SARTORIALIST meets eBay

"soon-ish" meaning, according to Sari Bibliowicz,
a beta version to launch in March, a full-fledged launch soon thereafter

... for an article in which I recently looked into innovative e-commerce solutions (the main focus was on on pre-order concepts like Moda Operandi and Couture Society) I caught up with Sari Bibliowicz from the soon-to-launch, New York City-based website Bib + Tuck. There was quite some buzz surrounding this website earlier on, after Vogue.com published a piece about it in October. Six months on a beta version of the marketplace is about to launch. So here comes the full-length English language version of Sari's answers to my questions, for all you fashion-obsessed clothes traders out there ...

to create some buzz prior to the actual launch,
the "Fashion Forward" project was a collaboration
with ten of Bib+Tuck's favourite stylists/designers/bloggers

What exactly is Bib + Tuck?
Bib + Tuck is an exclusive online trading community for the fashion obsessed. Our hope is to bring together the hippest fashion bloggers, photographers, stylists, trendsetters, and good-old fashionistas to exchange their clothes, shoes and accessories.

Surviving in the city and staying stylish means understanding how to do more with less (space, time, and money). At Bib + Tuck we are anything but daunted by this task, it’s what really excites us! Even if we did have a millie to re-swag our style, we’d still be intrigued by a great swap. Trade my once-worn Manolos for last season’s Balanciaga Bag? Yes please!

In a city that’s got plenty of people willing to drop thousands for the new “it” item, we define ourselves not by the pieces we own, but how we wear them. Bib + Tuck is about fashion, creativity, and resourcefulness, minus the hassle and dank smell of a second hand store. It’s curated for us and by us, and it’s our favorite place to shop!

How and when exactly was the idea born?
They say necessity is the mother of invention, and we’ll admit it was our insatiable appetites for fashion that drove us to create Bib + Tuck.

As five recent grads living in the same building in NYC with no closet space to spare, having access to each other’s fantastic wardrobes meant we suddenly had endless options! Bib + Tuck is our way of expanding our style options without having to increase the size of our closets. We style the pieces we once loved so that they can be someone else’s inspiration, and browse each other’s profiles for something that inspires us! Our endless goal is to do more with less.

What's unique about Bib + Tuck with regard to other marketplaces?
a) We are invitation only and we take this seriously. It is not easy to score an invite and we want to keep our community exclusive and master our demographic – composed of creative, style obsessed individuals with an enviable closet.

b) It’s not like any of the peer to peer marketplaces out there. It’ visual, it’s style, it’s inspiration, it’s creative. It feels like thumbing through your favorite blogs. We like to think of ourselves as ‘The Sartorialist meets eBay’. We’re not just about the clothes – but about the people behind the clothes – it's a way to approach marketplaces that hasn’t been done before.

c) No money involved aside from shipping and a small transaction fee. Its like shopping at your fave website, but for free. d) The swapping is not one to one, you “sell” an item for virtual credits and then use those credits to “buy” from someone else.

How do you assure quality control?
By curating and being selective about the people on the website, we decide who gets an in and who doesn’t, creating a trusted community of like-minded individuals who all have the same goal; to replicate the experience of shopping in their sister’s closet. We also allow users to “report” an item if they feel it is misrepresented in any way. On our end, we will monitor all items closely and take strict measures on any fraudulent activity.

How do plan to make money with Bib + Tuck?
Lets face it, we have to make money to keep the site running. We keep it simple and transparent: $3.00 per transaction. No selling fees, no listing fees, no hidden fees. We use PayPal, a trusted source, for every transaction ...