Vidisha always aspired to climb the ladder of success on her own. Right from the start, she has been an active girl with vigor to learn things quickly. After completing her ACA in Finance and Accounting from Nottingham University, she qualified as a charter accountant. She started her career with the Macquarie Group, an Australian investment bank in London and worked for three years there. She gained ample experience over there but soon she started to ponder upon the idea of starting something of her own.
This is when she decided to come back to India and start her own venture. Rekinza is an online community for women to buy and sell pre-owned fashion because the co-founders believed that your closet should not burn a hole in your wallet- or the planet. From Zara to Burberry, Rekinza has your dream wardrobe on a yearlong sale. Within a short span of time, the platform has created a huge buzz with more than 80,000 users each month and become a go-to place for women fashion.
Please provide a brief overview of your product/ service.
Rekinza is an online platform for buying and selling pre-owned fashion in an innovative manner that helps create new value for unutilized items. It provides consumers with an easy, anonymous online platform to buy and sell the latest fashion from one another. Rekinza members don’t just buy and sell clothes; they also refresh and recycle their wardrobes from each other’s overflowing closets.
Buyers at Rekinza can browse through heavily discounted fashion that in like-new condition and has been hand-selected as well as certified for quality. At the other end of the spectrum, our aim is to make the process of selling quick and hassle-free for sellers. Sellers schedule a free pickup of their clothes and accessories, and we take care of the rest.
What inspired you to build the above product/ service?
There exists an untapped inventory of like-new clothes, shoes and bags lying in the closets of potential sellers across India. Rekinza enables potential buyers who are currently constrained by price or availability to purchase these products at highly discounted prices. We aim to pioneer a shift in consumer mindset towards purchasing pre-owned fashion.
What is your life mantra?
My life mantra is – Satisfaction is not always the fulfillment of what you want; it is the realization of how blessed you are for what you have.
What was the most challenging part of your journey till now?
Buying pre-owned is not a concept that is widely accepted in India. Finding a way to change people’s mindsets and getting them to try pre-owned products has been a challenge.
How did you overcome those challenges?
Every item that comes to Rekinza for sale is put on intense triple quality and authenticity. Rekinza’s focus on quality has helped us become a trusted name in the pre-owned market and gain a competitive advantage over p2p platforms, say an OLX, where the buyers cannot be guaranteed of the quality of the clothes they are buying.
Share some details about the investments that you have been able to fetch for the business till now.
We are currently a bootstrapped business.
How do you protect yourself from the problem of Brain Drain?
Brain Drain is not a concern for us at the moment. We believe that the employment market in India has great potential and are confident that we can find excellent candidates for our current and future hiring needs.
According to you, what are the three qualities an individual must have to achieve success?
Patience, perseverance and passion
Which online tools/ services/ apps do you use the most and would like to recommend as well?
- Todoist – For task tracking
- Sortd – Keeps my emails organized
- Hootsuite – Manage our social media
Share any one habit which you think makes you more productive.
Starting every day with an organised and prioritized to-do list is the best way to get the most out of my day.
Share any one habit which you wish to change in yourself.
I have trouble delegating my work to others, which I’m working on.
Answer in less than 50 words
• One tip to success:
There is no substitute for hard work
• One mistake you believe every individual must avoid:
Don’t wait around for someday to start working on your dream, make that day today.
• One most important lesson that you have learnt till now:
Plan for scale, before scale hits you
What are your plans for next 3 years?
Scaling up Rekinza is my biggest goal in the next three years. We plan to expand our services to the kidswear and menswear segments and become synonymous with quality in the pre-owned sector.
If you get a chance to start your career again what would you do differently this time?
I have been lucky enough to get great opportunities and freedom with my career. My choices have enabled me to reach a position to start my dream company. So, there isn’t anything I would change!
What are your top three getaway destinations?
Share a quote that inspires you the most.
“If it scares you it might be a good thing to try.” – Seth Godin