A report by US reseller ThredUP estimates that second-hand fashion will soon overtake “fast fashion”, with an expected market worth of $41 billion USD by 2022. According to the site, in 2017 resale equated to six percent of the fashion market, with fast fashion at nine percent. By 2027 however, it’s projected to sit at 11 percent for resale and 10 percent for fast fashion. Why? Because there is a huge glut of clothes in the market, that’s why. You people are just not buying all the clothes that are being made. The trend is starting to affect big retailers. H&M has $4.3 billion worth of unsold clothing.
This is not only an environmental disaster, it’s also a huge turn-off for millenials who are cutting against the waste in the fashion industry and also looking for unique looks that go against the manufactured ‘trends’ in fast fashion.
The biggest sites in this resale space include Vestiaire and Vinted, among others. But mostly they concentrate on person-to-person sales. A new startup hopes to bring small second-hand shops into the space and has now raised a seed round to power its vision.
TPH.co connects local vintage shops with vintage fashion lovers. Vintage shops subscribe to the platform to load op their garments. TPH stands for The Pasta Haters, the idea being that people want to find original pieces, instead of bland ‘pasta fashion’.
It’s now raised $250,000 from London-based Seedcamp, Wave Ventures, STING and The Nordic Web Ventures. TPH says it has been gaining traction not just among fashion-loving customers but among stores as well.
The site is the brainchild of Lisa Gautier, who was previously with Outfittery (Curated shopping for men) and FYNDIQ (Bargain superstore) and was recently joined by cofounder Maki Kobayashi. Gautier says: “At TPH.co we’re reshaping the way you consume fashion, keeping your closet unique and environmentally friendly. The fact that we attracted investors from four different countries perfectly reflects and supports the international ambition and opportunity for TPH.”
Seedcamp’s Carlos Eduardo Espinal, comments, “We were hugely impressed from the moment we met Lisa by the global market potential for TPH, the promising early traction the business has experienced to date, and the social impact of the business.”
Anton Backman from Wave Ventures says: “Cool, trendy and ecological, not to mention global from day one. TPH and Lisa are tapping a huge underserved niche of vintage lovers that is growing year by year.”
