Meet Kristen and Kevin Gluch of Voyage is a Verb in Tempe

Today we’d like to introduce you to Kristen and Kevin Gluch.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Kristen and Kevin. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
In 2013, I (Kristen) was in a thrift store in Phoenix. I had been a regular there, sourcing my own wardrobe and internally crying when I’d find a designer piece for a couple of bucks, but one that wasn’t my size. Sometimes I would find those pieces there day after day, week after week, knowing that if the right buyer didn’t come along, they would be headed to a landfill.

One day it clicked: What if I could be that buyer and rehome them? I had never heard of reselling at this time, but I knew I could sell through platforms like eBay, so I grabbed a few $1 items one day and threw them on eBay for auction starting at $0.99. I thought, surely I could make my money back, and if not, I’m only at a loss of, like, $10.

When the first bid hit – and then the second that set me over my $1 cost, I was hooked. For the first few years, I resold on my own, without my husband’s (Kevin’s) help. He was always supportive, but this kind of work didn’t click with him right away. But as years passed and my little reselling side hustle grew, I needed him. I needed help shipping and answering questions and prepping items to list. I was underwater with a full-time job. I needed his help if I wanted to scale. And in summer 2018, with the promise of being able to work for himself, Kevin took over our operations full time. I was right behind him that winter, and we have been running our resale business full time ever since!

Has it been a smooth road?
When you sell single-SKU, one-off items, your challenge will always be scale. How do you grow a business when a single item requires end-to-end support, from sourcing the item to prepping it, to photographing and listing it, to inventorying it, and then answering any questions and finally shipping. It’s a lot of work to sell an item. Resellers are some of the biggest hustlers I know for this reason.

On a relational note, Kevin and I are very different in how we approach our business. I spend most of my day in the clouds, coming up with big concepts and developing marketing strategies, while Kevin loves a checklist and is the sole reason our shipments get out on time. It’s a great symbiotic partnership, and I wouldn’t want to do it with anyone else.

That said, we are both in this thing full-time. This means our bills, our livelihoods, and our future require this to be successful if we are to survive. We don’t have each others’ income to rely on when sales are slow. We are open and transparent that reselling is not a get rich quick scheme. We love working together and the freedom this work provides, and for that, we accept the financial challenges that come with it.

We’d love to hear more about your business.
The name Voyage is a Verb comes from the idea that if we want to truly live life and have adventures and a story to tell at the end of it, we must take action.

Right now, most of our business comes from flipping secondhand contemporary women’s designer clothing, shoes, and bags at a deep discount from its original retail price. We do a lot of business on Poshmark, and in November, we started our own website, twiceourcost.com, which delivers customers our finds for double what we paid for the item with no markups or attachment to its market value.

Transparency is monumental in what we do. We also offer reselling services so others can learn how to do what we have done. We have a growing Instagram account and YouTube channel, I create eCommerce websites for resellers to build their brands, and I’m working now on eCourses to help resellers level up. I think the service side of what we do is the most fun because I’m a trained teacher and it’s what I love to do!

Is our city a good place to do what you do?
Big cities are always best for resellers. We can throw a rock in any direction and hit a buy-sell-trade store, a thrift store, or an outlet store where we can source great, on-trend inventory. It’s much harder for rural sellers because the sourcing opportunities are more scarce, so they have to rely on traveling to cities like ours or sourcing online.

Kevin and I love Tempe. We have lived in our home for ten years and our business grew up within these walls. In 2019, we moved most of our operations into a co-op warehouse down the street called MAC6. They have warehouse spaces (as well as a coworking office) for small businesses to grow out of their homes. It’s like an incubator and community builder all in one, and we have loved seeing what other small businesses in the Phoenix area are doing!

Contact Info:

• Address: 941 S Park Lane Tempe, AZ 85281
• Website: voyageisaverb.com
• Email: hello@voyageisaverb.com
• Instagram: @voyageisaverb

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