- Platform for buying and selling pre-loved South Asian fashion.
- They take 25% commission on the final sale price for their standard service, and 35% commission on the final sale price for their VIP service with £25 upfront fee.
Circular Threads
Written in December 2023. Details may have changed since.
Bootstrapped
❓ Business Model
📈 Traction
- 147% GMV and 162% order YOY Growth Rate
- Hosted 4 Sell Out popups this year (250+ people at each).
- 20+ influencer and celebrity users (Kavita Cola, Ollie Locke, Rosanna Falconer, Shivani Pau and more)
- Featured on 13 BBC Channels.
- Growing community of 10K+ engaged online supporters.
🌱 Founding Team
- Anoli Mehta (Founder & CEO)
- 6.5 years in Management Consulting at EY
- Featured on BBC100Women for making change in the industry
- Won the chairman's prize on completion of the New Entrepreneurs Foundation accelerator
- Dipali Mehta (COO)
- Past includes: NetAPorter, MatchesFashion and Alexandalexa
- Qualified Pharmacist
📖 Story
Anoli had two big fat South Asian weddings with in 3 months of each other when her brother and sister both got married in 2017.
Each had 5 events with 300 people attending all of them!
She went to the ethnic hubs in the UK and was stuck for choice, unsure if she was being ripped off - and in the end, was lucky enough to travel to India to get her 10 outfits.
During lockdown, she did a huge clear out and self reflection, and it devastated her to think these heavy, hugely expensive outfits were not going to be worn again.
Anoli found it absurd that so many other South Asians had endured this exact process, and that the second hand market had not picked up in South Asian communities, when it was dramatically increasing in the western world.
That's when Circular Threads was born.
👀 Reasons to watch
- The resale market is worth $250bn and other companies have proven that the model works for western attire with famous examples including Vinted, Depop, and eBay.
- They are the first entrant into untapped market for South Asian clothing in the UK despite South Asian clothing being 3x as damaging to the environment and 3x more costly!
- They have established themselves as the go-to in their niche by being built by the diaspora for the diaspora. All of their progress so far is despite being fully bootstrapped so far and post funding they can scale new heights.
- The platform has over 1000 gently worn outfits for a fraction of the price, both designer and non-designer, weddingwear or guest wear. There are 400 individual sellers and a waitlist of boutique collaborations to sell their sample pieces.