Secondhand gifts for Christmas: Cheap or cool?

It’s a gray, rainy, December afternoon in Cologne. Unlike the streets outside, the shop windows of the Oxfam thrift store on the city’s Friesenplatz are bustling with activity. That’s because every Wednesday afternoon, they get a makeover. This week, the display is dedicated to Christmas, and is complete with golden baubles and bowls, a champagne bottle and glasses to match. Everything volunteers here sell was donated, and almost all of it is secondhand. All the profits go to Oxfam, allowing it to pursue its development goals, according to its mission statement.

“Aside from decorations, the most-bought items over the Christmas period are books and cute little things such as nice cups or toys,” said Steffi Müller, who has worked in the Friesenplatz store for 10 years now. Over that time, she has seen more and more demand for products other than clothes during the Christmas season. Her observations are confirmed by Matthias Scholl, the regional manager for Oxfam shops in western and southern Germany. “For several years now, we’ve witnessed an increased demand toward the end of the year in the 55 secondhand shops we operate across the country. In the lead-up to Christmas, sales are roughly 10% higher than the annual average.” Does this mean that more people are happy with used — and therefore sustainable — gifts?

It seems secondhand is becoming more mainstream. A 2020 study on ethical consumption, published by German e-commerce company Otto Group, found that 73% of respondents said they liked being able to buy or sell used items such as secondhand fashion or old furniture. As per trend researcher Peter Wippermann, who led the study, this shift in consumer behavior is driven by younger generations who are less interested in having new things than in getting what they want when they want it, and not having to spend much.

“New no longer has to mean brand-new,” said Wippermann, adding that the trend has spread beyond just fashion and other fast-moving goods to areas such as mobility. “Today, it’s important to be able to drive whenever you want, but not to own your own car.”

And the world of secondhand is now shedding its musty flea-market image. On large internet platforms, where people can buy and sell used goods, words such as “preloved” are starting to replace “secondhand.”

One of these secondhand fashion internet platforms is called Vinted, formerly known as Kleiderkreisel. In a recent Vinted survey run in the United Kingdom, France, Germany and the Netherlands, 56% of respondents said they would like to give or receive a mix of secondhand and new gifts for Christmas. According to Carl Tillessen, a trend analyst at German Fashion Institute, a Cologne-based company that researches fashion developments, “The secondhand market faces a serious challenge, in that each piece somehow has to find the exact person that want to buy it. But the internet makes this possible, and in a very cost-effective and hygienic way, without superfluous transport or storage,” he said.

People buying secondhand goods is a positive for sustainability, said Viola Muster, who heads the department of economic education and sustainable consumption at the Technical University of Berlin. “But that cannot then go hand-in-hand with buying more products. It’s a classic rebound effect: ‘I’ve saved money, because I bought this secondhand product cheaply, therefore I can go and spend those savings on other consumer goods.’ This doesn’t achieve anything,” she said.

This article was provided by Deutsche Welle