Mobile-First Bidding Marketplace for Resellers

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INDUSTRY

B2C, Reseller Marketplace

TIMELINE

5 weeks

MY ROLE

Being a founding product designer, I handled brand positioning, market research and user interviews, end-to-end design and testing.

About Source X

Source X is a mobile-first, bidding platform for consumers and resellers. It aimed to bring structure and transparency to a process that usually happened over WhatsApp or Instagram DMs. This project started after first draft of Culture Circle finished up, which targeted selling collectible sneakers and accessories directly to the consumers in the lowest possible rate.

Check it out

Business Goals

1 → Become the most trusted resale marketplace first in India and then globally.
2 → Encourage repeat buying and selling behavior
3 → Build a data-driven pricing ecosystem
4 → Expand beyond sneakers into streetwear and electronics

Target users

Indian first market, Gen-Z influencers, Sneaker collectors, and Resellers (individual and brands)

Market research

This was part of Secondary research where we first analysed existing platforms,
- where Stock X was the most known platform,
- then existing reseller platforms like Veg-Nonveg, GOAT, Flight Club, etc, and
- community observations like Reddit, Discord, Telegram channels and groups in WhatsApp.

Global trends across consumers and the locations

Reseller market growth from 2019-2021

Market capture stats after 2024 (Recent find)

Talking to users

We spoke to resellers and consumers who were:

Already buying and selling on Instagram and WhatsApp
Comfortable with negotiation but tired of back and forth messages
Extremely price sensitive markets

Insights from research

No single trusted place to discover inventory, hence larger areas for scam.

Prices varied wildly across sellers, because of less knowledge within Indian markets.

Negotiation happened manually and took time, people relied on connections.

Little visibility into fair market value and practices.

A key insight for me was that these users did not want complexity. They wanted speed, clarity and confidence that they were not being cheated. This influenced many design decisions, sometimes consciously and sometimes instinctively.

Solution

Browsing and discovery

Product listing focused on price and availability, it was categorized into popular brands and searches.
Kept minimal distractions to keep scanning fast, while ensuring modern and clean UI
The packaging of sneakers would always come with a verified QR code, users could also reverify the product's authenticity via mobile app.

Product detail and bidding

This was the core experience.

Current bid and time left was part of flow, but we removed it for first phase, to avoid complexity.
Analytics showed the bidding trend, made it easy to make decisions
Primary details was kept obvious

Reseller flow and listing experience

Making listings easy for resellers was critical to marketplace supply.

Listing was broken into small, linear steps instead of a long form
Required fields were kept minimal to reduce drop off
Visual previews helped resellers verify details before publishing

Impact made

Core flows shipped and were used by real resellers.

Users understood the bidding model quickly.

Early feedback validated the product direction.

What I learned

While the execution reflects an early stage designer, the thinking laid the foundation for how I approach product design today. I value this project not because it is perfect, but because it shows real growth earned through real product work.
This project highlighted my gaps as much as my strengths.

UI polish matters as much as flow clarity
Documentation and decision context reduce rework
Designing for constraints is a core product skill