Coming to you from wherever he may be at the moment, meet Louis Bonilla, who recently celebrated his ninth anniversary at Wayfair! As a senior IT builds engineer, Louis helps bring the technology behind Wayfair’s physical spaces to life. From offices and warehouses to retail stores, Louis makes sure new spaces have the technology they need to open their doors—including Wayfair’s first large-format store in Wilmette, IL.
Louis loves that his role gives him the chance to work with teams across Wayfair to bring various projects together from the ground up. Outside of work, he’s an avid traveler who loves visiting Japan, checking out Costcos around the world and exploring almost every Disney park — Shanghai is the last on his list!
Read on to learn more about Louis and his experience at Wayfair.
What project or accomplishment are you most proud of during your time at Wayfair?
My proudest accomplishment to date has definitely been the successful launch of our first Wayfair store in Wilmette, Illinois. As our biggest customer-facing physical project yet, it required massive cross-team collaboration and a complex physical build-out from the ground up. Seeing that store come to life and knowing my fingerprints are on the tech infrastructure that powers the customer experience was incredibly rewarding. It was a historic milestone for Wayfair, and I’m honored to have played a key part in it.
What aspect of Wayfair’s culture has shaped your growth?
The entrepreneurial spirit and room for internal growth have truly shaped my career here. I started out at Wayfair providing simple warehouse IT support, and today I’m the primary subject matter expert (SME) for our tech infrastructure on net-new builds. Wayfair’s collaborative culture has allowed me to work across teams, stay ahead of evolving tech standards and become a key stakeholder in how we build physical locations. Having the space to learn, adapt and scale my impact is what makes working here so rewarding.
What do you enjoy most about working at Wayfair?
Without a doubt, it’s the people and the cross-functional connections I get to make. Because of the nature of my role, I get to step outside of the engineering bubble and collaborate daily with teams such as visual design, construction and warehousing. These partnerships have not only made me better at my job, but they’ve also led to lasting personal friendships. It’s a rare and awesome thing to work at a place where the people you build massive projects with become the people you hang out with outside of work.
Where do you call home and what does “home” mean to you?
The running joke among my friends and colleagues is, “Where in the world is Louis today?” because I am always on the move, whether it’s for work or leisure. Because of that, “home” to me isn’t a single geographic location — it’s the feeling of traveling for fun and sharing new experiences with the people I care about most. Whether I’m exploring a new country with family and friends or simply relaxing back at home with my fiancée and our doodle, Bernie, home is defined by the connections and memories we create together.
What’s one fun fact about you that most people don’t know?
Even though I work in tech, I’m surprisingly low-tech outside of work and rarely use anything besides my phone. Instead, I channel that energy into a few specific travel passions: I love visiting Japan, I make a point to visit Costco locations all around the world and my fiancée and I are on a mission to see every Disney park. We’ve checked off almost all of them, with Shanghai Disney being the very last one left on our bucket list!
What’s your favorite Wayfair product that you’ve purchased?
While I haven't officially added it to my cart yet, my absolute favorite product is currently sitting at the very top of my Wayfair wish list: the
Design Toscano Basho the Sumo Wrestler Sculptural End Table. Given how much I love traveling to Japan, it feels like the ultimate tribute to one of my favorite places, even if it is a wonderfully ridiculous conversation piece. I'm still trying to figure out exactly where it would fit in my home, but it’s definitely a future purchase I can't wait to make!