- Specialization
- Not classified
- Business
Marketplace Operationand 1 more business valuesLess
- Logistics Services
- Market
- Retail
- Ecosystem
- Not applicable
- Customers
Enterprisesand 2 more customers valuesLess
- Consumers
- Small Businesses
More details
- Organization type
- Commercial Company
- Ecosystem
- Not applicable
- Business
- Marketplace Operation, Logistics Services
- Specialization
- Not classified
- Market
- Retail
- Customers
- Enterprises, Consumers, Small Businesses
- Delivery models
- Hosted Software, Professional Services
- Revenue models
- Not classified
- Listing status
- Not classified
- Latest equity round
- Seed
- Reported funding amount
- Not classified
About
WANTD builds a direct-to-consumer marketplace and influencer network for fashion and footwear brands to launch and sell products. It differentiates from Shopify by combining live commerce, marketplace and auction channels, influencer networks, order fulfillment, and a mobile-first experience to address brands’ cold-start problem.
Market
WANTD competes in fashion technology, live commerce, and collectibles marketplaces, serving both brands seeking direct-to-consumer distribution and consumers buying, selling, and tracking sneakers and streetwear. Its differentiation is the combination of brand enablement—multi-channel selling, influencer networks, fulfillment, and cold-start support—with a mobile-first consumer experience that combines live shopping, exclusive drops, collection tracking, and marketplace purchasing.
WANTD primarily serves fashion and footwear brands—especially emerging brands that need help overcoming customer-acquisition and distribution challenges—with brand founders and commerce or marketing teams as likely buyers. Its consumer audience is sneakerheads, streetwear shoppers, and collectibles-focused buyers who want live shopping, authenticated products, and collection-management tools.
At a Glance
Problem
WANTD addresses the cold-start and distribution problem facing fashion and footwear brands: creating a product is only the beginning, while reaching customers, activating influencers, choosing effective sales channels, and handling fulfillment can be expensive and operationally complex. The company positions this as a gap left by Shopify, which provides commerce infrastructure but not the full set of channels and demand-generation mechanisms brands need to launch successfully.
The killer use case is a brand product launch or drop that needs immediate discovery and conversion. WANTD gives the brand access to live commerce, marketplace distribution, auctions, influencer networks, and fulfillment, allowing it to focus more on product creation rather than assembling those capabilities independently.
Product / Service
WANTD is a mobile-first, direct-to-consumer marketplace and influencer network for fashion and footwear brands. Brands can launch and sell products through multiple channels, including live commerce, a marketplace, and auctions, while WANTD supports the associated influencer promotion and order fulfillment.
On the consumer side, the product is a live-shopping and community app centered on sneakers, streetwear, collectibles, and related categories. Its benefit is to combine discovery, social engagement, purchasing, and resale-oriented commerce in one experience, while giving brands and sellers a more direct route to consumers than a standalone online store.
Market
WANTD competes across D2C commerce enablement for fashion and footwear, live shopping, influencer-led commerce, and sneaker, streetwear, and collectibles marketplaces. Shopify is the explicit comparison point, while Whatnot is an adjacent live-shopping marketplace and StockX is identified in company-profile data as a competitor; these are overlapping competitors rather than exact product matches because WANTD combines brand launch services, influencer distribution, live commerce, and fulfillment.
The company was founded in 2021, participated in Y Combinator's Winter 2022 batch, is listed as active, and had a four-person team in the available company profile. Its Android app was publicly described in June 2024 as a live-shopping destination, providing evidence of an operating product, but the research does not establish verified GMV, customer counts, or profitability. Third-party funding and revenue figures conflict, so WANTD is best characterized as an early-stage active company with unverified commercial scale rather than definitively pre-revenue or demonstrably mature.
Founders & Leadership
Funding History
Not disclosed
Slow Ventures
Goodwater Capital
Y Combinator
Pioneer Fund
Recent News
A Y Combinator directory page dated 2026-07-28 lists WANTD as a direct-to-consumer marketplace for fashion and footwear brands to launch and sell products. This is a current company-profile update, not a funding announcement.
Active Roles
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Get notified when they postBusiness Model
WANTD appears to monetize through transaction revenue on products sold via its direct-to-consumer marketplace, potentially supplemented by brand services covering live selling, influencer distribution, auctions, and fulfillment. The evidence does not disclose a specific fee schedule, subscription price, or commission rate.