Only a few days ago, the Baden-Württemberg consumer advice center was waiting to sell clothing on the resale platform, now the Mädchenflohmarkt GmbH has filed for bankruptcy. This emerges from an entry on the website bankruptcy announcements.de.
The proceedings were opened on June 7th at the district court in Stuttgart. Attorney Ilkin Bananyarli from the law firm Plutar Rechtsanwalts GmbH was appointed by the court as provisional insolvency administrator.
The consumer advice center in Baden-Württemberg had previously speculated that the company would go bankrupt. For some time now, customers who have sold clothes via the platform have either not received their share of the sales price at all or have waited a long time for it. Apparently no money at all has been paid out since January and complaints about the girls’ flea market are piling up at the consumer advice center. Looking at the platform’s online reviews, the consensus is no more positive.
The business model of Mädchenflohmarkt envisages that used clothing, shoes, bags and accessories from a wide variety of brands can be bought and sold via the platform. In terms of sales conditions, a distinction is made between the self-posted marketplace items and the so-called concierge service from Mädchenflohmarkt. The platform retains ten percent of the sales price for all items it sells and posts itself. The fees for the concierge service, where girls’ flea market takes care of the description, photography, listing and shipping of the items, are higher. For items with a sales value of 50 euros or more, 30 percent of the sales price goes to girls’ flea market, with a sales value of less than 40 euros, a minimum commission of 13.90 euros is charged, or 40 percent of the price.
AboutYou responds to allegations and terminates cooperation
In December 2020, Mädchenflohmarkt announced a cooperation with the Hamburg online fashion retailer About You. At that time, the online retailer, which belongs to the Otto Group, launched its “Second Love” category, which sells second-hand fashion. According to a statement at the time, Mädchenflohmarkt offered around 250,000 products from its concierge service on About You.
This is now over, because even if the complaints from the sellers were not received directly by the online retailer, they reacted to the facts. As already reported by the industry magazine Textilwirtschaft, About You has ended its cooperation with girls’ flea market.
“We became aware of the matter late last week and responded immediately,” an About You spokeswoman told FashionUnited. “As a result, we initiated our internal processes to take the Mädchenflohmarkt items offline in our Second Love category. This happened on Monday.”