Resale Set To Be Star Of Retail In 2022 For Consumers And Brands

Buying second-hand was surging in popularity before the pandemic shook up the retail industry but supply chain issues and tightening household budgets has added to consumers’ unabating drive to find resale deals.

With a global desire to shop responsibly and sustainably – resale is predicted to be a major player in the retail landscape for 2022. To be a real success, resale needs to blend with online selling, with e-commerce set to explode over the next few years.

One of the biggest challenges for retailers and brands has been understanding how to monetise resale on their own platform. As with many retail innovations, technology is leading the way.

Leading tech integration Recurate has a bold vision – to enable brands to create their own resale platforms directly on their e-commerce sites. For retail as a whole, and especially small business, innovation such as this will ensure the industry moves forward meeting the needs of the customer as well as the planet.

Democratising retail

Allowing customers to resell items they previously purchased from a brand or business on their e-commerce site offers a seamless, brand-loyal experience for consumers, as well as offering brands and retailers the potential to keep resale, a fast growing market, within their own business.

Wilson Griffin, co-founder and COO of Recurate, explains. “The resale market is growing 11 times faster than traditional retail, which is due to a combination of factors from customer demand for more sustainable and affordable ways of shopping, to advancements in technology that power resale.”

With fast growth in consumer purchasing, the case for adding resale to an existing business is becoming stronger.

Kate Peters, managing director of Beyond Retro, a UK-based, clothing company, explains why they’ve chosen to add resale to their shopping experience.

“We’re proud to offer our customers a conscious shopping choice with sustainable, affordable pieces that are all handpicked and on trend, but we believe every brand needs to take responsibility, and push themselves to become more circular”.

Going green is key

Any business that ignores the desire and necessity of becoming more sustainable does so at their peril. This innovative route to resale has the potential to transform the retail industry’s green credentials.

Peters adds: “we’re seeing a growing concern for the environmental impact of consumer choices, and customers are understanding a lot more about the complexities of sustainability. The future of fashion has to be circular, and resale programmes will be encouraging customers to do just that”.

Resale hurdles

With any new strand to a retail business’s offering there will be challenges to overcome. Wilson explains. “The challenge for brands to get into resale has been that it isn’t their expertise. These brands have been designed to make and sell new products. We become advisors to our brand partners, and most importantly, our technology makes it incredibly easy to launch a resale channel”. 

Wilson adds that brands are “worried about protecting their customer experience”, however their technology integration allows brands to lead with their images, branding and product descriptions, making the experience of purchasing second hand “just as amazing as the experience of purchasing a new product.”

Resale is a major conversation in the fashion industry and one of the fastest growing consumer behaviours. In the US alone, over 33million consumers bought second-hand apparel for the first time in 2020. The resale market is projected to double in the next 5 years, reaching $77billion. With the technology needed to power resale becoming more accessible to all, 2022 should be the year that all retailers and brands, both big and small, consider resale.