home24 review requests: how to automate the ask

Automate review requests on home24.

home24 is one of the largest pure-play online furniture retailers in the German-speaking market and runs its marketplace on Mirakl. Selling furniture to German buyers combines the longest review lead time of any category with the most exacting reviewers on this site — which is an opportunity rather than a warning.

German furniture buyers write the reviews you want

There is a real difference in how thoroughly buyers review by market, and DACH sits at the demanding end. A German furniture review is more likely to mention the material thickness, whether the pre-drilled holes lined up, how the finish has held after a month, and whether the assembly instructions were comprehensible.

For a seller that is uncomfortable and extremely valuable. Uncomfortable because sloppy products get found out quickly. Valuable because that level of detail is exactly what converts the next cautious buyer, and because it is genuinely hard for a competitor with worse products to fake.

If your furniture is good, this is a market that will say so in detail — but only if someone asks.

Assembly is the event, not delivery

Everything said about furniture timing applies here doubly. The parcel arriving is not the moment. The moment is when the thing is built and standing in the room, which in practice can be a week or two later and depends entirely on when the buyer had a free Saturday.

Asking before assembly gets you a review of the box. Worse, it gets you a review of the box from someone who has not yet discovered that the product is excellent — you have spent your single ask on the least informed moment in the buyer's experience.

Instructions and packaging are part of the product here

In flat-pack furniture, the assembly experience is the product experience for the first hour, and reviewers treat it that way. Clear instructions, labelled parts, no missing screws — these show up in reviews constantly, and sellers who get them right build a reputation for it.

That also means the review programme feeds back into your operation. A steady flow of honest reviews tells you which SKU has the confusing instruction sheet long before your return rate does.

What Merita does

We take the delivery confirmation from your home24 orders, wait long enough for the piece to have realistically been assembled, and send one message in German through the marketplace's own buyer messaging asking for an honest review. Nothing offered in return, one message per order, and any order with a complaint, refund or open return excluded.

What Merita does on home24

We watch your home24 orders for the moment each one is actually delivered, then send one polite message through the marketplace’s own buyer messaging asking the buyer for an honest review. Nothing is offered in return and nothing is incentivised, so the ask stays inside the marketplace’s rules. Orders with a complaint or an open return are skipped automatically. On our live client this took the rate of review collection from roughly 1 in 100 delivered orders to about 5.2 in 100 — a 5.2× lift.

home24 — common questions

When should a home24 buyer be asked to review flat-pack furniture?

After assembly, not after delivery — which in practice means a wait of one to two weeks, because buyers build furniture when they have a free day rather than when it arrives. Asking earlier spends your single request at the least informed moment in the buyer's experience, before they have discovered whether the product is good.

Are German-market reviews harder to earn?

They are more detailed and more exacting, which cuts both ways. DACH buyers routinely comment on material quality, whether pre-drilled holes lined up and how a finish has held up over weeks. Poor products get found out quickly, but good ones get described in a level of detail that is very hard for a weaker competitor to match.

Can a review programme tell me anything about my own products?

Yes, and in flat-pack furniture it is unusually useful. A steady flow of honest reviews surfaces the SKU with the confusing instruction sheet or the consistently missing fixing well before your return rate moves, because buyers mention the assembly experience constantly in this category.