Luxury fashion marketplace and tech business Farfetch has announced the acquisition of resale platform, Luxclusif, for an undisclosed sum.
The deal includes Luxclusif’s tech platform, and the transfer of the resale company’s team to the Farfetch group.
Luxclusif is a B2B service provider, founded in 2013, which enables the acquisition, authentication and sale of second-hand luxury goods to and from auctions, retailers, eCommerce platforms, and stores around the world.
Farfetch said the acquisition will significantly accelerate its resale capabilities through the development of key technology and service features such as automated pricing, and faster geographic and category expansion of its own resale service, Second Life.
The aim is to become a leading global platform for pre-owned luxury for both customers and industry partners.
The two businesses have already worked closely for several years, firstly through Farfetch’s start-up accelerator programme and most recently in relation to the launch and rollout of the marketplace’s Second Life initiative. Luxclusif provided the platform in Europe to authenticate, price and then sell on pre-owned handbags submitted to the programme by customers in exchange for Farfetch credit.
Following the completion of the acquisition, the Luxclusif team will operate Second Life, integrating both existing and new partners into the programme. Additionally, Luxclusif will continue to sell pre-owned products it acquires from specialist suppliers and luxury consumers through Second Life or similar programmes it operates for other luxury industry partners.
There will also be an opportunity for Luxclusif to operate white-label pre-owned propositions for brands invested in the ‘Farfetch Platform Solutions’ offering.
Giorgio Belloli, chief commercial & sustainability officer at Farfetch, said: “Luxclusif joining the Farfetch group allows us to expand the company’s pre-owned offer for our customers, for brand and retail partners and for other suppliers of pre-owned products.
“The pre-owned market is growing extremely fast and is increasingly important to both luxury customers and to the luxury fashion industry as a whole.”
He added that Farfetch’s Conscious Luxury Trends Report 2020 showed that more than half of the retailer’s customers have bought or sold pre-owned in the last year and industry estimates suggest the pre-owned category is growing three times faster than the primary market.
Rui Rapazote, co-founder & CEO of Luxclusif, called Farfetch “the ideal home” for his business as it looks to scale.
“Together, we are very much focused on growing the resale market through innovation and tailored solutions,” he said.
Guilherme Faria, co-founder and chief operating officer at Luxclusif, said the two newly conjoined companies “share a vision of a cleaner, conscious, circular and inclusive fashion industry and we are also aligned as tech enablers and industry leaders in our fields”.
Read more about luxury resale on Green Retail World
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