Our latest episode, Emma speaks to Emily Rea, the co-Founder and Chief Commercial Officer of Circulo: a software solution that powers repair services for businesses, brands, and retailers. Designed for the unique requirements of repair, the company’s technology helps fashion companies to navigate the complexities of repair services and enable  them to integrate trusted, accessible repair services at scale into their business models. Circulo is intended to be for repair what Shopify is for e-commerce and Salesforce is for CRM.

Emily Rea has a deep passion for the repair industry, driven by the ambition to empower consumers to take responsibility for their possessions and reduce waste. As co-Founder of The Restory (the first repair platform that provided aftercare services, end-to-end management, and technology globally) she grew the business directly to consumers and established unique partnerships with enterprise luxury brands like Farfetch,  Harrods, Selfridges, Manolo Blahnik, Harvey Nichols, Brown Thomas, Arnotts, and Nicholas Kirkwood through Farfetch Platform Solutions.

Emily and Emma cover a wide range of topics in our conversation, including why it is so important for brands and trailers to invest in circularity, the ways in which data can be used to improve the design process, changing the consumer mindset, and her vision for repair and a more sustainable fashion industry.

Listen to the full 35-minute show below (or by following The Interline Podcast through your podcast / audio app of choice) and read on for some additional details.

Emily Rea

Key talking points from Emma and Emily’s conversation:

  • How and why brands and retailers can invest in repair and the way that Circulo’s solution can help them embrace both the primary and secondary market.
  • Repair as a key lever in building stronger customer relationships and a critical component of shift away from linear production and consumption, towards made-to-order, personalised and circular fashion.
  • The path towards changing consumers’ mindset and the part that brands and retailers can play in accelerating it.
  • The importance of data in general, and specifically the value of repair data today.
  • Whether there is a best practice fashion businesses who choose to outsource the whole repair process, those who just outsource the physical side of it, and others who do everything themselves.
  • How tightening sustainability regulations around the world are going to impact the fashion and textiles industry significantly and the power of repair data for meeting compliance but also for using it to integrate into the next cycle of design.
  • Her opinion on the end goal for repair and how far Circulo’s technology and the values underpinning it can go.

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