Vestiaire Collective undertakes first ever crowdfunding exercise as it eyes IPO

Vestiaire Collective, the trailblazing global fashion resale platform, is undertaking its first crowdfunding exercise ahead of its "next big objective", which will be an IPO.

Founded in Paris 15 years ago, the business was a pioneer in luxury and designer fashion resale and already boasts an enviable line-up of investors including luxury conglomerate Kering, publishing house Condé Nast, investment house Eurazeo and French public investment bank Bpifrance.

Riding the boom in the pre-loved fashion market, it achieved so-called "Unicorn status" (i.e. a start-up that reaches a $1 billion valuation) in 2021 and last year it boasted a product catalogue of 10 million items and processed two million orders from 800,000 customers.

Now the B-Corp certified platform is turning to its community for extra funding as it continues its global expansion in what CEO Maximilian Bittner has described as a "pivotal year" for the business. A Crowdcube page is inviting interested parties to gain early access to the campaign before officially going live on 6 February.

Bittner said the business's largest market was now the US but it has a strong presence in Europe and Asia with ambitions to grow further, along with the global fashion resale market as a whole, which he said was expected to grow from $200 billion to over $350 billion by 2027.

Maximilian Bittner

"We're taking market share from first-hand fashion every single day," Bittner said. "2024 is a pivotal year for Vestiaire Collective. We expect to continue to take market share, achieve profitability and the next big objective will be an IPO."

Speaking about the establishment of the business 2009, co-founder Fanny Moizant commented: "At the time I noticed consumers were drugged on loyalty always consuming more and more. The result? A massive waste in people's wardrobes. So I wanted to stop that cycle. Therefore the mission of Vestiaire Collective is to transform the fashion industry for a more sustainable future by empowering its community to drive the change."

She added: "Vestiaire Collective was built on three pillars. The first one is community. On the platform you have amazing sellers opening their wardrobes and buyers who can interact directly with them. The second pillar is trust. We want every single item on the platform to be genuine. For that we have built a two-step authentication process. The first step is digital and the second step is physical with 45 experts. The third pillar is inspiration. On the platform we offer a catalogue of almost five million unique items."

As well as its peer-to-peer service, Vestiaire powers the resale platforms of major names, such as Gucci, Chloé, Burberry and Courrèges. Last year staff in the business all became shareholders.

Main image: Vestiaire Collective's authentication process