EP18: Fixing the fashion industry’s $120B waste problem - Queen of Raw
Not So FUN FACT
In New York City alone, over 200 million pounds of clothing ends up in landfills each year- the equivalent of filling the Statue of Liberty with garments 440 times.
FOUNDERS
Stephanie Benedetto
LAUNCHED
2018
Funding
$360,000 from WeWork
HQ
New York, NY
Problem
Of fashion apparel's roughly $800 billion market, an estimated $120 billion of leftover, unused and perfectly good fabric goes to waste annually. It gathers dust in warehouses, or gets thrown away and burned in landfills. This is a loss not just for the planet- businesses also suffer from overproducing and over-purchasing.
Solution
Queen of Raw’s online platform connects buyers looking for fabric with sellers of unused fabric. Factories, brands, and retailers post their unused fabric for resale on the platform, giving purchasers quick, easy access to new materials at competitive price points.
Sellers also subscribe to a monthly service that maps, measures, and traces their supply chains, minimizing their waste streams going forward. Through its optimized supply chain solution, Queen of Raw has helped 100,000 users save millions of dollars—and more than a billion gallons of water (MIT Solve).
Episode Brief
Stephanie Benedetto, Queen of Raw’s Founder and CEO, joins Peter on this week’s episode to discuss:
Her eureka moment
The hidden costs of the fashion industry
How the Queen of Raw marketplace works
Quantifying climate impact
Solving the chicken-and-egg problem
What’s next and the moonshot
Lightning Round:
What’s your favorite podcast and why?
Several trends hitting law profession — fewer grads, fewer jobs and the specter of growing automation in legal services. What’s your take? Should people exploring law as potential career reconsider?
What emerging brand are you most excited about?
If you weren’t working on QoR, what problem area would you be exploring?
Credits
HOST
Peter Levin
PRODUCTION
Dan Mahoney
MUSIC
Eddie Knuckles