The RealReal snags $115M to fuel brick-and-mortar footprint

Dive Brief:

The RealReal on Wednesday announced the closing of $115M in Series G financing, led by PWP Growth Equity, the middle market private equity group of Perella Weinberg Partners, with additional participation from new investor Sandbridge Capital and existing investor Great Hill Partners, according to a company press release.
With this round, The RealReal has raised a total of $288 million. As part of the investment, PWP Growth Equity Co-Founder and Partner Chip Baird will join The RealReal's board of directors.
The funds will go toward expanding the luxury resale site’s brick-and-mortar footprint into new markets and to new e-commerce fulfillment centers, The RealReal CEO and Founder Julie Wainwright said in a statement.

Dive Insight:

Even before this announcement, consumers were seeing more television ads from The RealReal, which has staked out its share of the lucrative online resale market at the luxury end.

Several months ago, Wainwright was said to be making the rounds with investors in hopes of collecting another $100 million, which she appears to have topped. In March, the company also hired former Walmart executive Jun-Sheng Li as chief operating officer and former Amazon executive Len Eschweiler as chief revenue officer. The company also expanded its brick-and-mortar footprint with a 6,000-square-foot pop-up shop in Las Vegas.

Apparel and accessories resale is a fresh and growing market, fueled by opportunities to buy and sell online. The total U.S. apparel resale market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 13% from $18 billion in 2016 to $33 billion in 2021, according to Coresight Research. Second-hand apparel site ThredUp calculates that the resale retail market is on pace to reach $41 billion by 2022, with 49% in apparel, according to its own report released earlier this year.

So-called "re-commerce" upstarts are growing 20 times faster than the broader retail market and five times faster than off-price retailers, which offer a similar treasure hunt, according to Coresight. Clothing, shoes and accessories currently make up 49% of total U.S. resale sales, CoreSight said.

That leaves The RealReal particularly well positioned in the space. Rather than looking askance at shoppers' ability to find second-hand items there, Kering — the parent company of upscale brands Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent and others — have told analysts that they're actively working with The RealReal on merchandising.