The Rising Trend For Sustainable Fashion Ft. Sehrish Raza

In this conversation I sit down with Sehrish Raza, the founder of BizB, a platform for pre-loved fashion. We talk about why fast fashion bothers me, the massive environmental impact of our clothing choices, and the quiet courage it takes to wear secondhand in a society that still whispers log kya kahenge, what will people say.

What bizb actually is

Sehrish describes BizB as a marketplace where women can buy and sell pre-loved apparel and accessories. It started with a focus on bridal and party wear, the kind of outfits that sit in closets for years after one wear. But the customer demand shifted toward daily wear, lawn suits, and everyday pieces. So they rebranded from Biz Bright to BizB and now carry everything from shoes to accessories. “We are helping women digitize their wardrobes,” she says, “and making it accessible to fashion lovers across Pakistan.”

The itch that started it all

Sehrish tells me she was always a clothes repeater. She would wear things until they tore, which drove her mom crazy. But she was surrounded by women who loved fashion, her best friend, her mother, and she kept noticing how many clothes just sat unused. Years later, while working as a digital marketer, she thought: why don’t we have a platform for this? She pitched the idea to her husband’s software company, got the tech support, and started testing the waters with a simple Facebook and Instagram page. She gathered clothes from friends and family, sold through DMs, and only built the website once she knew the market was there.

The environmental wake-up call

I asked Sehrish to share some of the facts that made her realize how urgent this is. She told me, “Fashion is the second biggest polluting industry in the world.” I had no idea before starting BizB, she says. To produce one shirt takes about 2,500 liters of water, enough for one person to drink over two and a half years. The industry produces around 2.5 billion tons of waste annually. And then there’s the stat that hit me personally: on average, fifty percent of a woman’s wardrobe is useless. She doesn’t wear half of what she owns. That made me think of my own closet, and the piles of PR clothes I accumulated as a blogger. I ended up with so many things I didn’t need, just because I had to make content. It went against the kind of mindful shopper I am. I would spend hours choosing one piece, and suddenly I was drowning in stuff. That’s when I stopped accepting most PR and started paying attention to what I truly love wearing.

The stigma and the shift

Sehrish’s biggest struggle has been the social stigma. People would say, “Oh, tum landa bechti ho,” comparing it to secondhand export leftovers. She would explain: by definition, landa means export surplus from London. I don’t sell clothes from London. I sell clothes that women have in their own wardrobes. Don’t you wear your sister’s or friend’s clothes? How is this any different? She points out that even people who buy from BizB often won’t admit they’re wearing secondhand. But things are slowly changing. The pandemic made people slow down, clean out closets, and reflect. Globally, the secondhand market has grown from a 35 billion dollar industry to 62 billion, bigger than fast fashion. Even Gucci’s parent company has invested in a secondhand platform. Sehrish believes it’s only a matter of time before the shift reaches Pakistan fully. I see it happening already. When I decided to sell my own wardrobe on BizB, I felt lighter. It’s not about giving up fashion. It’s about loving it responsibly.

Building a business as a woman

Sehrish is honest about the extra hurdles. When she started looking for investments, the questions changed. “Oh you’re married? Oh you’re going to have a kid? How are you going to manage it?” She read the statistics: last year, only three percent of women-led startups raised investment. “Being a woman entrepreneur, you have to work maybe five times harder than your male counterpart,” she says. But she kept going. She applied for a program funded by the U.S. Embassy and was selected as one of twelve women entrepreneurs from Pakistan for an investor outreach program in Silicon Valley. She also talks about the early days when she would go weeks without a sale, and people told her she was wasting her time. “There was something in me that said I just have to be patient,” she recalls. Now she gets messages from sellers who earn a monthly income sitting at home, and from buyers who finally have a trusted platform. That makes the struggle worthwhile.

Why this conversation matters

This episode is for anyone who has ever felt judged for repeating an outfit, or who wants to shop without guilt. Sehrish’s story reminds us that small choices, like buying pre-loved or selling what we don’t wear, can have a big impact. It’s not about being perfect. It’s about being a little more mindful, a little more kind to the planet, and a little more accepting of each other’s choices. If you’ve been holding onto clothes that don’t spark joy, maybe it’s time to let them go. And if you’re looking for something new, maybe it’s already waiting for you on BizB.