Fast facts & context
- System size: 270+ stores; 50 more in development
- Annual sales: “well over a quarter-billion”
- Category tailwind: US secondhand market ~$45B (2023) → projected ~$73B (2028)
- Sustainability: Americans landfill 11M+ tons of textiles yearly (~80 lbs per person)
- Merch mix: 90%+ used, locally sourced
- Tech stack: Fully proprietary POS, appraisal, inventory, and customer interfaces
- Payout options: Cash, +20–25% store credit, and new digital payouts (e.g., Venmo)
- Key themes & takeaways
- Co-CEOs that work: Clear lanes (Zach: ops/tech; Tyler: marketing/finance/dev) + “brutal but respectful honesty.” Example: they scrapped a glossy 70-page marketing playbook in favor of chunked, usable modules.
- Franchising’s edge: Pushes ownership to the local level. Innovation bubbles up from franchisees; Basecamp codifies and scales the best ideas.
- Innovation from the field: Franchisee-sparked digital cash-out removed daily bank runs and met younger sellers where they are.
- The real customer: In resale, vendors (sellers) are the most valuable “customer.” If you win supply (quality & volume), shoppers flood in.
- Data over intuition: Proprietary appraisal software recommends buy & sell prices using historical store/regional/national data—turning subjective thrift into repeatable retail.
- Brand positioning: Lead with unmatched value and a boutique-clean experience; sustainability is authentic but secondary to price/quality.
- Centralized where it counts: Paid digital advertising is managed centrally but ring-fenced to each store’s local market; organic/community remains local.
- Scaling readiness: They built an 8-person, process-driven new-store team; year-one performance for recent openings is trending ~2x last year’s cohort.
- Next bottleneck: Enabling higher unit volumes (from $1M → $2M → $3M and beyond) via process, data, and in-store throughput—not bigger “rubber walls.”
- Customer joy moment: Shoppers enter expecting “thrift,” experience boutique curation, then see the price tag—confusion flips to delight (and approval from the parent paying).
- Segment guide (chapter markers)
- Open & context: Resale tailwinds, landfill reality, why timing is right
- Co-CEO dynamics: Lanes, feedback, and the 70-page playbook lesson
- From banking to resale: Preconceptions vs. what the data revealed
- Why franchise (not VC roll-out): Local ownership → local magic
- Franchisee innovations: Digital payouts & removing cash friction
- Who to market to: Vendor-first strategy; “cash for clothes” message
- Tech & pricing: Turning intuition into proprietary data products
- Marketing org design: Centralized paid; local organic/community
- Scaling stores: Building the downstream team; cohort results ~2x
- Operations puzzles: Throughput, storage, seasonality constraints
- Sustainability without the scold: Real impact, but value leads
- Tell Me Something Good: The “price-tag joy” moment at openings
- Where to learn more: Brand sites & social; franchise info
