High-street fashion retailer Zara has announced a new scheme where shoppers can book repairs and donate unwanted items of clothing as the brand looks to reduce its carbon footprint.
The pre-owned service, which launches in the UK on 3 November, will be Zara’s first step into the resale or repair market, allowing customers to donate unwanted items, organise repairs and sell unwanted Zara purchases.
Zara started installing clothing donation bins in their outlets across Europe in 2016. Now, under a new partnership with the Red Cross, clothes can also be collected from customers’ homes as part of the new scheme.
Paula Ampuero, the head of sustainability at Zara, said: “At this stage, this platform is exclusively conceived as a tool to help customers extend the lifetime of their clothing and take a more circular approach.”
To take advantage of selling pre-loved clothing online, sellers will take pictures of their items with detailed product information provided by Zara. The company will run the sales platform via its website and app, with payment handled by the Stripe system.
Research shows that customers are increasingly demanding more sustainable fashion options that enable the reuse or recycling of resources.
Zara joins several retailers who are establishing their presence in the rental, resale, and repair market, as the fashion industry faces criticism over its high carbon footprint.
The fashion chain said the UK had been chosen as the test market as its consumers “push us to improve and innovate”. If successful, the service is likely to be extended to other key markets.
Other brands investing in the rental and resale space include Marks & Spencer which has teamed up with Dotte to enable the resale of children’s clothing, designer label Joules which is working with Reskinned on resale items, and department store John Lewis’s FashionCycle service offering shoppers a discount voucher in return for bringing back five items.
The resale and refurbishment market is forecast to outgrow fast fashion in the coming years, with brands from Mulberry and Harvey Nichols to Dr Martens and H&M taking part.
The Selfridges department store group aims for almost half its interactions with customers to be based on resale, repair, rental, or refills by 2030.
