Dive Brief:
- French fashion brand Maje launched a peer-to-peer resale platform in the U.S. called Maje Secondhand on Oct. 16, according to a release from Archive, the company that designed the e-commerce site.
- In the U.S., Maje’s resale site will allow customers to list their preowned Maje pieces and trade items for either Maje credit or cash, per the release. A similar site for Maje called Seconde Main launched in France in 2022.
- Later this month, Archive is also set to launch an in-store resale component for Maje in its West Village store in New York City, per the release, which stated that the brick-and-mortar version “will be powered by Archive’s first-of-its-kind resale POS.”
Dive Insight:
Designer resale continues to grow as fashion brands look to take control of their circular and sustainable fashion footprints. Companies including leather goods brand Mansur Gavriel, which launched its resale site earlier this month, and luxury house Oscar de la Renta, which launched its program in 2021, have created branded sites designed by companies such as ThredUp, Trove, Recurate and Archive.
Archive, which launched in 2021, now works with more than 40 fashion brands in seven countries, according to an email from an Archive spokesperson. In 2023, Archive started resale programs for 23 brands including Ulla Johnson, Maje and Canadian-based outdoor multibrand retailer Sail, which launched its Resail e-commerce site this week, per Archive. The Resail site offers preowned items from approximately 600 brands including The North Face, Osprey, Colombia and Helly Hansen. It’s the first time Archive worked on a multi-brand resale program.
For its resale program with Maje, Archive is giving secondhand shoppers the opportunity to either receive store credit, which can be used for online purchases, or get cash in return for their items, per the release. Maje is the second brand from French fashion group SCMP to launch a resale site with Archive, after Sandro Secondhand launched in October 2022.
“We are thrilled to be launching Maje Secondhand in the United States, following the European launch last year,” Paul Griffin, president and CEO of Maje, said in a statement sent to Fashion Dive. “This comes after the release of Maje Forward, our rental platform, and the Fairly Made global traceability program. Circular fashion is ingrained in the Maje DNA.”
Pricing of resale items on the Maje Secondhand will be set either directly by the brand, or via an Archive algorithm.
“We have an algorithm that takes a lot of data into account,” Meredith Blechman, head of marketing for Archive, said in an interview with Fashion Dive. “Data such as the original MSRP, the item condition which the seller will tell us, and what merchandise assortment is on the site. We then give the seller a suggested retail price.”
Maje originated in Paris in 1998 and has since grown into a global fashion brand with sales of 467 million euros, or about $492 million in 2022. It accounts for 39% of parent SMCP’s total volume, second to Sandro at 48%.
Meanwhile, Archive announced a $15 million Series A fundraise late in 2022, led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and joined by Bain Capital Ventures, Fernbrook Capital, G9 Ventures, and some minority investors. Archive has raised over $24 million to date.
Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly attributed the company behind the Maje's secondhand website in France.
