This female entrepreneur is making luxury affordable, sustainable

Namisha Gupta’s passion for luxury products and the understanding that such products are out of reach for most people led her to start an online e-commerce platform that sells pre-owned luxury fashion items. 

“I always loved fashion and wanted to do something different and unique for the industry keeping climate protection as my top priority. Hence, I founded ReTag an online luxury platform created exclusively for pre-owned products for women, men, and children’s apparel and accessories,” she tells HerStory.

From designers like Abujani, Sandeep Khosla, Anita Dongre, Falguni and Shane Peacock to traditional luxury brands like Gucci, Prada, Celine, Chloe among others, one can find products from around 138 labels on the platform. Namisha believes that it’s important that people realise the importance of buying pre-loved luxury as much as one desires for first-hand luxury items, because it cuts down on waste. 

While luxury thrifting has recently found acceptance in the country, most shoppers are still apprehensive about buying used clothes. Namisha believes that the scenario is changing now.

 “Indians are now understanding that thrifting luxury is not as bad as it may sound, and yes, slowly but surely, with ReTag we will be able to inculcate the knowledge behind thrift goods among the Indian audience. Indians have become more open towards pre-loved luxury now,” she says. 

The products at ReTag range anywhere between Rs 1,600 and Rs 4,25,000.

Journey from online to offline store 

Namisha started ReTag in 2018 with the purpose of selling kids apparel and accessories online but within a month, she had to realign her business model to keep up with consumer demand. She has always had a knack for luxury so finding customers and products for ReTag wasn’t a difficult task. 

“Honestly, it was not a very difficult journey for us as every woman who knows about luxury brands is looking for their first Louis Vuitton bag which they couldn’t afford at the retail prices in store. Our stable customer count is about 50% and it has taken us about four years to develop this kind of a base,” she says.

The pandemic 

The last two years of COVID-19 pandemic, which slowed down many businesses across the world, helped ReTag grow. “We are growing each year and more so during COVID as people were unable to travel abroad so they have been decluttering more and buying from us. Every year on an average we are growing at a rate of 50% compared to the previous year.”

This resulted in ReTag opening its first offline store on 25 Oct in New Delhi.

With the platform carving its own niche, it has become the go-to reselling portal for people who own luxury items in India.

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However, it has not been an easy task to make luxury not only affordable but also accessible to people. “As a female entrepreneur, there are challenges that we always have to face, apart from those, making people understand the motive of buying pre-owned luxury has been a challenging journey,” Namisha shares her challenges.

The digital revolution helped Namisha grow her business. “Social media platforms and digital space have made the reach to grow by making the platforms accessible to anyone and everyone on their fingertips,” she adds.

Finally, Namisha’s only advice to those who want to dabble into the business of luxury is to be authentic to cut across the competition.