This New York Magazine article might help: http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/09/they-were-quirk...
And for a more recent update: http://www.theverge.com/2015/4/24/8488531/quirky-invention-p...
tl;dr An online community for inventors to brainstorm and pitch ideas they have. The entire community helps refine the idea (name, marketing slogan, features) - and then Quirky picks a few at a time to bring to market (manufacturing, distribution).
That number is absolutely staggering. I would love to see what their internal product development was like.