eBay has launched a new UK partnership with clothing resale, sanitization and repair platform ACS to expand the online marketplace’s secondhand offering and help reduce waste in the fashion industry. The partnership aims to help more brands create and scale resale offerings while adding more secondhand options to eBay UK’s platform.
ACS cleans, sanitizes and repairs secondhand items to make them resale ready, and also helps manage the logistics of item listing and delivery. eBay will help connect millions of global shoppers to this stock, including eBay UK’s 20 million customers. The first retailer to launch on ACS’ eBay Shop will be Monsoon, with other companies set to follow.
“Our economy and our environment are in need of urgent repair,” said Murray Lambell, UK VP of eBay in a statement. “If we want our businesses to be here in 20 or 100 years’ time, we need to move away from our fixation on overconsumption and instead mark ourselves on circularity. There is huge commercial value in backing the resale economy and the retailers that are first to make the change and invest will benefit the most in the long run.”
The development follows research from eBay that found the resale economy is growing in the UK as shoppers seek both cost-conscious and environmentally friendly options. A full 87% of adults surveyed said they have purchased a secondhand item in the past, and the top reasons for doing so were:
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- To “get a better deal or to find a bargain” (32%);
- To “cut back on spending” (31%);
- “The rise of the cost of living” (31%); and
- To be “more sustainable” (26%).
One in four (25%) adults surveyed said that a larger range of used items now available to buy was a key reason for them making a secondhand purchase. The ACS partnership will help eBay UK overcome some of the top barriers to buying resale, which included concerns about hygiene (51%), safety of secondhand products (35%) and quality issues (28%).
“The surge in secondhand clothing sales is undoubtedly a reaction to the growing consumer conscience of sustainability in fashion as well as the increasing cost of living and the pressure this places on spending,” said Andrew Rough, CEO of ACS Clothing in a statement.
In October 2022, eBay partnered with the British Fashion Council to introduce the Circular Fashion Innovator’s Fund. The fund will launch with an initial £100,000 ($113,000) in funding for six small businesses specializing in circular fashion solutions.
