The Story

Genderplayful is a new clothing marketplace that celebrates diversity in gender presentation and body types. Strong community support is making it possible.

Status: The marketplace is in private beta and will open as soon as we're ready.

For those of you who are expressing support and generosity by spreading the word, here are some easy bits to grab from. (If you don’t see the bits you’re looking for, check the FAQ — there’s a lot there, too.)

Press Releases

January 3, 2010: Genderplayful Marketplace Raises Startup Funds in Only Two Weeks

About the Genderplayful Marketplace

Genderplayful is a plan for an online clothing marketplace that celebrates diversity in gender presentation and body types. This is for anyone who can’t easily find what they’re looking for in a typical clothing store, with special support for androgynous, unisex, butch, dapper, femme, gender-bending, gender-transgressive, and gender-fanflippingtastic clothing solutions for all kinds of bodies.

Genderplayful cares about custom solutions, and the marketplace will host a lively community that finds and creates those solutions together. Vendors will include indie designers, crafters, clothing makers, tailors, and people selling things from their closets and local thrift stores. Community members will pool notes on what they’re excited about, and vendors will take cues from buyers on what to create more of. The goal is to create a culture-rich gorgeous Internet bazaar for the playful, the exquisite, and the just trying to get dressed in the morning.

About the Fundraiser

If Genderplayful can raise $5,000 in community funding by January 15, 2011, founder Sarah Dopp will commit to making the project a reality. Anything above that baseline number will go toward making the project happen faster and better. (Really, she needs more like $50,000, but she’d rather do it cheaply than wait to do it perfectly.) You can donate at genderplayful.tumblr.com. All financial backers will receive perks based on their contribution level.

The PayPal Haters Fund: a sub-campaign
On the first day of the fundraiser, several community members expressed disappointment that the only way to donate was through PayPal. Since the initial software plan for the Genderplayful Marketplace only supports PayPal transactions, this feedback sparked a second Genderplayful fundraiser: the PayPal Haters Fund (this time using Google Checkout). The first priority for all money raised through the PayPal Haters Fund will be adding other payment methods to the Genderplayful Marketplace. These funds are separate from the baseline funding goal.

FUNDRAISER PROGRESS

Start Date: December 15, 2010

Goal Achieved: December 27, 2010

Final Totals (January 15, 2011):

$7,055 from 269 people through our main fundraiser, and
$1,435 from 24 people through our “paypal haters fund” (earmarked to get the marketplace alternate payment methods).

…for a grand total of $8,490 from 293 people.

About Sarah Dopp, founder of Genderplayful

Sarah Dopp has been building websites and online communities for over ten years. She’s a front-end web developer, an experienced project manager, a blogger, and a community manager. Also a longtime freelancer, her clients have included Cisco, Blogher.com, THE LINE Campaign, Offbeat Bride, and Planned Parenthood of Northern New England. In 2007, she founded Genderfork.com, a supportive community for the expression of identities across the gender spectrum, which serves over 20,000 readers a month and has a 15-person volunteer staff. She’s also the author of Culture Conductor, an industry blog about online community management.

For more about Sarah, try these resources: