NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Wayfair Inc. is betting that consumers will be buying more of their home furnishings online, and that investors can profit through its stock. Investors appear enthusiastic. The company’s W, +0.00% initial public offering was priced Wednesday evening at $29, above the indicated range of $25 to $28 a share. The 11-million-share offering raised $319 million and could increase if an overallotment option is used. Trading begins Thursday on the New York Stock Exchange. But Wayfair, which describes itself as having one of the largest online selections of furniture, home furnishings, décor and good, is hardly a household name. The company consolidated more than 240 websites, such as bedroomfurniture.com and allbarstools.com in late 2011 into one site and now operates under five brands. Here are five things to know about Wayfair and its IPO: Do people really want to buy beds online? Shoppers may be going online more, but furniture is still a tougher sell. Wayfair puts the share of home goods sold online in the U.S. around 7%, well below the proportion of other retail markets. That said, Wayfair sales are climbing, reaching $915.8 million in all of 2013, 77% more than the $517.3 million in 2011, the year it consolidated its brands. Sales in the first six months of this year hit $574.1 million. Active customers, or those who bought at least once during the previous 12 months, totaled 2.6 million on June 30, up from 2.1 million at the end of 2013 and 1.3 million at the end of 2012. Repeat customers accounted for 47.2% of orders delivered in 2013. The company says its typical customer is a 35-year-old to 65-year-old woman with an annual household income between $60,000 and $175,000. Wayfair doesn’t buy all those lamps, mattresses and other items shown on its site. Instead, it’s the middleman, and suppliers ship directly from their warehouses. According to its prospectus, it had relationships with more than 7,000 suppliers as of the end of 2013. It has to fight Amazon.com Inc. AMZN, -1.06% And IKEA, plus traditional furniture stores, department stores, specialty retailers like Crate and Barrel, as well as general retailers like Wal-Mart Stores Inc. WMT, +0.74% and Target Corp.TGT, +0.39% “If the online market for home goods does not gain acceptance, our business may suffer. Our success will depend, in part, on our ability to attract consumers who have historically purchased home goods through traditional retailers,” Wayfair says in its prospectus. Indeed, many of those traditional retailers, including Bed, Bath & Beyond Inc., The Container Store and Pier 1 Imports are investing heavily to expand their online sales. Brick-and-mortar stores are increasingly making it possible for consumers to pick up online orders at the store. And surveys have shown that consumers spend more when they can buy both from a retailer’s online site and physical stores. The company isn’t profitable. Wayfair posted a net loss of $63.2 million in the first half of 2014, compared with a loss of $24.3 million a year earlier, according to its prospectus. The two founders will control the company. Most of the money from the IPO is going to Wayfair. Just 500,000 of the 11 million shares being sold are from existing shareholders, none of which are company executives. The two founders, Chief Executive Niraj Shah and Chief Technology Officer Steven Conine, aren’t selling and will each own 28.3% of the company. Your vote doesn’t count as much. The company is selling Class A shares, which each have one vote. But the company has nearly 71.6 million shares of Class B shares, which each come with 10 votes. http://www.marketwatch.com/story/5-things-to-know-about-the-...