Retail tech platform Mason has announced a $7.5m seed funding round to offer an Amazon grade store infrastructure storefront to help merchants bypass Amazon.

The funding round was led by Accel and Ideaspring Capital with participation from  Lightspeed India Partners as well as Mana VC, Gaingels, Core91 and VH Capital.

Having spent decades building solutions in Myntra, Flipkart and Walmart, Mason founders Barada Sahu and Kausambi Manjita met at Myntra, Walmart’s fashion arm in Asia.

Manjita recalled: “The penny dropped when we realised that growth was not a one-size fits all opportunity but that it had to have bespoke store engines that would run online stores.

“Most brands are left with no option but to sell at marketplaces like Amazon and pay 35c for every dollar simply because running a profitable standalone D2C store is just too hard,” he said.

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“With access to their own growth engine like Mason, brands can transform their D2C storefront into their most profitable channel, getting 50% uplift in their margins from day one.

“By democratising access to a complex tech stack, from data-driven merchandising to sales automation, to personalisation, the team is helping more entrepreneurs stay independent and become profitable.”

Barada Sahu, co-founder and head of revenue, added: “Traditionally only big retail has had the technology muscle to implement complex infrastructure while the rest of the market has been left stitching together fragmented solutions that simply do not work well with each other.

“Mason simplifies this with an all-in-one no code solution that powers marketers, product managers and founders to upgrade their stores from storytelling to selling from day one.

“Paying an upfront cost for a sophisticated merchandising engine is beyond what most brands can work on. For small and medium businesses, an all-in-one solution with a commission-based model is easier to understand.”

Mason says it has over 1,000 customers and powers over 8,000 brands worldwide with a pay as you grow pricing model.

The company claims that a typical store improves average order value by 23% in 30 days, improves session time by 17% and improves sell through by 35% in just 60 days

Subrata Mitra, partner at Accel commented: “In order to build a truly scalable outcome, the team is on the journey to create a self-serve platform wherein eCommerce brand owners could use it to create, communicate and grow.”