Co-founder and CEO, OnTheList

French native Delphine Lefay is one of the forces behind OnTheList, one of Hong Kong’s first flash sales platforms.

OnTheList puts on flash sales that offer past-season items from luxury fashion brands at major discounts. The flash sales are much like pop-ups, lasting only a few days, and are open only to members who sign up to OnTheList.

Lefay brought the concept to the city in 2016 while she was still working full-time with Faguo, a French clothing and accessories brand — for which she had originally moved to Hong Kong the year before to help expand the distribution market in Asia.

When she found that she couldn’t find a “good solution” to liquidate fashion stock in Hong Kong, she decided to start her own venture.

“The [flash sales] business model existed in Paris and New York, and I knew about it,” she remembers. Together with her husband Diego Dultzin Lacoste, she decided to give it a try in Hong Kong.

The first flash sales event, for French brand ba&sh, was a success — and they became motivated to run it as a business. At first, Lefay and Dultzin Lacoste kept their full-time positions, with OnTheList running one flash sales event a month. When the business became big enough for them to look to hire an employee, they quit their jobs.

Lefay believes that the business offers brands a “serious partner” to manage their old stock — and it’s a great way to shop for consumers, who are “always really enthusiastic to buy international brands with big discounts.” Meanwhile, the business model also addresses a pressing concern in the fashion industry: waste.

Today, OnTheList works with over 200 luxury brands. It launched in Singapore last year and is set to hit the Taiwan market in 2019. The co-founders have their sights set on Mainland China.

What is she most proud of? “To be able to, at 29 years old, have a team of 20 passionate talents that are all working hard to develop OnTheList.”

Her first job? Waitressing at a restaurant during the summer break in the French Riviera.

Who inspires her? Fanny Moizant, co-founder of Vestiaire Collective — one of Europe’s leading designer and premium fashion resellers.

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