£17m
Ledger market today
~850–1,150 large in-scope apparel and footwear groups × ~£17k a year.
For investors and programmes · pre-revenue
The system of record for unsold fashion stock.
Since 19 July 2026, large companies selling clothes or shoes in the EU, UK brands included, may not destroy unsold stock, and that includes recycling it. Exceptions need evidence and a public disclosure checked to within 10%. Today that evidence lives in emails and liquidator spreadsheets. Thread Futures routes each unsold batch to its best legal outlet, produces the proof automatically, and turns the data into a buy-less forecast.
4–9%of textiles placed on the EU market were destroyed before use (264,000–594,000 t a year)European Environment Agency, 2024
20–50%of net sales lost to markdowns at a typical fashion retailerBain, 2021
>75%of 95 UN Fashion Charter signatories didn’t disclose what happens to unsold goodsCharles University, 2025
Market
£17m today, roughly doubling in 2030, before forecasting.
Bottom-up estimates. There is no official count of in-scope companies; ours starts from Eurostat 2023 enterprise counts plus non-EU brands selling into the EU.
£35m
From 2030
Medium-sized companies join: ~3,000–4,000 groups.
£85m
Forecasting upsell
The same groups buying buy-less forecasting.
£2.5–5m
Reachable from London
150–300 UK and English-speaking EU brands.
Business model
Brands pay. Outlets join free.
One brand earns about £35k a year at a 93% gross margin. The brand gets back roughly £9 for every £1 it pays.
| Per brand, per year (typical mix) | £ | How it’s worked out |
|---|---|---|
| Ledger subscription | 18,000 | £1,500 a month |
| Success fee | 5,400 | £1.5m stock routed × 18 pts better recovery × 4% × half of brands |
| Forecasting upsell | 12,000 | £40k × 30% of brands |
| Hosting + support | (2,500) | Cloud, 5-year archive, support |
| Gross profit per brand | 32,900 | 93% gross margin |
| Cost to win a brand | ~13,000 | Sales & marketing + onboarding; paid back in ~5 months |
Projection
Base case: £1.8m revenue and 54 brands by 2031.
Estimates from a formula-driven model with every assumption editable: £18k subscription, 60% pilot conversion, 10% annual churn, team growing to the founder plus 9 by 2031.
| Scenario | Brands 2031 | Revenue 2031 | Profit 2031 | First profit | Cash needed first |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cautious | 29 | £0.96m | £0.09m | 2031 | £343k |
| Base | 54 | £1.79m | £0.75m | 2029 | £75k |
| Upside | 81 | £2.68m | £1.46m | 2028 | £5k |
Competition
Many players own one piece. Nobody owns the record.
| Who | Forecast | Route | EU evidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stock allocation AI e.g. Nextail, Onebeat, Increff | Yes | No | No |
| Resale & off-price e.g. Trove, Archive, Otrium, smatch (partners) | No | One channel | No |
| Compliance suites e.g. TrusTrace, osapiens | No | No | Partial |
| Routing + audit trail e.g. Flexireo, ReBound, Zerow (early) | No | Yes | Partial |
| Thread Futures | Yes (upsell) | All outlets | Full pack |
Plan
Prove it with three brands, then sell through the industry.
Each stage has a goal before the next one starts.
Next 90 days
Discover
- 15 interviews with ops and sustainability leads
- 5 outlets ready to take routed stock
- Prototype on one brand’s real data
Goal: 3 design partners, 1 paid pilot
2027
First customers
- Pilots → subscriptions
- UKFT and BRC events, referrals
- Commercial co-founder
Goal: 10 paying brands
2028
Product
- ERP connectors
- Forecasting upsell
- EU mid-market brands
Goal: 18 brands by 2029
2029–31
Scale
- Medium companies join (2030)
- Self-serve onboarding
- Returns and offcut modules
Goal: 54 brands, £1.8m revenue
!
Main risks: enforcement is still being set country by country (so we sell recovered money first); brands may make do with spreadsheets and existing liquidators; early competitors; long sales cycles for a solo founder (so mid-market first, paid pilots, and a commercial co-founder).