ThredUp Adds to Board as It Plots AI Expansion

ThredUp tapped Tapestry Inc. executive Noam Paransky to join its board as the company seeks to build up AI for its legacy resale marketplace.

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Paransky, who is chief omni and innovation officer at Coach parent Tapestry, will advise ThredUp as it updates its approach.

James Reinhart , cofounder and chief executive officer of ThredUp, said: “In today’s rapidly evolving technological landscape, prioritizing digital innovation to enhance the customer experience is critical to ThredUp’s ability to transform the future of resale and further our mission to inspire the world to think secondhand first. Noam’s extensive experience in omnichannel strategy and innovation aligns with this focus, and his appointment comes at a pivotal time where we’re leveraging breakthroughs in technology to improve the shopping experience on ThredUp and redefine how people interact with secondhand apparel online.”

Before Tapestry, Paransky was senior vice president of digital at Gap Inc.

“I’m delighted to be joining ThredUp’s board as they continue to revolutionize the resale industry and bring circularity to the forefront of fashion,” Paransky said.

Since it was founded in 2009, ThredUp has processed more than 172 million items from 55,000 brands across 100 categories.

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While resale has been a hot spot in the fashion industry for years, it’s been a tough business for investors to get behind recently as various players, including ThredUp, push to toward bottom-line profits.

But even as the business model is getting ironed out, demand for resale still seems to be growing stronger.

In its annual report on the secondhand industry in March, ThredUp said the global secondhand apparel market expanded by 18 percent to $197 billion last year, in terms of gross merchandise value.

ThredUp also projected that resale will grow three times faster than the overall apparel market and will hit $350 billion by 2028.

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