Rati Sahi Levesque joined luxury resale marketplace The RealReal as its first employee in 2011. Fifteen years later, she leads a business that generated nearly $693 million in revenue in 2025. Along the way, she has learnt that leading a company is not just about making the right decisions, but also recognising when those decisions need to change.
In an interview with CNBC Make It , Levesque, who became CEO in October 2024, shared a key lesson from her 15 years at the company, emphasising the importance of being open to the possibility of being wrong.
“One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned is not to get too attached to being right,” she said, reflecting on her experience at the company.
However, the Covid-19 pandemic exposed the challenges of that approach, forcing its leadership to reconsider how the business operated. In an interview with ELLE in 2024, Levesque spoke about the company’s earlier missteps, including opening large flagship stores that proved expensive to operate. The company reported revenue of $692.8 million, a 15% increase from 2024, according to its 2025 financial results . It also recorded positive adjusted EBITDA in every quarter of 2025 for the first time.
The RealReal’s journey has not been without setbacks. Like many start-ups, the company initially prioritised rapid growth and customer acquisition. The business eventually moved towards smaller neighbourhood stores that required less capital. The company also had to return its focus to its core consignment model after experimenting with buying inventory during the pandemic, when collecting goods directly from customers became difficult. The RealReal’s subsequent financial performance offers a measure of how far the business has come.
