Mom Made $735K Reselling on Poshmark, Social Media With No Upfront Investment

• Mona Mejia, 44, was a stay-at-home mother when she started reselling on Poshmark in 2015.
• She earned $735,000 final yr promoting on social media livestreams and thru model partnerships. 
• She’s assured others can have comparable success as properly, nevertheless it does not occur in a single day. 

Earlier than 2015, Mona Mejia’s full-time job was caring for her three youngsters. 

Now, the 44-year-old Houston-based mother boasts an revenue of $735,000 final yr, in keeping with paperwork verified by Insider, promoting new and used clothes, residence items, and toys on social media. 

She says she’s by no means invested a single greenback out-of-pocket into her enterprise. Beginning with simply the garments in her closet, she later used her earnings to buy extra stock to promote at a markup. 

“After I speak about every thing that we have gone via, I am nonetheless shocked about it from the place we got here from to now,” Mejia advised Insider.

Mejia is one in all tens of millions of Individuals who’re discovering methods to make ends meet with out counting on a standard 9-to-5 workplace job. US staff filed over 5 million new enterprise purposes in 2021, probably the most since 2005. A 2021 Upwork examine discovered that 59 million Individuals — or 36% of the US workforce — had carried out freelance work over the prior 12 months. Others, like Mejia, have discovered methods to begin companies of their very own. Whereas these existence will not be with out their challenges, they’ve supplied some Individuals the alternative to lastly get forward financially. 

Mona Mejia

“Every little thing was promoting actually shortly”

In 2015, Mejia’s household was in want of extra revenue to complement her husband’s pay. It was a “actually arduous time,” she stated. “You do not know the place you are going to eat.”

When her sister launched her to the reseller platform Poshmark, she started promoting a number of gadgets from her closet. 

She remembers her first sale — a costume — which bought for $36 after 11 hours. When she started itemizing extra gadgets, she observed that “every thing was promoting actually shortly” and actual cash was trickling in.

Two years in, Mejia’s husband had open coronary heart surgical procedure and wasn’t in a position to work — the duty fell on her to assist the household, and she or he took her efforts to a different stage. As Mejia branched out to different reselling platforms, she says the $100-200 she was incomes per week was $1,000 — translating to just about $50,000 in whole earnings in her first yr. 

It wasn’t till roughly a yr in the past, nonetheless — when she began promoting on livestreams via Instagram, TikTok, and Fb, that her enterprise actually took off. Whereas she earned $23,000 via Poshmark final yr for instance, she says social media is the place the majority of her revenue now comes from. 

Her husband’s well being has since improved, however somewhat than going again to his job, he now helps his spouse sustain along with her thriving enterprise. Collectively, they now personal a house that they’ve paid off in full and have despatched two youngsters to varsity with none pupil loans. 

“The extra you record, the extra money you are going to make.”

After working via her closet, Mejia took her earnings and went to yard gross sales and clearance sections to search for cut price merchandise she might purchase and resell. That included garments, sneakers, residence items, youngsters gadgets, equipment, jewellery — “just about every thing.” She’s bought gadgets for as low $15-20 to as excessive as $1,300-$1,400 for a Louis Vuitton or Chanel bag.

Whereas she nonetheless frequents yard gross sales and retail shops, nearly all of her purchases are actually bulk orders purchased at a reduced value from varied distributors. 

Mejia then lists most of her merchandise at a roughly 40% off their market price, or the worth a buyer would pay at a retail retailer as an illustration.  She says giant reductions are typical on reselling platforms. She as soon as paid $30 for a costume that sells for practically $300 at Anthropologie. 

Regardless of discounting, she says she’s in a position to keep excessive ranges of profitability by solely promoting gadgets she purchased at particularly low cost charges.

In a uncommon occasion, nonetheless, she remembers making fairly the revenue on a pair of “flamingos and frogs” pants that she paid $1 for at a yard sale. “These are hideous however I will attempt them,” she thought. They bought for $100. 

Mejia does not suppose she has a specific expertise for selecting what to promote, and that “the extra you record, the extra money you are going to make.” 

“Every little thing sells,” she stated, including that the shift to e-commerce when the pandemic started has fueled gross sales — which have risen 50% vs. pre-pandemic ranges.

Mona Mejia

“I like it. It is an habit to me.”

Mejia says she spends eight to 10 hours doing the majority of the work on her enterprise, however actually she is “working all day” and is on the clock “24/7.”

Early on, she remembers stuffing packing containers within the nook of her eating room and kitchen within the household’s one-bedroom house earlier than they had been shipped to clients. Now, they’ve a house with six-bedrooms, two of which — an “stock” and “itemizing” room — are used to retailer future shipments. 

She lists at the least 100 gadgets every day, nevertheless it’s the evenings — when clients have a tendency to purchase — which are particularly busy. She says she stays up until 3:00 AM to make sure shipments get out the door — then wakes up at 7:30 to begin the following day. 

“There is no stopping, nevertheless it’s okay,” she stated. “I like it. It is an habit to me.”

Mejia thinks anybody can discover success as a reseller however emphasizes that it takes arduous work and dedication — it took her seven years to get the place she is now. Lots of people surrender, she says, however perseverance can repay. 

“Lots of people see the place I am at proper now. And so they’re like, ‘Oh, I need to do this proper now,'” she stated. “Yeah, it is going to occur finally, nevertheless it’s not simply going to occur in a single day. So I’d say do not surrender and simply maintain itemizing, maintain sharing your closet, be constant.” 

Although her hundreds of followers on social media are actually useful, she says “you actually do not should have an enormous following to generate income.”

Because of her promoting success, Mejia says she has signed contracts with Torrid and Goal, which pay her to put on and promote their clothes on social media. It is due to offers like these that she earned $735,000 final yr.

She plans to proceed full steam forward along with her enterprise as properly. Gross sales have grown 30% during the last six months, and she or he has plans to open up a “pop-up” retail retailer of her personal subsequent January in Houston. She’s planning to rent three staff in December to assist out.  

“We love what we do,” she stated, “and the one strategy to proceed to develop is working.”