The GenZ market-focused apparel brand Curtsy raised a whopping $11 million fund from Index Ventures, as reported by Sarah Perez on TechCrunch.
Main Takes
- Curtsy raised $11 million in Series A funding for its clothing resale app aimed at Gen Z women
- The round was led by Index Ventures and included participation from Y Combinator, FJ Labs, 1984 Ventures, and angel investor Josh Breinlinger
- To date, Curtsy has raised $14.5 million
- Curtsy aims to make it easier for casual sellers to list items by reducing the work involved
- The app uses machine learning and human review to help sellers merchandise their items
- Curtsy caters to the Gen Z to young Millennial user base (ages 15-30)
- First-time sellers receive a free starter kit and Curtsy helps schedule a free USPS pickup
- Curtsy app has achieved success with several hundred thousand users and an average transaction rate of three items per month, due to its use of technology, outsourced teams, and added features
Curtsy 11m Index Venturespereztechcrunch is solving one of the biggest problems solved by GenZ: clothing. At the start, Curtsy only allowed customers to list dresses for rent, but the app has now evolved into allowing women to list their pre-loved clothes for sale.
In a Series A round led by Index Ventures, Curtsy succeeded in raising $11 million dollar from several investment firms including, Josh Breinlinger (ex-Square Ventures), FJ Labs, Y Combinator, and 1984 Ventures.
This isn’t the first time that Curtsy has successfully raised capital; the company has a good history with investment firms(Curtsy 11m Index Venturespereztechcrunch) . Including this round led by Index Ventures for $11 million, Curtsy has now raised a total of $14.5 million in investments. Prior to this $11 million round, Curtsy raised capital from other angel investors including SV Angel, Priscilla Scala, Kevin Durant, etc.
As the world is changing and adopting sustainability, many young people are now looking for alternatives to buying new clothes every time they see a fine piece of clothing. This is when Curtsy comes into action; the app allows you to buy preloved clothes so that you don’t have to buy new expensive clothes all the time.
Curtsy vs Poshmark – Who Wins the Competition?
Curtsy faces Poshmark as its direct competitor in the used clothing business. However, the former is winning due to its convenience.
In Poshmark, many women were listing and making money from their used clothing, but there’s a catch. It is not just the listing and packaging that’s time-consuming. In order to get their product out in the market, they have to be part of communities and market their clothes in order to get some return.
Curtsy (Curtsy 11m Index Venturespereztechcrunch) is another story, a good one. The app doesn’t care how many followers a seller has. As long as the product is good, it will sell. These are the easy steps you need to follow in order to sell a product on Curtsy:
- Download the app and create an account
- Upload a photo of the item and fill in the details
- Receive a price recommendation from Curtsy
- Curtsy improves and crops the image and moderates the listing for spam
- Receive a free starter kit with packaging supplies
- Schedule a free USPS pickup or receive a shipping label
- Receive payment when the item is sold
- Easily resell the item in the future with just one tap.
“The big gap in the market is really for casual sellers – people who are not interested in selling professionally… In pretty much every other app that you’ve heard about, pro sellers really crowd out everyday women. Part of that is the friction of the whole process,” stated Curtsy CEO David Oates.
Curtsy realized that many young people (Gen Z) do not have printers, so they offer a label service that sends the shipping label in the mail for free to help them participate in selling online. This service is part of their goal to increase liquidity and help more people sell on their platform.
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