Niche marketplaces offering a curated selection of products that cater to specific needs have been rising for quite some time. From vegan-only stores to sustainable fashion platforms, curated marketplaces foster a sense of community and personalization by addressing specific consumer demands, often filling gaps left by larger, more generalized retailers.
Launched in 2021, Tall Size is a marketplace where tall women can buy, sell and discover clothes and shoes that are designed to fit their bodies, providing a tailored solution in a market that has long overlooked their needs.
The ideation phase: Coming up with Tall Size
Nicole Murphy, a marketing executive in the consulting and advertising industries, and Kayla Alexander, a professional basketball player for the WNBA and the Canadian national team, have been friends since childhood. Both over 6 feet tall, the two women shared the frustration of finding clothes that fit them properly. "I wasn't able to just walk into any store or go on any website and find something that actually fits," Murphy recalls.
Murphy and Alexander were comparing notes on where to shop for clothes when they realized there was only a small selection of brands offering tall fashion, and many of the names weren’t well known. “All their money was going into inventory, designing and manufacturing the products, so they really didn't have any money to put into marketing,” Alexander reflected. This sparked the idea for Tall Size—a curated marketplace tailored to the fashion needs of tall women.
What sets Tall Size apart is its mission to create a place that feels like home—a community that celebrates and empowers tall women, bringing them together. "The fashion industry has long overlooked tall women, and we wanted to create a space where they feel seen, understood and celebrated," Murphy explains.
The design phase: Choosing the marketplace model
From the start, Murphy and Alexander’s idea was to launch a platform that would help tall women find brands catering to them while helping brands better reach their customers. That’s the winning idea behind curated, multi-vendor marketplaces: they bring together fragmented markets and connect brands with their target audience.
Murphy’s background in marketing and technology helped shape the platform’s vision. Although she wasn’t familiar with the technical requirements of setting up a marketplace, she knew there had to be a way to partner with multiple brands without holding inventory.
The early days of Tall Size
Setting up a marketplace comes with a series of technical challenges. Murphy and Alexander chose to launch their platform on Shopify.
Focused on offering the widest and best possible selection of clothing for tall women, the co-founders reinforced the community aspect of their platform. In fact, Tall Size’s success is largely based on word-of-mouth referrals and community-building efforts. “Tall women have felt extremely overlooked and underserved by the mainstream fashion industry for their entire lives, like myself and Kayla, and to finally find a brand that sees them and understands them led to a lot of word-of-mouth referrals and some media attention,” shares Murphy.
The role of technology: Scaling Tall Size
Tall Size’s success resulted in increased operational needs. The marketplace required more sophisticated technology to manage both the marketplace and the suppliers, streamline shipping and integrate with vendors using platforms other than Shopify. They decided to go with Onport, a multi-vendor marketplace platform.
“It really came down to finding the best way to create the best experience for both our suppliers and our customers,” says Murphy. Since launching the platform, Tall Size has offered a white-glove experience to their suppliers, and with Onport, it takes less than 15 minutes for vendors to connect to Tall Size’s store. "They receive the steps, send us their API credentials and we get all their products ready."
Onport’s ability to integrate seamlessly with various platforms, along with its advanced inventory management capabilities, proved essential for Tall Size’s growth. “Onport supports more sophisticated and stronger inventory management needs, such as managing orders with multi-currency options. Combined with being able to manage different shipping rates depending on where the orders are being placed and where the products are being shipped from, this makes it the perfect solution for us,” the co-founders explain.
The flexibility of Onport’s composable architecture was key. Tall Size could plug in the tools and systems they needed as they grew, without being locked into a rigid tech stack. “The customizability of the Onport platform and the technical advice we receive from Onport’s support team, have proved invaluable for us,” Murphy adds.
The future of Tall Size
As Tall Size grows, Murphy and Alexander are ready to face the challenges of scaling up their marketplace as demand increases. The platform’s flexibility allows Tall Size to streamline vendor management and gives it the advantage of being ready to onboard new brands, evolve and continue to offer a shopping experience without friction. “There isn't even a world where we would have built something like we have now without the support of Onport at all levels,” said Murphy.
The success of Tall Size further confirms that niche, curated, multi-vendor marketplaces are responding to customers’ needs and are fast becoming the dominant model in e-commerce.
And as they expand, Tall Size stays true to its mission: empowering tall women with fashion that fits and a community that celebrates them.
