Submitted
2022 Solv[ED] Youth Innovation Challenge

SwagSwap

Team Leader
Diya Shah
Solution Overview
Solution Name
SwagSwap
One-line solution summary.

SwagSwap is an online clothes trading platform, operating on a point-based currency.

Elevator pitch
What is your solution?

Our solution is SwagSwap, an online point-based trading platform, striving to make affordable and sustainable clothing accessible to everyone. 

If a seller has an article of clothing that they do not want anymore, they can go on the website and answer a few questions about the item. Once answered, we will provide the seller with a recommended selling price, which they can then use or alter. 

Once the item is posted on the website with some background information, it’s ready to be sold! If a user is interested in buying the item, the item will be shipped to the buyer, and the seller is reimbursed with the points they sold the item for. 

Using these points, the seller can purchase new items on the site. However, there can also be a case where a seller’s item does not get sold. In that case, a seller with the premium plan has the option to send their clothing to the sustainable artist network. 

The artists would remake the clothing into sustainable merchandise, and the item would be uploaded once again on our website. Once the item sells, the seller will receive 70% of the recommended point price and can use those points to shop for new items.

Through this, we aim to create a circular economy of buyers and sellers spending and using points.

What specific problem are you trying to solve?

Global fashion styles are rapidly changing in today’s world. To keep up, consumers, especially teenagers, constantly buy new clothes. However, these clothes are often simply discarded after the user is bored with the style, or when the clothes do not fit anymore.

Every year, 17 million tons of new clothing are manufactured (EPA). According to a survey we conducted, 67% of teens today throw out their clothes before even 2 years of use - in fact, the average person throws away 70 pounds of clothing per year. This results in a ripple effect - and so 13 million tons (out of the 17 million) of textiles are landfilled globally every year (EPA). Over 95% of these clothes could have been reused or recycled (Sustainable Brands). 

Additionally, this constant buying and discarding takes on a major toll on not only the environment, but also the consumer's wallet. In 2020, teenagers spent an average of $508 on clothing (CNBC). 

Our solution aims to provide an alternative to this by offering customers a sustainable, environmentally friendly way to dispose of their clothes and shop for new fashion - without spending large amounts of money on it.

Who does your solution serve? In what ways will the solution impact their lives?

Our solution aims to serve predominantly teens and young adults. Most teenagers cannot afford to splurge on clothes because they do not have a stable income source of their own. 

Our solution takes this into account. Trading on SwagSwap is based upon points, so money is not required to access clothes and accessories.

Additionally, the world of sustainable fashion has been largely dominated by teenagers who are looking to make a change and stray from fast fashion. By catering predominantly to this age group, we would be able to make our website appealing and fun for teenagers to shop on. We also plan to broaden our social media horizon, which is mainly dominated by teenagers and young adults themselves.

What steps have you taken to understand the needs of the population you want to serve?

To understand the needs of the population we want to serve, we conducted surveys and interviews with interested teenagers and our target demographic. We interviewed them on whether they would use our website given all the facts, how much they would be willing to pay for a premium membership, and which companies come to mind when they think of our industry. 

We also asked interviewees what they think is the biggest challenge people face during online shopping, and in what way they think it can be solved. By asking this question, we were able to see what typical obstacles people face online shopping that turn them off altogether, such as quality, reputation, shipping processes, and more. 

We were able to see their responses and change our shipping plan and review system accordingly. They also provided us specific feedback regarding our Premium plan pricing - we adjusted the price accordingly and eventually arrived at a consensus of $12.99. We have also reached out to many sustainable artists on Instagram, who have let us know that they would be interested in partnering with us in the future; two prominent accounts are Revival London and Redesign Club.

Which aspects of the Challenge does your solution most closely address?
  • Taking action to combat climate change and its impacts (Sustainability)
Our solution's stage of development:
  • Concept: An idea being explored for its feasibility to build a product, service, or business model based on that idea
Explain why you selected this stage of development for your solution—in other words, what have you accomplished to date?

As SwagSwap is currently a concept, we are focused on getting word out in the market and doing market research, such as conducting surveys on the feasibility of our product. 

However, we have accomplished a number of tangible things over the course of the past year. We have entered numerous business pitching competitions and have gained monumental success. Most recently, we were Diamond Challenge semi-finalists, placed 2nd in our school’s business competition, and were 2nd place winners in the NFTE World Series of Innovation Mary Kay Textile Upcycle Challenge. 

As a result of placing in these competitions, we have gained invaluable feedback from a number of noteworthy mentors, including Mr. Rich Keller (entrepreneur and UPENN graduate), Mr. Rich Sedmak (founder of Startup Ventures), and Ms. Sierra RyanWallick (founder of UPCycle Designs, another clothes repurposing startup) - all of them have provided insightful feedback regarding the feasibility of our service. 

SwagSwap has also been mentioned in various news outlets, including newspapers such as Bloomberg, Financial Post, and Yahoo Finance. In addition, we have reached out to a number of sustainable artists over social media and have successfully fostered a few potential partnerships to be taken into effect once the site launches.

Where our solution team is headquartered or located:
South Brunswick Township, NJ, USA
Team Lead:
Diya Shah
More About Your Solution
About Your Team
Your Business Model & Resources
Solution Team:
Diya Shah
Diya Shah
Aairah Koujalgi
Aairah Koujalgi
Bhargavi Karthikeyan
Bhargavi Karthikeyan