Don't Build the Marketplace. Plug Into One.

01 /The Concept

Buying a washing machine, a heating unit, a chandelier, or a wardrobe is only half the job – they still need to be assembled, installed, mounted, or hung. Not every buyer can handle that alone, and not every store includes installation with the purchase. So shoppers end up searching for the right technician online or through gig platforms.

Dealt offers stores a way to embed that marketplace directly into their storefront. Once integrated, buyers can book installation at the moment of purchase – with the store providing the service through a network of independent contractors, without maintaining any in-house installation staff.

Dealt's core proposition: it sells stores a turnkey marketplace – the technology platform plus 10,000 freelance contractors capable of handling 300 service types, covering nearly all of France, where the startup is based.

Stores can start offering installation for home appliances, plumbing, lighting, HVAC, garden equipment, computer setup, and furniture assembly – as well as ongoing maintenance, servicing, and repair.

Adding the marketplace lifts store performance on both revenue and conversion. Customers are more likely to buy from stores that handle installation – Dealt reports an average 5% conversion lift for its partners, with approximately 15% margin on services rendered. Stores can also sell ongoing maintenance subscriptions to their customers.

Integration can happen in a few ways.

The simplest: create a standalone service marketplace section on the store's website using the Dealt platform, covering the service types and territory the store wants to offer.

The deeper option: use Dealt's API to embed service booking directly into product pages and the checkout flow. Slightly more technical, but shortens the path from purchase intent to service order.

For offline retail locations, QR code posters on shelves link shoppers directly to service booking for the products next to them.

Dealt is currently live on 40 e-commerce sites and in 500 physical retail locations across France. It has raised €6 million in new funding on top of a previous €1 million, with expansion into Belgium, Switzerland, and Spain coming next.

02 /Why It Matters

This particular freelancer marketplace was actually founded back in 2016, operating for five years under the name Mon Super Voisin on a direct-to-consumer model – attracting shoppers looking for installation and repair contractors.

The problem: most of those engagements were one-time. When a contractor did good work, the customer took their number and went direct next time – cutting the platform out.

Research also revealed that two-thirds of customers had come to the platform right after buying new equipment.

In 2021, the startup pivoted to B2B – selling the marketplace to stores, which then offered it to their own buyers. That pivot immediately unlocked €1 million in initial funding.

This is the same pattern that has appeared repeatedly: many startups hit their growth inflection when they shift from B2C to B2B, keeping the same underlying technology and service while changing the distribution model.

Dealt also rides a broader structural trend: the accelerating digitization of the services market. As one of the investors in Dealt's latest round put it: "The 2000s saw the e-commerce boom, when online retail and then marketplaces exploded. In 2010–2020, we realized the same transformation had to happen in services. That's why we're particularly interested in this market right now."

To put numbers on one segment: the US market for online installation, repair, and maintenance services for home equipment currently sits at roughly $1.5 billion and is growing at 14.3% per year. The overall market – including offline – is around $90 billion, growing at half that rate (7.1%).

The gap in growth rates signals a market in migration from offline to online. The runway is enormous: the overall market is projected to reach $156 billion by 2030, and even a 10–20% online share of that would dramatically outpace current projections for the online segment.

Dealt isn't alone in this view. Scnd ([reviewed here](/review/zajti-i-vzletet)), a platform for building service marketplaces that raised €4 million in its first round, cites 24% annual growth in the online services market.

So Dealt made the right pivot from B2C to B2B, and is targeting the right market.

Prolong ([reviewed here](/review/esli-obychnoe-znachit-rynok-bolshoj)) runs a closely analogous model – embedding repair services into stores that sell clothing, footwear, watches, and jewelry – and raised €1.5 million in its first round.

03 /Opportunities

The broad direction: the online services market is growing fast, and there's a long runway ahead.

You can try to build a consumer-facing marketplace and grow the audience yourself. But that's slow, expensive, and uncertain – especially if the funding environment gets rocky.

The faster path is to attach to someone who already has the audience – stores, online and offline, following the Dealt and Prolong model.

The core question: who can you attach to, with which set of services? The Dealt and Prolong answers are fairly obvious. That's both a strength (large market) and a risk (high competition).

Are there less obvious combinations? The principle here isn't limited to product-adjacent services – installation of goods you just bought, repair of things you already own. There's also an audience-overlap angle: what services does the audience of a given retailer or platform frequently use that aren't already embedded there?

What services would you attach to which sellers – and why?