When New Jersey entrepreneur and Boxed co-founder Chieh Huang talks about success, it’s abundantly clear how so much of what he acts upon is drawn from prior experience — both professionally and personally.
At the New Jersey Tech Council Venture Conference held in Newark, New Jersey, Huang emphasized the importance of investing in your employees, especially in a startup environment.
Boxed is an online shopping marketplace where customers can buy in goods in bulk, similar to Sam’s or Costco, and have their purchases shipped to them in two days or less. Since Huang started the company around four years ago in his garage in Edison, New Jersey, Boxed has had explosive success. They now employ over 600 people and run six facilities across the country.
Luck had nothing to do with the company’s rapid growth. Instead, Huang attributes his success to the lessons he’s learned from co-founding a prior startup; he became CEO of gaming company Astro Ape in 2010, and through his leadership at both companies, he quickly learned the value of taking care of your employees.
His revelation on the value of happy employees came one day when visiting the Boxed office in Atlanta. Upon arrival, he saw only two cars in the parking lot. Thinking he’d catch everyone on a long lunch break and have to be the villain boss, he walked through the front doors to find the office fully staffed.
It turns out, despite paying his employees above market wages, only two of them could afford private transportation to work.
He knew he had to help somehow. He considered renting or leasing cars, but then considered his own life path, and realized that he was where he is today because of the priority his parents placed on his education. Even though his employees were making $15-17 an hour, most couldn’t afford to send their children to a private or even state school.
In a move that gathered national attention, Huang decided to pay for the tuition of every child of his employees. Now, almost half his company shares are dedicated to that fund.
Even further, Huang also recently announced that the company would pay for the wedding of any of his employees, and estimated that over 10 percent of Boxed employees would take advantage of the program.
But there’s more to keeping strong relationships with employees other than the pay or special perks he set up. Huang also interviews every one for at least 20 minutes in the final round to see if they’d be a good fit for the company environment in which he has invested so much.
When via video chat at the conference what his greatest challenge has been, Huang quickly had an answer: making sure everyone fits in.
“With 600 people, with very experienced folks from around the country and different walks of life, it’s hard to make it all work,” said Huang.
For example, when their chief merchant used to work at Sam’s Club, she oversaw 54,000 people in her ward and traveled across the country on private jets. With Boxed, she manages ten people and has a desk on the floor just like everyone else.
“Not only is it a challenge to make sure they’re integrating right, but also making sure it’s all working,” said Huang.
Moving forward in the age of robotics, Boxed remains committed to sticking with their workforce. While industry giant Amazon now boasts fully-automated fulfillment centers to ship out orders, Huang finds a balance of high-tech factories and human employees.
For example, the company’s newest fulfillment center in central New Jersey features robotics, three miles of conveyors and a mezzanine. But you’ll see those machines working alongside people.
So far, the approach seems to be paying off. The company is carving out a market for itself despite long-time players like Amazon continuing to expand. Boxed is admittedly not an “everything” store. Instead of carrying 10,000 brand of popcorn, they’ll carry one or two, but due to their ability to sell so much, they can offer deep discounts that others cannot.
“The moment we try to be like Amazon is the moment we lose our way at the company,” said Huang.
Through his unique commitment to his employees, Huang is attracting the right employees and making it attractive for them to stay and grow with the company. Boxed is just four years in, and with the help of over $100 million in venture capital, it is scaling rapidly and showing no signs of slowing down anytime soon.
