Retail Is Boring. Resale Is
Booming. Inside the Consumer Shift Reshaping Apparel
Companies
hate markdowns and shoppers hate full price. Resale startups are solving both
problems.
EXPERT OPINION BY HOWARD TULLMAN, GENERAL MANAGING PARTNER, G2T3V AND CHICAGO HIGH TECH INVESTORS @HOWARDTULLMAN1
Mar 10, 2026
It’s no secret that
during the last 15 years, growth
in retail apparel sales has cratered while the resale
market for secondhand clothes—both brick-and-mortar and
online—has exploded. Resale growth is scaling at five or
six times retail’s growth rate and should double by
2028. Most estimates expect that global sales
of “previously owned” clothing will grow by more
than 10 percent annually, while traditional retail results
will be flat or even down. The truth is that virtually no one
these days has any interest in paying full price for anything, and
especially for costly items that they’re likely to wear a
couple of times and then forget about.
The rise of
the “fast fashion” industry and its messaging didn’t do any
favors to the old-line brands and manufacturers when they
taught several generations of upcoming kids, mini fashionistas, and social media
influencers that all these products were quickly
and cheaply made, likely to last for a single season, and
imminently disposable. They’re hot for a moment and
then they’re not. Prices are up while quality is
down in flimsy fast fashion items.
No one under 35 (40
percent of all used apparel shoppers) thinks of clothing
as classic anymore. Multi-generational hand-me-downs and well-made
garments that can last for years to come seems to be a thing of the
past. Looking like a slob can be a strong social statement
that you’re socially responsible and don’t really care about
material things.
An under-appreciated aspect
of the whole resale revolution is how social the
entire shopping experience has become with direct
links, rewards and incentives being pushed by TikTok and
Instagram. Retail is boring and mass; resale is an adventure in
personal branding and an opportunity to discover unique items and
stand out from the herd.
The broader explanations
offered for this shift in demand, desire and taste are several and typically
fall into four areas: affordability/budget consciousness,
sustainability/eco-friendly action, thrifting as an adventure/social
signaling, and uniqueness/non-mass market. One of the modest ironies with
respect to this desire for non-mass market goods is, of course,
that most of the apparel now available for resale was in fact
mass produced back in the day when it was new. But now it’s chic
and charming. Smart young shoppers are also aspirational and appreciate
the opportunity to acquire upscale brand apparel at a
discount. Another curious consideration is that if the
goods weren’t well made initially, they probably wouldn’t have
lasted and been available for the secondary market.
In any event the
main driver of the exponential resale expansion has
been internet connectivity, technology advances
in management of large scale data and images along
with the emergence and popularity of online resale sites like Depop, Poshmark, and ThredUp. At the higher and more
expensive end, The RealReal sets
the price and
luxury curve. The RealReal management has also
experimented with brick-and-mortar stores, but with only limited
success.
Much like the car
business, no one calls these clothes “used” however. The big brand chains have
slowly started to respond to the resale trend by offering their own versions –
they’ve all come up with clever names like Worn Wear (Patagonia), Athleta Preloved,
Hanna-Me-Downs, Rejuiced, and Madewell Forever. In many cases, this
response is accelerating because, aside from the obvious pressure from the
resellers, the big brands hate the embarrassment of mark-downs,
don’t like to see their goods sold in discount and outlet chains, and
like to avoid all of the problems disposing of excess inventory. As a
result, a fair amount of the goods moving through these channels may, in fact,
be virtually brand new, in colors and styles that simply didn’t sell,
or returned goods. Resale companies like Archive are pitching brands every day to help them increase
their profits by more efficiently and quickly disposing of unwanted
inventory.
As exciting as the rapid
growth has been, there’s an enormous remaining volume of resalable
goods (including adjacent markets such
as shoes, toys, outdoor and sports gear and baby products)
which all share similar ownership and behavioral
characteristics. No one outgrows and ages out of
expensive infant products faster than sprouting little kids. And
no one abandons running shoes, pickleball racquets and other
exercise gear more quickly than Millennials.
But it’s not
as easy as it may seem to enter these spaces
and to cost-effectively attract, aggregate and market millions
of these items, especially when the vast majority
of the amateur “sellers” are “one of
one” cases. It sounds like a great idea to sell your stuff until
you actually set out to sort, take pictures of, write
descriptions for, and then “list” those everyday items, which might
ultimately not be worth the time
and effort. But it’s a great green space
for enterprising entrepreneurs.
Two-way consumer-targeted markets are ridiculously expensive to build and grow unless you can figure out a way to work with the existing players and “ride their rails” so your business can avoid the vast majority of costs on both sides of the process. Let existing vendors expand, aggregate, and organize all the inventory on one side and find partners and affiliates who are already attracting millions of shoppers on the other side and figure out a win-win way to work with both groups.
That’s what is so
interesting about Beni, which permits retail
online shoppers to quickly and painlessly search for
second-hand items, matching their searches through over 300
million apparel and accessory offers from more than 40
different resale sites in a one-stop online
location and/or through its own app. Visitors can search by
image, text or URL. Beni’s browser extension overlays other vendors
stores and “tags along” essentially as an intelligent assistant
that accompanies and interrupts a typical retail search with
suggestions of comparable (and less expensive) secondhand
goods available at any of its affiliates’
sites. It’s already so effective that in some cases the company is
working directly with brand sites like Patagonia to offer their
own secondhand items so that the brands don’t have to build
out and maintain their own
systems. While we’re clearly well past the “peak apps” point in our
lives and our phones, the truth is that a simple Chrome browser extension
is a pretty simple and painless ask for all the search power and access
that Beni provides.
And, of course, the
Beni enabling technology strategy
avoids virtually all of the marketing and acquisition costs on both sides of the
resale search marketplace. Their offerings are expanding and
improving at a rapid pace with photo management tools (Beni
Lens), real-time alerts, and wish lists all in one place. They have a
good shot at becoming the secondhand search engine for the
entire resale marketplace.
