‘Empowerment Over Shame’: thredUP’s Revamped Fashion Footprint Calculator Aims to Inspire

As it’s done every year since 2013, secondhand clothing platform thredUP released its 2023 Resale Report this week.

Compiling data from independent consumer surveys and its own brand partners—which include labels like Kate Spade, J. Crew, Hot Topic and Tommy Hilfiger—the company aims to give a snapshot of how the recommerce industry has changed over the past year and what people and companies should expect to see next.

The global resale market grew 28% in 2022, according to thredUP’s report, reaching $177 billion in total. Next year, the platform predicts that it’ll make up 10% of the global apparel market, with resale outpacing the rest of the market in coming years to reach $350 billion globally by 2027.

“We’re on a promising trajectory,” James Reinhart, thredUP CEO, said in the report.

This year, it relaunched a consumer-facing tool called the Fashion Footprint Calculator alongside the report. The tool estimates the climate impact of a person’s fashion habits based on how many new pieces of clothing they buy each year, what they do with garments they no longer want, as well as how often—and how—they wash their clothes.

The calculator was initially launched in 2020, and the revamped version has some notable changes, including a tone shift that avoids shame-inducing language and instead aims to empower shoppers with practical steps to curb the climate impact of their closets.

While the report charts significant growth in branded resale and a steadily increasing consumer interest in secondhand, experts point out that resale is just one tool to address the climate impact of the fashion industry. Secondhand business models must be part of a broader shift away from overconsumption as well as overproduction that relies on virgin materials—instead, moving toward a slower, more ethical way of creating and distributing clothing.

Focusing on opportunity for change

To address the consumer behavior side of the equation, thredUP changed the tone of its Fashion Footprint Calculator, which the brand initially launched in 2020, asking consumers: “How dirty is your closet?”

Instead of emphasizing the emissions generated by a person’s current habits, the new quiz focuses more on the positive impact of each potential action, a spokesperson explained. And rather than telling the user how dirty their closet might be, the intro page acknowledges the complexities of navigating greenwashing—helping the user to understand which habits have the biggest impact.

The calculator tool draws on new Life Cycle Assessments conducted in partnership with sustainability tech platform Green Story Inc. that compares the environmental impact of buying new clothing with buying secondhand. The tone shift reflects study findings from Pew Research and others showing that shame-inducing messaging, rather than spurring action, can lead people to hopelessness and inaction.

“While value continues to be a key driver that motivates consumers to think secondhand first, global climate issues have increased awareness of resale’s potential to reduce fashion’s impact on the environment,” Reinhart said in the report. “We are still in the earliest days of inventing how resale can reduce the ongoing production excess in the apparel industry, and I don’t see a world where we’re going back to the way it used to be.”

Fashion industry watchdog and research firm Remake said it welcomed the Fashion Footprint Calculator’s relaunch, highlighting the importance of consumer education around the climate impact of fashion and the benefits of opting for secondhand over new. But there’s still work to be done, noted Katrina Caspelich, the nonprofit’s CMO.

“Over 100 billion garments are produced annually worldwide,” Caspelich said. “With the clothing industry’s annual volume growth rate at 2.7%, total resource consumption will continue to outstrip any sustainability efforts the industry makes, including secondhand shopping, unless large-scale, urgent efforts are made by the companies that profit from garment production.”

Difficulties in purchasing used

While thredUP’s growing list of partners means more options for secondhand shoppers, resale must be more than a side project for brands if it’s going to reduce the climate impact and waste created by the industry.

“Consumers have a role to play in growing the resale market, but ultimately the responsibility is on brands to build their resale systems for long-term business transformation,” Matthew Hawthorne, sustainability consultant at environmental consultancy Quantis, told Adweek. That means moving beyond pilot programs and into core sales channels, he continued.

“As long as it is more difficult to purchase used than new, educating consumers on the benefits of circularity will do little to catalyze systemic transformation of fashion impacts,” Hawthorne said.