Let's Talk Resale

Join host Andy Ruben, founder of Trove, in a groundbreaking episode where the intersection of business and sustainability takes center stage. Uncover the strategies and insights that redefine sustainability as not only essential but smart business. In this candid conversation, Andy and industry experts Asha Agrawal Head of Corporate Dev at Patagonia, Chris Riley, former strategic planning director...

In this episode of "Let’s Talk Resale," we dive into the future of item digitization, where every product will have its own digital identity. Joined by industry leaders, we'll discuss how brands are navigating this new terrain, especially in light of emerging initiatives like the EU's digital product passports. This isn't just about meeting new standards; it's about leveraging this dual physical-d...

Who is the customer of tomorrow? How do they shop? What do brand - and brand values - mean to them? In this second episode of Let’s Talk Resale, we consider brands' future customers. We live amid a massive cultural shift in customers' beliefs and priorities. Digital commerce and internet ubiquity have changed the shopping experience - brands, pricing, reviews, and comments. Gen Z is coming into th...

ThredUp and eBay in the News: Decoding Their Moves to Uncover the Future of Resale This Weeks Key Takeaways: Embrace in-house resale channels: While brands can learn from resale marketplaces, it's essential to bring resale in-house as it becomes a more significant portion of sales Leverage strategic partnerships with marketplaces: As platforms like eBay continue to grow their partnerships with bra...

This Weeks Key Takeaways: Selling second-hand products has the potential to attract customers in ways that one-off, sustainability-oriented products haven’t Brands and retailers looking to increase profits can benefit from launching resale programs that include returns, as they can provide cost savings starting point

This Weeks Key Takeaways: Brands will continue to innovate toward a listing/trade-in value proposition that makes sense to their customers. Lululemon and Frye were good examples highlighted in the 2023 Resale Index Although the economics differ, rental and resale both hold brand benefits in more circular models. Brands will want to pick the right model(s) that make sense for their customers

This Weeks Key Takeaways: Changes at The RealReal present opportunities for others in the resale market. Brands will need to treat emissions with the same level of importance as financial performance, as poor performance may have negative market consequences, similar to financial underperformance, down the road.

What is the state of resale today? Which brands are leading the industry? Where exactly is the industry heading? And … how fast? In this episode of Let’s Talk Resale, we discuss Trove’s inaugural resale Index, a report that takes a step back, assesses our progress so far, and anticipates what’s to come for the circular economy. Our discussion touches on the construction of the report and reflects...

W. David Marx, author of the book Status and Culture was highlighted In a New York Times Style piece this week, on the evolving status symbol of luxury goods. According to Marx, “Someone carrying a beat-up Hermès bag suggests they are not simply wearing it because of its label. I don’t even care if it gets beat up, because I’m not using this for status marking.” As the article points out, the grow...

Jacklyn Wells , a 19-year-old Depop seller posted a TikTok in late January showing off “the most insane thrift haul.” The TikTok quickly went negative, really negative with more than 5.9M views inciting a moral reaction that thrifting should be philanthropic not for profit. Jacklyn was called "greedy, lazy, and parasitic." I will spare you from the most aggressive comments but the controversy crea...

There are high expectations for resale as pointed out by The Guardian. Next-generation customers will seek out pre-owned items that will allow the fashion industry to automatically transform a 100+ year-old linear model into a circular model. This will not happen in a straight path, nor will it happen overnight. Today, we live in the wild west, where it’s hard to distinguish the positive forward m...

The secondhand luxury goods market grew 28% in 2022 to reach $45.21 billion, according to Bain & Company and Fondazione Altagamma . This is 1.3X higher than the growth rate for new luxury goods. For a related growth stat, eBay shared they saw a 24 percent increase in circular fashion businesses joining their site last year, and searches for pre-loved clothing on eBay UK have skyrocketed 1600 p...

J. Crew launched its resale program, J Crew Always, with Thredup’s Resale as a Service (RaaS) last week, well-timed to be announced at NRF’s Big Show. Given the existing Madewell program with ThredUP, it wasn’t surprising to see J Crew enter resale in this way. According to WWD , “The J. Crew items already listed on ThredUp are not part of the J. Crew Always initiative.” Historically it has been a...

Rent the Runway’s deal with Amazon is a five-alarm fire for brands such as Rag & Bone and Tory Burch. RTR sells pre-owned branded fashion and its own branded pieces on Amazon at significant discounts. RTR started with selling via Thredup the Sacks Off Fifth and now Amazon. Their stock was rewarded, but this is short term, but it’s hard not to see the desperation with long-term concerns for the...

Don't Buy This Jacket - A Story with Former Patagonia’s Nellie Cohen and Trove’s Founder Andy Ruben The birth and evolution of Patagonia’s Worn Wear is a story of confronting the hard truths about our linear business models that overproduction is ultimately unsustainable. It is a story of innovation through iteration baked with intentionality, failing forward and trying again. As Nellie and Andy r...

It’s been a week of 2023 prediction soup. Nearly all the prediction lists included Resale–some predictions driven by younger customer preferences, some by value in difficult economic times, and some for sustainability-oriented shoppers. Learn how these predictions can be acted on for your brand in this week's Resale Edit.

Happy New Year, and Welcome to what is sure to be a dynamic 2023 for Resale. Let’s start with Glossy’s article, The state of resale in 2023: Competition, consolidation and a push for profitability . The piece assessed players from The RealReal to Treet and summarized with “twin challenges of an overcrowded market and the growing expectation for profitability will be difficult to overcome.” A criti...

5 Resale Predictions for 2023 As the news slows down for the Holidays and New Year, we’d love to share our resale predictions for 2023. Let’s start with how the end of this year. 2022 will be the year Branded Resale became table stakes. We went from 31 to 120+ brands with dedicated resale programs. There is no going back. Brands didn’t start the shift, customers did as pioneers such as The RealRea...

As Sourcing Journal writes, Money Keeps Flowing Into Secondhand Shopping . Yes, and this week we will cover Vestiaire ’s $80M in a credit line and Beni’s raise of $4M. There is a lot of talk about how secondhand is accelerated by the economy or this or that. The reality is, shopping secondhand allows us to get nicer things for less money. Value is about as basic as it gets for what appeals to cust...

Join host Samantha Dersarkissian and Co-founder and CEO of Beni, Sarah Pinner, as they dive into consumer sentiment for gifting resale and how brands can tap into resale to acquire new customers and increase loyalty with existing customers. To learn more about Beni please visit joinbeni.com If your brand wants to launch a profitable and scalable trade-in and resale program, learn more about Trove...

There Will be a ‘Before and After’ of the Recent Rolex Pre-Certified Announcement Rolex continued to make news this week as the industry digests the implications of their pre-certified program. Charles Gorra of Rebag was quoted in PYMTS saying “It’s incredible. I think [Rolex entering the market] is the biggest news that I’ve heard in the last decade in terms of the resale world. I think there wil...

We are in a tough economic environment. Increased costs of new items make resale more attractive by comparison. Yet third-party marketplaces such as ThredUP and The Real Real (TRR) have reduced their growth projections. Let us look at the variety of factors at play: Less discretionary income, hence less shopping dollars in play Retailers are heavy on inventory across the board Deeper discounts on...

Ahh…so it begins. The barrage of Black Friday and Cyber Monday emails and now SMS appears to be the hallmark of the Holiday season. In the 2000s national chains such as Walmart, Target, and Best Buy found a way to take advantage of this timing as a marketing moment to kick off holiday shopping–setting record sales numbers year after year by focusing deals in small time windows or "events." But tim...

In an article titled, ‘Secondhand Luxury: Opportunity or Threat’ BoF raises the question: what's the right path for brands? Buyback and then resell their own goods, or route them to resale sites, which give brands a cut of sales? The growth of resale is all about brands... imagine shopping on The Real Real if none of the items were branded. Customers are shifting their behavior toward resale based...