Is it even the year’s end if you’re not making predictions about the 365 days ahead? We keep a close pulse on the fashion resale industry — from consumer demand to business moves to larger industry trends and patterns. 2022 was a transformative growth year for fashion resale. What will 2023 bring? The Resale Stylist Founder Emily K. Schwartz shares her thoughts.

Prediction #1: Consumers Warm to Brand Resale Programs

Lululemon, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Shein, Athleta, Madewell, Torrid, PacSun, Oscar de la Renta, Rolex, Mara Hoffman… the list goes on, and on, and on. These brands have all rolled out their own resale programs, either in partnership with resale-in-a-box providers (like thredUP RaaS, Archive, and Trove), or on their own. From a business standpoint, owning your own brand resale channel makes a ton of sense: not only do you build customer loyalty and retention, you’re vouching for the quality of your product — all while controlling your brand narrative and, hypothetically, making strategic use of customer data.

But it’s still early days for brands who own their own resale channels. Will customers embrace these programs? What will their hesitancies or reservations be? What will the limitations of these programs be? How will brands market and position these programs with existing and new customers? I see consumers exploring these programs if an item they’re considering purchasing is more money than they’d like to spend, if they want to purchase a higher-end brand that’s usually out of reach, and/or if they’re looking for a particular item that’s no longer in season or actively produced. They key for all of these scenarios, though, is strong brand equity and trust with consumers. That’s the only way this works for a specific brand, otherwise consumers pop on over to platforms like Poshmark for potentially better prices.

2023 will be a massive year of learning for brands who are testing out how owning their own resale programs impacts their businesses. I’m especially interested to see how these brand-owned resale marketplaces net out between participating buyers and participating sellers. But all in all, I see consumers leaning into these programs more in 2023 — especially consumers who may be wary of secondhand generally, but have trust in a given brand.

Prediction #2: Everyday Fashion Resale Gets Easier for Men

I sincerely hope I’m not wrong about this one. Yes, there are existing fashion resale options for men, and men’s clothing, shoes, and accessories are prolific across peer-to-peer platforms like Depop, Poshmark, and Grailed. But that’s kinda the problem. Peer-to-peer resale platforms require significantly more effort from and generally have a longer learning curve for both participating buyers and sellers, resulting in men (or those in their lives who want to shop for them) being limited in easy-to-use resale options.

Consignment platforms The RealReal and Rebag both offer men’s pieces, but these are generally higher-end pieces — not necessarily everyday wear (yes, consumers can hunt-and-peck for exceptions to this, but I’m speaking broadly). thredUP — one of the simplest online consignment platforms — doesn’t yet carry men’s items.

So, what’s a guy to do? Men who are looking for everyday pieces are largely limited to peer-to-peer platforms, or thrift businesses like Goodwill, Buffalo Exchange, Crossroads Trading, or Plato’s Closet, in addition to other local thrift and consignment stores. There’s major whitespace in the men’s online consignment space right now, and I’d love to see more than one player fill it. Bonus points if they can build an effective business moat.

Prediction #3: More Growth Before Consolidation

Despite already seeing a little consolidation in the fashion resale space, I think the resale space is still predominantly growing. Dozens if not hundreds of small, newer entrants across the globe are spinning up their own fashion resale, rental, and repair platforms and software, and I don’t think we’re anywhere near peak saturation yet — even though it already feels totally busy and overwhelming. I see more growth in brand programs, peer-to-peer platforms, consignment platforms, rental programs, repair programs, and resale-programs-in-a-box software throughout 2023. Maybe we’ll start to see consolidation in 2024, but I don’t expect 2023 to be the year of fashion resale mergers and acquisitions.

So there you have it. Let’s check back in this time next year and see where we are. Until then…