Bed Bath & Beyond acquires One Kings Lane at a discount

The flash-sale shake-out has hit home for One Kings Lane.

The online furniture retailer — once valued at nearly $1 billion on paper — was sold at a fraction of that to Bed Bath & Beyond, which declined to disclose the purchase price Tuesday other than to say it was “not material.”

The San Francisco-based startup joins a laundry list of e-commerce startups that have failed to live up to their lofty valuations after investors pumped hundreds of millions into the space.

Fab.com sold for a less-than-fabulous $15 million last year after once being valued at $1 billion, while Gilt Groupe sold to Hudson’s Bay in January for $250 million, a quarter of its peak value.

Zulily sold itself to the parent of home shopping channel QVC for $2.4 billion in 2015 after watching its shares plunge 60 percent following its initial public offering.

One Kings Lane, founded in 2009 by Alison Pincus and Susan Feldman, was valued at $900 million in 2014 after raising $225 million. Its investors included Kleiner Perkins, Tiger Global Management and Scripps Networks.

Like other so-called flash sale sites, One Kings Lane offered a few select products on a daily or weekly basis at a steep discount. But the once-hot sector started to cool as the field became crowded and consumers grew tired of the concept.

In December, One Kings Lane laid off a quarter of its staff — it second big round of cuts — as it struggled with slowing growth, management defections and pressure to cut costs.