Why Brands Are Selling Their Own Used Clothes
Patagonia, Lululemon, Eileen Fisher, and 150 other U.S. fashion brands now sell used versions of their own products on
Patagonia, Lululemon, Eileen Fisher, and 150 other U.S. fashion brands now sell used versions of their own products on their websites. This represents a 325% increase since 2021. The secondhand market is valued at $260 billion in 2025 and expected to hit $522 billion by 2030, growing 2-3 times faster than first-hand fashion.
Brands are competing with themselves. They’re teaching customers to buy used instead of new. They’re cannibalizing their own full-price sales on purpose because circular fashion has become more profitable than pretending the resale market doesn’t exist.
Capture the Value or Watch It Leave
For decades, fashion brands ignored what happened after the first sale. Customers bought new clothes, wore them, donated or threw them away. What happened next wasn’t the brand’s problem. This worked when resale happened at thrift stores and garage sales.
Then Poshmark, Depop, and thredUP digitized secondhand. Millions of customers could easily buy and sell used clothes. Brands watched customers buying used versions of their products from strangers instead of buying new from them. No revenue captured. No customer relationship maintained. losing control over quality.
Brands had three options: fight resale legally and damage brand reputation, ignore it and watch value go to third-party platforms, or participate and capture some value. Most chose participation.
Circular fashion programs let brands buy back used items, refurbish them, and resell them. This generates revenue from the same product multiple times. Archive, which powers resale for Banana Republic and AllSaints, raised $30 million Series B in 2024. Trove Commerce, working with Levi’s and Patagonia, secured $100 million. These aren’t small side projects. Patagonia’s Worn Wear launched in 2013 and generates significant revenue. Lululemon’s Like New operates in 300+ stores.
The Math Works
Selling used clothes sounds like cannibalizing new sales. Customers buying secondhand often wouldn’t have bought new anyway. They’re price-sensitive, environmentally conscious, or interested in older styles no longer in production. Brands can serve these customers profitably through circular fashion while keeping them in the ecosystem.
Brands buy back used items at a fraction of original price, refurbish them, and resell at 30-70% of original retail. The margin is lower than new but the cost structure is different. No design costs, no manufacturing, no shipping from overseas factories. Just acquisition, cleaning, repair, and resale.
Brands use store credit for buybacks, keeping money in their ecosystem. A customer sells back a used jacket for $50 in credit, then spends $150 on a mix of new and used items. The brand acquires resale inventory cheaply while driving additional purchases. The customer feels good about sustainability while spending more than they would have otherwise.
The data matters too. Which products last longest? What styles remain desirable years later? Where do quality issues appear? This information feeds back into design and manufacturing.
New Customers From Old Clothes
A college student can’t afford a $300 Patagonia jacket new but will pay $150 for used. That customer enters the brand ecosystem, has a good experience, might buy new later when income increases. The used sale creates a future full-price customer.
Brands also reactivate lapsed customers. Someone who bought five years ago and hasn’t returned might sell back old items for credit. That interaction brings them back to the website where they see new products. The buyback creates a touchpoint that wouldn’t have existed.
The environmental credentials attract conscious consumers. Customers who research sustainable options discover brands through circular fashion programs. They might buy used first, appreciate the quality and values, then become regular buyers. The resale program functions as marketing that generates revenue instead of costing money.
Beating the Platforms
Brand resale programs compete with thredUP, Poshmark, and Depop. These platforms have scale and customer habits. But brands have advantages.
Brand programs offer authenticated products. Customers know they’re getting genuine items in described condition. Third-party platforms struggle with counterfeits and misrepresented condition.
The shopping experience is simpler. Customers browsing a brand’s website see new and used together. They can compare prices, mix new and used in one order, use the same checkout and customer service. Platforms require separate accounts, separate checkout, separate customer service.
Store credit for buybacks keeps money with the brand. Poshmark lets customers cash out or buy across many brands. Brand programs make it convenient to sell back and buy from the same brand.
Some brands partner with platforms instead of building in-house. Banana Republic uses Archive’s technology but maintains brand control. The platform provides infrastructure, the brand provides customer relationship.
Regulations Are Coming
The EU’s Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation requires textiles to be more durable, repairable, and recyclable. Extended producer responsibility makes brands financially responsible for disposal. France requires environmental scoring on clothing. The Netherlands is implementing deposit return systems for textiles. California is considering extended producer responsibility.
Brands building circular fashion programs now prepare for coming requirements. They develop expertise, infrastructure, and customer habits before regulations force compliance. Early movers have years of learning that latecomers lack.
Fashion generates 10% of global carbon emissions. The industry’s environmental impact has created regulatory pressure and consumer demand for change. Circular fashion addresses both while generating revenue.
What Fails
H&M’s conscious collection and recycling program generated criticism for greenwashing. The company produces too much new cheap clothing for resale programs to offset environmental impact. Customers saw through it.
Brands treating circular fashion as pure marketing rather than real business strategy usually fail. Small-scale pilot programs that don’t integrate into core operations don’t deliver results.
Quality control failures damage trust. Brands selling damaged items as “good condition” or charging too much for used products create negative experiences. Customers trying brand resale once and having bad experiences don’t return.
Complexity kills programs. Brands requiring customers to mail items back, wait weeks for credit, and navigate complicated redemption make selling back hard. Successful programs offer instant credit or in-store drop-off.
Fast fashion faces harder challenges. Clothes designed to last one season and cost $10 new don’t have resale value. The quality doesn’t support multiple owners. Customers buying fast fashion care about trends and low prices, not sustainability. Circular fashion doesn’t work for brands built on disposability.
Where This Goes
More brands will launch resale programs. The economics work, regulations push it, customers want it. Circular fashion will become expected rather than differentiating.
The secondhand market reaching $522 billion by 2030 means brands can’t ignore it. That’s too much value flowing outside their control. Circular fashion lets brands participate in and profit from markets that exist with or without them.
153 U.S. brands operate resale programs now, up from 47 in 2021. ThredUp’s 2025 Resale Report projects the global secondhand apparel market will reach $350 billion by 2028. In the U.S. alone, the market hit $43 billion in 2024. Gen Z drives much of this, with 62% having bought secondhand in the past year.
Technology will improve. AI-powered condition assessment, automated pricing, better logistics. The operational challenges get easier as platforms solve problems repeatedly. Integration will deepen. New and used inventory managed together. Product design considering multiple lifecycles.
The brands learning circular fashion now position themselves for a future where used is normal and waste is unacceptable. The ones still ignoring resale will explain why they let that much money walk away.
Sources:
Business of Fashion – Brand Resale
