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Update on our commitment to the Black community

Education

Back in June, we committed to implementing change and driving the progress needed to fully represent and truly celebrate the Black community within Depop. We’ve always believed that who we are as Depop is rooted in the diversity of our community, and over the past couple of months, we’ve spent our time thinking, discussing and exploring with the Black community in and around Depop to understand where we’re starting from and what’s needed for the future. Here’s what we’ve done and what we’ve learned:

The importance of D&I Training


In June, we started with a company-wide day to reflect on why we exist, what we owe our community and how our company is designed to make that happen.

We launched compulsory D&I training for all employees, led by YSYS, and extensive training for our Executive team with The Other Box focusing on broader D&I, as well as courses on privilege and unconscious bias
 

Meaningful Conversations

We hosted safe space conversations between our Black employees and our Executive team to discuss our progress as a business and launched our own Equity Collective (DEC), whose mission is to hold all of Depop accountable for the creation of a more equitable company

Our talent team also forged new relationships with job boards that prioritise diversity in hiring and new partnerships for recruitment specifically focused on Black talent

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion


We hired our first Head of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Chinny Okolidoh, who will ensure that we are embedding DEI into the heart of everything we do

  • We set our 2022 targets for Black representation at Depop. In 2.5 years, our goal is to increase Black representation:

    • Board, C-Suite & SVP from 0% to 10%

    • Director & VP from 0% to 15%

    • Head of from 10% to 15%

    • All staff from 10% to 15%. 

Improving Visibility

Getting our house in order is one aspect of our success, but true success to us means that our community is representative of and leading the future we’d all like to see. Since June, we’ve launched streams of work to qualitatively and quantitatively understand where we sit in terms of Black representation on our platform so we know where we need to be. While we’ve increased the presence of Black sellers across our Explore page, social channels, marketing campaigns and newsletters. We know we need to create more dialogue between these channels to show more of what this community represents. We believe in creating pathways and space for existing and new Black sellers to share knowledge with there being a value exchange at the heart of these interactions. We believe in providing more visibility to the style, history, culture, inventory, and voices rooted in this community to give rise to a more fulfilling, comforting, and inviting Black experience on Depop.

Individual Empowerment

This month isn’t the breadth of efforts or the end of them. But it’s a moment for us to check in with you, our community, and check in with ourselves as Depop to make sure that we’re being clear on what still needs to be done. Our desire for resolve exists as an important reminder for why diversity, equity and inclusion are fundamental to what we believe in as a business. It’s about putting the power back in the hands of individuals who celebrate self-expression as fashion, self-made creativity as entrepreneurship and individuality as the ultimate currency of unity. For us, it’s about who we are and who we can be.