Hi, this is Imran Ahmed, founder and CEO of the Business of Fashion, and welcome to the Bof

podcast. In the State of Fashion 2019 report, we predicted the end of ownership as one of the key

themes that would define the fashion industry in 2019. Of course, vintage clothing has always been

part of the retail fashion scene.

But as with many brick and mortar retail segments, this is now transitioning online and boy what a year

it has been. In June 2019, the pioneering resaleer, the Reel, Reel, rates $300 million in its initial

public offering on NASDAQ. That same month, Paris-based Vester Collective raised $45 million, and London-based Deep

up raised $62 million, both to fund their own expansion.

That's $407 million raised in one month.

The resale market is clearly on fire and growing consumer desire for variety

and affordability means it could outgrow the fast fashion market in 10 years, according to some

estimates. To explore this topic, we invited Max Bittner, CEO of Veshare Collective, and Maria Raga,

C.O.D. Pop to the Voices 2019 stage to speak with BOF sustainability correspondent

Sarah Kent about the rise of the resale economy.

Neither of you come from a fashion industry background.

And so I wanted to start by having both of you talk through where you come from and what drew you to this opportunity.

And Maria, if you would like to kick off.

Sure.

So, like Hayden, I also need to accept that I come from the management consulting world.

I did that for about five years.

And then I jumped into the digital world.

I started to Groupon.

...