hero image China’s cash-strapped shoppers drawn to second-hand luxury items
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The ZZER store is a bricks-and-mortar incarnation of a thriving online second-hand market for luxury goods, at a time when the wider industry has come under mounting pressure in what was once a booming market.
Luxury groups including Cartier owner Richemont, Gucci parent Kering and LVMH reported third-quarter sales drops in the Asia-Pacific region outside Japan, which is dominated by China. Richemont’s chief Nicolas Bos has said that the Chinese consumer slowdown “is probably a mid- to long-term phenomenon”, while Kering warned profits would halve this year.
While concerns over demand for new luxury products in China are growing amid heightened fears over the economy, there are signs of a strong appetite for second-hand goods. In September, luxury resale platform Hongbulin was acquired by Zhuanzhuan Group, an online marketplace for used goods.
The wider market surpassed Rmb1 trillion (US$138 billion) in 2020, compared with just Rmb300 billion in 2015, according to a report from consulting firm Frost & Sullivan and Tsinghua University.
Although there is a lack of recent data on the second-hand luxury market, there has been a rise in users of online platforms such as ZZER and Xianyu that provide a venue for users to resell luxury goods for a commission.
