Sellers make thousands as second-hand fashion market booms

Pre-loved is popular, and marketplaces like The Turn are allowing everyday Australians to cash in.

Sadie Wyer-Manock models one of the classic second-hand dresses for sale at The Turn HQ in Punchbowl in Sydney’s southwest. Picture: John Feder

Thrifty Australians are rushing to sell second-hand items, spurred by cost of living pressures and the drive to cut waste, leading to a boom for online marketplaces.

Sales of pre-used goods have soared in the past year, according to research by Gumtree. Sellers made an average of $8107 on the site last year, a leap from $2821 the previous year. In the past four years, the estimated value of resale items in the “circular economy” overall has grown by 44 per cent – up from $43bn before the pandemic in 2019 to $62bn in 2022, Gumtree said.

Clothing, shoes and accessories were the items most commonly sold on the platform over the past year, followed by games and toys and home decor.

Exclusive figures provided to The Australian show that fashion items accounted for more than half of the goods sold on Gumtree last year.

Fashion, shoes and accessories now make up 56 per cent of goods traded on the online marketplace, with sellers reporting that fashion listings sell faster than items in other popular categories.

Gumtree managing director Mark Kehoe says he has seen the clothing portion of the circular economy grow dramatically since the platform launched in Australia in 2007.

“Pre-loved fashion is becoming much more mainstream. It’s becoming normal practice to look for ways to extend the life of your items, whether that’s through repairing or repurposing, or passing (them) on to someone else.”

Gorman, Zimmermann, Nike and Patagonia are the most searched brands on Gumtree.

Financial strain – including cost of living pressures and debt from buy-now-pay-later schemes – are among the factors driving the resale market. However, when it comes to fashion, the sustainability movement and vintage trends have also fuelled the rise of new sites dedicated to selling preloved clothes and accessories.

When it comes to the market for high-end and contemporary fashion, most Australians generally turn to specialist overseas websites such as New York’s RealReal or Vestiaire Collective which operates out of Paris.

However, relatively new local player The Turn – the upmarket sister business of Sydney’s Uturn clothing store chain – is providing Australians with a local alternative to overseas resale platforms, with 700 brands including quality pieces by luxury houses such as Miu Miu and homegrown designers including Scanlan Theodore.

General Manager of The Turn Katie Revie says as Australians become more sustainably minded, “more customers are turning to the preloved market for premium and designer pieces”.