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Archive, a startup that works with brands to resell their own secondhand products, just had a big transaction of its own: $8 million in new funding.
- The seed round was co-led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Bain Capital Venture; investors including Alex Bolen, CEO of Oscar de la Renta, and Shan-Lyn Ma, co-founder and CEO of Zola, also participated.
- Archive, which is just shy of a year in business, has now raised ~$10 million in total, according to the company.
How it works: Archive helps retailers create their own resale marketplaces—sites that often look very similar to their existing e-comm presence, complete with the original product photography and descriptive copy. Along with building and maintaining the websites, Archive is part curator and facilitator, setting up forms for sellers to ensure clothes aren’t too worn—or smelly.
The goal? In part, to enable companies to keep customers close rather than losing them to popular platforms like eBay.
It’s a growing concern among brands amid an exploding resale market, explained Emily Gittins, co-founder and CEO of Archive. She spoke to about 100 retailers about resale before starting the company, and they said they felt kind of...ghosted.
“They were seeing their customers buy things from their brand and then leave the platform and go to Poshmark and Depop” to eventually resell them, Gittins told Retail Brew. “Customers are talking about their product and sharing love about it and they’re completely cut out of that whole ecosystem.”
- So far, five brands have introduced resale sites through Archive, including The North Face (just in Canada for now), and Oscar de la Renta.
- But more retailers are taking note of the strategy: 60% of US industry execs offer or are open to offering resale items to their customers, according to a ThredUp report.
Archive has only about a year of data, but what it has is promising for companies: Sellers on its resale sites are offered an option of getting the selling price minus what’s usually a 30% commission (brands vary) in cash, or the entire amount in store credit. Three out of four take the store credit to buy something new from the brand, according to Gittins.
Crowded closet
Archive certainly isn’t the only company powering resale for retailers. ThredUp introduced its resale-as-a-service platform in 2019, and has already partnered with some 20 brands, including Adidas and Crocs.
- Other startups like Trove and Recurate have also emerged on the scene.
Looking ahead: Still, Gittins is excited for what’s next. She said Archive has “a lot more brands in the pipeline” set to debut this year, but declined to reveal which ones. Still, whoever they turn out to be, she said there’s more in it for retailers than just making a sale.
“Part of this is pulling that [sale] back into the brand and actually seeing a resale offering as an asset which you use to build community and love around your brand.”—AAN