Dive Brief:
- Eileen Fisher hosted its first resale e-commerce ‘Earth Day Takeover’ on Monday to promote its Renew program, according to an email sent to Fashion Dive from a company spokesperson.
- The all-day event directed online shoppers “to consider purchasing a gently worn garment instead of buying new” by altering the company’s landing page to focus on its Renew program. Through Renew, customers can trade in pre-owned Eileen Fisher items that are “either resold or made into one-of-a-kind works of art using custom felted technique,” per the spokesperson.
- Renew’s backend is powered by resale software firm Trove, the spokesperson said. Canada Goose, Lululemon and REI have also used Trove’s technology, and Carhartt began a resale partnership with Trove last year.
Dive Insight:
Many fashion companies use Earth Day, celebrated every year on April 22, to promote their sustainability initiatives. Resale has become especially popular in part because it allows consumers to access aspirational labels at more affordable price points while also offering brands a more circular approach to their supply chains.
“Renew is a take-back program that embodies our commitment to building a circular design system and creating a future without waste by extending the lifecycle of the clothes we love,” Lilah Horwitz, director of Renew content and marketing at Eileen Fisher, wrote in an email to Fashion Dive. “The philosophy is simple: buy quality pieces, wear them as long as possible, and when you’re done with them, give them a chance at a new life.”
The program began in 2009, which Horwitz said was “long before the term ‘brand owned resale’ was commonplace” in the fashion industry.
“We knew at the time that the apparel industry was one of the most taxing on the environment, which is why we were designing our clothing to be worn repeatedly,” Horwitz said.
To date, the program has collected more than 2 million garments, per Horwitz.
“Asking our customers to consider shopping secondhand instead of buying new is a big, bold, and radical act for an apparel company,” Horwitz said. “It’s something we are excited to highlight this Earth Day with the homepage takeover and it is our hope that this moment will spark an increase in secondhand shopping moving forward.”
Products sold through Renew cost approximately a third of Eileen Fisher retail prices, and the initiative has two stand-alone retail locations, located in Washington and New York, per the spokesperson. In addition, the program is featured online and in select mainline retail stores, and the brand will host 30 in-store pop-up shops this week.
Eileen Fisher is a privately held company that became a certified B corporation in 2015. While the company’s spokesperson said Renew was unable to share an exact customer count, “the number of customers who shop from RENEW increases every year.”
However, in its 2022 Benefit Corporation Report, the company reported that its Seattle Renew store “saw a relatively flat year in sales” for 2022. The report added this was “a departure from the previous two years where sales increased, especially online.”
