The business of second-hand clothing is booming

二手服装生意正蓬勃兴起

Can it be profitable, too?

它能否实现盈利？

Secondhand fashion, once relegated to charity shops, is now in style. Vestiaire Collective, a luxury resale site, featured in an episode of the latest season of “Emily in Paris”, a Netflix drama known for its designer costumes. 

二手时尚曾一度局限于慈善商店，如今却蔚然成风。在 Netflix 热播剧《艾米丽在巴黎》最新一季中，主打奢侈品转售的 Vestiaire Collective 平台闪亮登场——这部剧集向来以设计师服饰为看点。

eBay, an online marketplace, has partnered with “Love Island”, a cult British reality show, to kit contestants out in used clothes. At London Fashion Week last year Vinted, a Lithuanian resale site, and Oxfam, a charity, showcased second-hand outfits.

在线市场 eBay 与英国现象级真人秀《爱情岛》达成合作，为参赛选手提供二手服装。在去年的伦敦时装周上，立陶宛二手交易平台Vinted与慈善机构乐施会共同呈现了二手时装秀。

The global market for used clothes and accessories is now worth some $100bn, according to research from Lombard Odier, a bank, up from $30bn-40bn in 2020. McKinsey, a consultancy, reckons the American resale market grew 15 times faster than clothing retail more broadly in 2023, and that second-hand sales will account for 10% of the global apparel market this year. 

据瑞士隆奥银行研究显示，全球二手服饰及配饰市场规模已从2020年的300-400亿美元攀升至约1000亿美元。咨询公司麦肯锡估算，2023年美国转售市场增速是整体服装零售的15倍，预计今年二手服装销售额将占全球服装市场的10%。

Some 30,000 items are now newly listed on Vestiaire every day. At a time when many fashion brands are struggling, resale sites are booming. How much bigger will they get?

如今 Vestiaire 平台每天新增约3万件商品挂牌。在众多时尚品牌举步维艰之际，转售平台却逆势增长。它们的扩张空间还有多大？

Some shoppers buy second-hand for environmental reasons. The fashion industry is responsible for about10% of global carbon-dioxide emissions, more than shipping and air travel combined. It uses a lot of water, too.

部分消费者选择二手服装是出于环保考量。时装产业碳排放约占全球总量的10%，超过航运与航空业总和，同时水资源消耗也相当惊人。

Yet as Maximilian Bittner, Vestiaire’s chief executive, notes, “by far the dominant driver is price.” Stretched consumers are increasingly turning to used goods to save money. 

但正如 Vestiaire 首席执行官马克西米利安·比特纳所言：“价格仍是目前最主要的驱动因素。”捉襟见肘的消费者为节省开支，越来越多转向二手商品。

Vestiaire has calculated that second-hand designer gear bought on its site is 33% cheaper on average than firsthand fast fashion from firms such as H&M, rising to 64% for coats and 72% for dresses, measured by cost per wear (calculated as the price of an item minus its resale value, divided by the amount of times it’s worn).

Vestiaire 经测算发现，其平台售出的二手设计师单品，按单次穿着成本（商品价格减去转售价值后除以穿着次数）计算，比 H&M 等快时尚新品平均便宜33%，外套和连衣裙的价差更是分别达到64%和72%。

There is plenty more growth to be had. Analysts at Wells Fargo, a bank, reckon there are $200bn-worth of luxury goods sitting in people’s wardrobes that are ripe for resale, of which only 3% make it onto the market each year.

增长潜力依然可观。富国银行分析师估计，人们衣橱中价值2000亿美元的奢侈品具备转售条件，但每年实际进入市场的仅为3%。

To entice more people to part with their “pre-loved” outfits, resale platforms are looking to make the process cheaper and easier. Vinted scrapped listing fees for sellers back in 2016 (it charges a fee of around 5% to buyers instead). Last year Depop, a London-based social commerce firm, and eBay followed suit in Britain. 

为吸引更多人出让“心爱旧衣”，转售平台正致力简化流程、降低成本。Vinted 早在2016年就取消了卖家上架费（改为向买家收取约5%服务费）。去年，伦敦社交电商公司 Depop 和 eBay 也在英国效仿了这一做法。

For many would-be sellers, though, the hassle remains a bigger barrier. Mr Bittner recently spent about half an hour putting four of his own items up for sale on Vestiaire. He says that is still too long. A number of resale platforms are now investing in artificial-intelligence tools to help sellers fill in product descriptions and advise on pricing.

不过对许多潜在卖家而言，繁琐程序仍是主要障碍。比特纳近期花费约半小时在 Vestiaire 上架四件私人物品，坦言耗时依旧过长。多家转售平台正投资人工智能工具，辅助卖家填写商品描述并提供定价建议。

Resale platforms are using technology to improve the experience for buyers, too. Shoppers want to know that branded goods are authentic, particularly when it comes to pricier designer fare. 

转售平台也在运用技术优化买家购物体验。消费者需要确保品牌商品为正品，尤其是高价设计师单品。

Hiring experts to manually check products is costly and slow. But there are a growing number of whizzy alternatives. Osmo, one startup, uses sensors to authenticate shoes by their odour. Ordre, another startup, helps brands create a “digital fingerprint” of their products by photographing parts of an item during the production process.

聘请专家人工验货成本高昂且效率低下，但创新型解决方案层出不穷：初创公司 Osmo 利用气味传感器鉴定鞋类真伪；Ordre 则帮助品牌在生产过程中拍摄产品细节，生成“数字指纹”。

Growth is one thing. Profit is another. Investors have become impatient with loss-making resale platforms. Shares in The RealReal, an American luxury-resale platform, have lost three-quarters of their value since the company listed in 2019. 

增长是一回事，盈利又是另一回事。投资者对持续亏损的转售平台渐失耐心。美国奢侈品转售平台 The RealReal 自2019年上市以来股价暴跌75%。

Those of thredUp, another online-resale firm, have dropped by almost 90% since its listing in 2021. Neither firm is in the black. Vestiaire, founded in 2009 and still privately held, promises that it will become profitable in the coming quarters.

另一在线转售公司 thredUp 自2021年 IPO 后市值缩水近90%，两家企业均未实现盈利。成立于2009年仍未上市的 Vestiaire 承诺将在未来几个季度扭亏为盈。

Vinted, which also remains private, is a rare exception, having turned a profit in 2023. The firm has invested in its own logistics and payments arms, and has its own servers and security software. Thomas Plantenga, the firm’s boss, says doing this “unsexy stuff” keeps costs down, though he acknowledges the strategy makes the business “more complex”.

保持私有化的 Vinted 是罕见例外，该公司在2023年已实现盈利。Vinted 投入巨资打造自有物流和支付体系，并拥有自己的服务器和安全软件。CEO 托马斯·普兰滕加坦言，这些“不够光鲜”的基建投入有效降低了成本，但他也承认，该策略增加了业务复杂性。

Perhaps the biggest threat to profits, though, is competition. Charity shops and online marketplaces are not the only place to buy used clothes. Brands including Lululemon and The North Face are getting into resale themselves. A growing number of shoppers are buying second-hand clothes through social-media platforms like TikTok. 

然而对盈利最大的威胁或许来自竞争。慈善商店和在线平台并非购买旧衣的唯一渠道：Lululemon、The North Face 等品牌纷纷自建转售业务；越来越多消费者通过 TikTok 等社交媒体购买二手服装。

As the industry grows, others may take an interest. Mr Plantenga of Vinted worries his firm could one day be crushed by a Silicon Valley tech giant. For now, though, there are plenty of wardrobes still to be cleaned out.

随着行业发展，更多参与者或将入局。Vinted 的普兰滕加担忧某天会被硅谷科技巨头碾压。但就目前而言，仍有无数衣橱等待清空。

（红色标注词为重难点词汇）

重难点词汇：

relegate [ˈrelɪɡeɪt] v. 使降级；使沦落；把…归入次要地位
entice [ɪnˈtaɪs] v. 诱使；引诱
hassle [ˈhæsl] n. 困难；麻烦；争辩 v. 不断打扰；与…争辩；使烦恼
whizzy [ˈwɪzi] adj. 新颖的；高科技的；令人印象深刻的
impatient [ɪmˈpeɪʃnt] adj. 不耐烦的；急躁的