Showroom B2B Secures $6.5 Million in Pre-Series A Funding to Revolutionize India’s Unbranded Garment Market
- ByStartupStory | October 19, 2023
Showroom B2B, India’s premier B2B platform for unbranded garments, has successfully raised $6.5 million in pre-Series A funding. This funding round was led by Jungle Ventures and featured participation from new investors Accion Venture Lab, Saison Capital, and ICMG Partners, along with the continued support of existing backers Strive, Gemba Capital, and Titan Capital. Debt partners Alteria Capital and Stride Ventures also contributed to the round.
The infusion of capital will play a pivotal role in further scaling Showroom B2B’s unique “phygital” distribution model and expanding its network of “Experience Stores” throughout India’s Tier 2-3 markets. These innovative stores serve as hubs for innovation, offering convenient access to garment samples and catalogs for fashion retailers and wholesalers. This enhanced accessibility improves the ordering experience for clients, combining the best of both digital and physical aspects. Showroom B2B also intends to bolster its private labeling capabilities and provide premium, affordable fashion options to retailers in Tier 2+ cities.
India’s unbranded garment wholesale market is on the cusp of significant growth, projected to increase from $50 billion to $80 billion within the next five years. Traditional wholesalers face challenges related to offering a broader range of designs as their inventories expand, while retailers must make frequent trips to sourcing clusters to stock their store inventory. Showroom B2B’s asset-light business model offers retailers a solution by granting access to a wider selection of competitively priced unbranded garments within their local communities.
Abhishek Dua, Co-founder and CEO of Showroom B2B, commented, “At Showroom B2B, we take pride in leading the transformation of the Indian apparel industry. Our steadfast commitment to eliminating middlemen and empowering small retailers and wholesalers who were previously underserved has yielded remarkable results. Notably, our order sizes consistently outperform competitors by 5-10 times, and our industry-low return rate remains in the single digits, a stark contrast to the industry norm of 25-30%. However, we acknowledge that there is more work to be done, and this fresh investment will play a significant role in scaling our operations to make an even greater impact in the untapped segments of the unorganized apparel market.”
Vishesh Sharma, Vice President, India Investments at Jungle Ventures, added, “Unbranded garments constitute the majority of clothing worn by Indians today, particularly in the categories of female ethnic and children’s wear. With major global apparel manufacturing hubs located in Indian cities like Surat-Ahmedabad, Tirupur-Bengaluru, Delhi-NCR, and others, domestically manufactured apparel is set to continue gaining momentum. Showroom B2B enables these manufacturers to reach the market more efficiently while allowing customers to access a wider array of designs at competitive prices. We believe the phygital approach adopted by the company will shape the future of garment retail in the country and are excited to partner with the team on this journey.”
Rahil Rangwala, Managing Partner at Accion Venture Lab, expressed, “We firmly believe in the potential and scale of platforms to disrupt traditional supply chains and provide embedded financial services to large informal SMEs. Showroom’s tech and touch solution has fostered strong trust with both micro retailers and SME manufacturers on their platform, resulting in the lowest return rates in the industry within a highly competitive sector. We’re thrilled to support visionary entrepreneurs like Abhishek Dua and Shubham Gupta in their mission to digitize the Indian apparel market.”
Founded by graduates of IIM Lucknow, Showroom B2B leverages their previous success in the B2B furniture industry, where they excelled in eco-friendly particle wood board manufacturing. Currently, Showroom B2B operates three experience stores in different regions, facilitating interactions between fashion retailers and manufacturing samples before placing bulk orders. With partnerships involving over 500 garment manufacturers and 3,000 retailers, Showroom B2B simplifies transactions and ensures doorstep deliveries through its app-based ordering system.
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