Loops raises $3.5M to let shoppers search stores in plain language
What's the deal? LoopsDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, a San Francisco startup, has raised a $3.5 million seed round led by a16z speedrunDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, with NTT DocomoDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → and others also taking part. The software lets online shoppers describe what they want in full sentences instead of guessing keywords or clicking through filters.
Why now? Chief executive Ari Nazir and president İlker Selim Zorluoğlu founded the company after Zorluoğlu tried to buy a gift online, sent the retailer a question, waited hours and never completed the purchase. With shoppers already asking AI chatbots for products conversationally, Nazir built the first prototype over a weekend to bring that experience onto a store's own site.
What's the endgame? Loops wants to replace the usual patchwork of separate AI tools with one system. It runs search, a shopping assistant, product enrichment, and virtual try-on on the same catalog data and record of each shopper's visit, so the tools reinforce one another.
Why it matters: Most ecommerce search still runs on keywords and filters, and results depend on how a retailer labels its catalog. The Baymard Institute rated search on 56% of the 344 US and European sites in its 2026 benchmark as mediocre or worse.
The numbers: More than 70 retailers and brands use Loops or are piloting it, and the company says 64% of pilots have become paying contracts. Customers include A101Dealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, one of Turkey's largest discount supermarket chains, and Istanbul-based denim brand Mavi, which sells in more than 30 countries. Smaller stores can install Loops as a Shopify app for $25 to $200 a month.
"A retailer does not need five different AI products that each understand one slice of the customer," Zorluoğlu said. "It needs one system that understands the catalog, the business and what the shopper is trying to do."
The signal: Retailers have been bolting on AI one task at a time — one tool for search, another for support, another for descriptions. Loops is betting the next edge comes from unifying that stack, turning scattered features into a single layer that understands both the catalog and the shopper.
Read more: sovereignmagazine.com
Image credit: Artem Beliaikin
