Clothing and accessories retailer New Look has joined the resale in retail revolution, which continues to build momentum in the UK.
The retailer said it is “committed to being a force for good within the fashion industry”, and as part of that ambition it has partnered with pre-loved apparel platform, Re-Fashion, which helps resell unwanted clothes and keep them out of landfill.
“We’re using kinder materials, we’ve closed the loop on our plastics and all of our stores are carbon neutral, but there’s more we can do,” New Look states on the website announcing the new resale in retail tie-up.
“That’s why we’ve teamed up with Re-Fashion.”
New Look customers wanting to take part in the scheme can order a free donation bag online, which they then fill with unwanted garments before sending on to Re-Fashion, which sells the items via its own website.
For each New Look bag donated a tree will be planted, too, thanks to another environmental partnership the retailer has established with Tree-Nation.
Consumers participating in the New Look-Re-Fashion scheme will also receive 30% off their next purchase at re-fashion.co.uk, as a way of encouraging growth in second-hand shopping which is viewed as more circular behaviour than shopping at fast fashion websites.
Earlier this year, gifts, homeware and fashion retailer Oliver Bonas joined the resale in retail movement, by launching its own partnership with Re-Fashion.
Re-Fashion assesses received items and classes them as “good”, “OK”, or “not so good”, and depending on their condition relist items for sale, sends them to charity, or upcycles them respectively.
Magazine and events platform Wired releases its annual trends briefing, The WIRED World in 2022, this week. It is available from Condé Nast stores worldwide and via digital download from Thursday 4 November, and this year’s offering highlights the rise of resale in retail.
In the report, president & co-founder of second-hand luxury platform Vestiaire Collective, Fanny Moizant, says: “Our own research has shown that buying a handbag second-hand rather than opting for new can reduce its environmental impact by up to 91%.
“According to the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, increasing an item’s lifetime by just nine months decreases its environmental impact by 30-40%.”
She adds: “Resale today is a similar phenomenon to eCommerce in the 1990s, which was also underestimated to begin with. Today, those companies that have embraced eCommerce fully are thriving. Those that did not are struggling or have already disappeared. In 2022, we will see a similar transformation of the sector as brands and organisations that ignore the new customer’s needs will slowly but surely lose to their more perceptive competitors.”
[Image credit: New Look]
