that December. Vendors reported unpaid invoices, and staff told the shutdown would come in February were let go before Christmas.
Source: Fast Company / SEC / Grokipedia (~$2.6B IPO valuation Nov 2013, stock soared post-IPO; acquired by Liberty Interactive/QVC for $2.4B 2015; sold to Regent by Qurate May 2023; liquidated via ABC Dec 2023)
