The Popsa Journey so far

Over the past decade, Popsa has grown from an idea into a thriving business that serves millions of customers across the world – and the pace of growth has only accelerated.

From nothing to something meaningful

Popsa sells personalised products to millions of people every year. We’ve gone from generating $100k in revenue in our first twelve months to more than $40m a year by the early 2020s. In 2025 we achieved a new company record of $58m in revenue – the highest in our history. We also hit our first days with more than $1m+ in revenue, and delivered our highest growth rate in four years. On average every customer purchases at least twice, and many of our customers have ordered hundreds of times.

We’ve also gone from 3 team members to more than 60 – and we hit the milestone of over $1m in revenue per employee in 2025, a benchmark of exceptional efficiency. According to an independent report by Deloitte, Popsa was the fastest-growing software company in the UK in 2020, and we were the only company to remain in the Top 10 fast-growing startups in 2021. In 2022, The Financial Times ranked Popsa in the Top 20 fastest-growing companies in Europe.

In 2025 alone: 

• We made over 1 million AI-generated “Year-in-Review” albums 

• Organic search visibility increased over 1,300%

• We created 17,000 video ads (up from 7,000 previously)

• We received over 100,000 Trustpilot reviews

These reflect both product strength and deep customer engagement

But it hasn't been an easy ride. Popsa’s success is built on raw talent, attention to detail, and perseverance. We are inventors. We create something where there was once nothing. Sometimes we fail, but we always get back up again. Our work can be intense but is incredibly rewarding. And the best part is that together, our hard work is empowering our customers to spread happiness by reliving the meaningful stories in their lives.

Accessible from anywhere

The first step in empowering people is to build a service that is accessible, no matter your skills or where you come from. We apply this philosophy on a global scale – with Popsa now shipping to 48 countries on 4 continents and localised services in 12 languages. In 2025 alone, we sent half a billion emails in 12 languages to customers worldwide.

Germany and France remain key markets, but we continue to grow strongly in the United States, Australia, Canada, and most recently expanded into Mexico in 2025, broadening our North American footprint. Popsa is also now certified as a B Corp, reinforcing our commitment to sustainability and social impact. We manufacture our products at nine facilities around the world and design physical IP in London.

But our approach goes far beyond translations and distribution; our features also reflect our international-first policy from inception. For example, customers can select public holidays to be included in their personalised Calendars. This is simple if you’re serving one country; Shutterfly has Thanksgiving and Presidents Day, but if you live in France or Australia this is alienating, you would expect Bastille Day or Anzac Day instead. Furthermore Mother’s Day in the UK is not on the same date as Mother’s Day in America.

So we invented a system that pulls in public holiday information from the internet for more than 200 countries around the world. This means that our customers always see public holidays that are appropriate for them. We also localise the name of the holiday into multiple languages. This means that you can make a gift for someone abroad and everything will be localised for them at the tap of a button. This attention to detail is not only a source of great pride, but is one of the reasons our customers love using Popsa.

A diverse team

The Popsa team is as international as our audience; we’re proud to welcome team members from around the world. We are nearing an even gender distribution and more than 10% are openly LGBT – and we continue to broaden representation as we grow. Occasionally, we work with agencies on specific objectives, but mostly we build things in-house. It’s the best way for us to learn from one another. At the moment everyone works from the UK, but plans are underway to open more offices in our core markets, starting with the US in 2026.

The founders aren't afraid to get stuck in either. More often than not they're just a few desks away and can often be found working on solutions with designers and engineers. If they're not already in one of your interviews, do feel free to request a chat before making a decision to join Popsa.

How we work

In terms of expertise, the team is roughly composed of three functional groups: Marketing, Product & Engineering, and Customer Service & Operations. Within that we employ strategists, creatives, media buyers, product designers, product managers, backend engineers, frontend engineers, data scientists, analysts, and customer success agents.

Most of the team now work cross-functionally, bringing individual roles together with joint responsibility for achieving specific objectives. 

As we grow we’re planning to add more cross-functional teams so we can deliver our extensive roadmap increasingly in parallel. This way of working gives team members an opportunity to specialise in particular areas and work on more ambitious projects not constrained by two-week sprints, but also the ability to occasionally move between teams to ensure they get to work on a variety of challenges.

Experienced founders

Popsa was founded by CEO Liam Houghton and CTO Tom Cohen. Popsa was founded by CEO, Liam Houghton, and CTO, Tom Cohen. Liam started creating eCommerce apps as a teenager and graduated with a First in Architecture before becoming a product designer. Meanwhile Tom qualified as a Computer Scientist, worked for a time on software for maritime software at BAE Systems, and went on to win the UK Young Entrepreneur of the Year award.

Before Popsa, they spent years building consumer products together. In 2016, they focused entirely on the idea that became Popsa, building it into a global business. Since then the founders have been joined by Chairman and Commercial Director Declan Mellett, CRO Meera Shah, and other senior leaders.

Strong financial backing

Popsa has a strong track record of fundraising to support our mission and we’re backed by several of the best investors in Europe. Popsa’s seed round was led by Silicon Valley accelerator, 500 Startups, followed by a sizeable investment from The Garage Soho.

Our three largest supporters have all invested in Popsa several times since 2018; Pembroke VCT, Guinness Global Investments, and Octopus Investments. And we welcomed our newest investor, Gresham House Ventures, in 2022 as part of a $12m round. The money we raise is mainly spent on R&D and the expansion of our team. The more talent in the team, the more we all learn from each other, and the fact that we spend most of our budget on R&D means that we get to work on some really existing things, delivering value for our customers in ways that our category has never seen.

Customer-focused principles

From the outset we built the infrastructure necessary for scalable eCommerce with a focus on serving customer needs first. We’ve evolved proprietary algorithms to generate Photo Book designs in milliseconds, prioritise user ease, and embed AI to enhance personalisation. Today, Popsa uses AI throughout the experience – from smart layouts to hyper-personalised suggestions – helping new users create products faster and with less friction than ever before.

A sense of purpose

When you’ve spent years creating digital products it becomes clear technology evolves rapidly, but the physical artefacts Popsa delivers will last decades. Millions of Popsa artefacts are treasured family keepsakes that may be passed down through generations.

And finally

Aside from realising our customer vision, our common goal at Popsa is to learn. Being part of a fast-growing startup gives exposure to fundamental problem solving. At heart, we are inventors, creating something from nothing – facing challenges together, succeeding together, and learning from our setbacks along the way.