Kream’s Series C Funding Round Boosts Valuation to $742 Million in Reselling Marketplace

Luxury resale platform Kream has secured $168 million in a Series C funding round, valuing the company at approximately $742 million, doubling its previous value of $306 million as of October 2021.

Kream’s total funding to date is now over $266 million, according to TechCrunch on Friday (March 23).

The recent round follows significant growth over the past few months. The company reported that its monthly active users surged to 5.3 million from 2.2 million in October last year. Its gross merchandise value has skyrocketed by 270% and 190% in Q3 and Q4, respectively, compared to the same period last year, per the report.

Altos Ventures, a previous investor, spearheaded the Series C funding round, while other investors, including SoftBank Ventures Asia, Mirae Asset Capital, Naver, Samsung Securities and Axiom Asia, participated in the round.

With its new round, the South Korea-based company plans to maintain its minority stakes in its Asian counterparts, such as Soda in Japan, Sasom in Thailand, and Shake Hands in Malaysia. In addition, the company intends to make more investments in Asia to align with its strategic objective of connecting with other reselling platforms in the region. According to Chief Business Officer Mingook Kim, this initiative will enable Kream’s users to leverage its C2C resale affiliates and buy and sell luxury goods.

StockX and Hong Kong-based POIZON are regarded by Kream as its primary rivals with other luxury goods resale platforms, including Rebag, The RealReal, and Vestiaire Collective.

Kim highlighted that counterfeit goods are a major challenge for C2C reselling platforms, particularly those focused on luxury items. However, Kream is actively developing an inspection program to alleviate this issue and offer its users a solution.

To date, Kream’s process enables sellers to list their items on the platform, and upon selling their item, the product is then dispatched to the company’s inspection center for authenticity verification. From there, if the item successfully passes the internal inspection, the seller is then permitted to proceed with selling the product. At this point, no refunds are allowed for transactions made between consumers. Buyers have the option to resell the item through the platform, according to a spokesperson for the company.

Kream was originally founded in 2020 under Snow, a Naver subsidiary that focuses on camera apps but has since separated in January 2021.