Chinese luxury fashion resale platform Plum, also known as Hongbulin, has inked USD 100 million in a series C funding round backed by second-hand trading platform, ZhuanZhuan Group, the company announced.
The strategic investment will see Plum develop databases, service standardisation, and enhance user experience, according to a release.
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The investment will also see Plum sell its used fashion items on ZhuanZhuan’s marketplace and will help the group process more brands and goods, according to ZhuanZhuan, a general marketplace borne out of 58.com.
“We will fully leverage our pricing technology that the firm has accumulated, as well as our order fulfilment capacity to enable the fashion industry to be more sustainable and green,” said ZhuanZhuan CEO, Huang Wei.
Founded in 2017, Beijing-based Plum operates both consumer-to-business-to-consumer (C2B2C) and business-to-business-to consumer businesses (B2C2B).
In August 2019, the start-up raised USD 20 million in its Series B round from venture capital groups including Matrix Partners China and Qiming Ventures.
Founded in 2015, ZhuanZhuan Zhuanzhuan’s second-hand online platform covers dozens of categories, including mobile phones, 3C digital, books, clothing, shoes and hats, maternal and child products, furniture and household appliances, mainly in the C2B2C model.
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It has received backing from strategic investors including Tencent, 58.com, and Qingyue Fund.
According to the 2022 resale report by ThredUp, the largest online thrift and consignment store, the global second-hand market is expected to grow to USD 36 billion by 2024 and to more than USD 200 billion by 2026.
The growth of the second-hand market in Asia and Australia is more than three times faster than that of the new apparel market.