thredUP

About the Founders
James Reinhart, co-founder, is a serial entrepreneur and recent graduate of the Harvard Business School and the Harvard Kennedy School. Prior to HBS/HKS, while working in the Bay Area, he helped build one of the nation’s premier public schools, Pacific Collegiate School – recently named the #3 school in America by US News & World Report. After Pacific Collegiate, he started Beacon Education Network, a charter management & school turnaround organization, with a one million dollar seed grant from Netflix CEO Reed Hastings.
Oliver Lubin, co-founder, is currently the Marketing Technology Manager at Foley Hoag LLP. Over the past two years, Oliver has stewarded the launch of multiple websites for the firm. Oliver earned a M.S in Healthcare Technology Management at Marquette University. He has worked in marketing and technology consulting for the past six years and holds a degree in Computer Science from Boston College.
Chris Homer, co-founder, a recent graduate of the Harvard Business School, worked at Microsoft from 2005 to 2007 and helped grow the reach of the company’s mid-market, live-event sales group. He was a key member of multiple major product launches, delivering mid-market focused presentations at the Windows Vista, Office 2007 and Microsoft CRM 3.0 launch events.  Chris has a B.S in Engineering from Princeton University.

What other people don’t seem to get…
Non-consumption in the used-clothing space is not about price, it’s about convenience. No matter how cheap it is, if you have to battle crowds and lines it’s not worth it. No matter how cheap it is, if you have to bid many times in an auction or go to the post-office, it stinks. thredUP’s model – supply driven consumption and Netflix-like pre-paid mail service – solves the problem uniquely by eliminating these barriers to consumption. When it’s just as easy to thredUP as it is to “put stuff in storage,” “spring clean”, or “closet rationalize” consumers will pay. 

Our particular competitive advantage works on two dimensions. First, thredUP is a network-effects driven business. Scale matters. Being first in a non-consuming market means we can lock-in customers with a great experience (and a trusted name) and keep out imitators who will lack sufficient scale to jump in.  Second, thredUP is not a mousetrap. The key advantages are in scale, service and price. We will be well-positioned to respond aggressively to anyone who attempts to compete with us on these dimensions.