Secondhand gifts are going mainstream this holiday season

For most of history, holiday shopping came with an unspoken rule: Never give someone a used present. A preowned gift seemed cheap, or worse, thoughtless. But that taboo seems to be falling away. For most of its 17-year history, ThredUp, which bills itself as the world’s largest online thrift store, saw a dip in sales over the holidays, in contrast to most retailers, who wait for the glut of holiday shopping to finally turn a profit for the year. “We were the inverse of traditional retail,” says Alon Rotem, ThredUp’s chief strategy officer. Lately, though, ThredUp has noticed a shift. Its holiday sales are now growing faster than its sales during the rest of the year. Between 2023 and 2025, the number of items ThredUp sold during the holiday season grew 37%, compared with 22% for the full year. To understand the trend, ThredUp commissioned a GlobalData survey of more than 2,000 U.S. adults. It found that 62% of Americans plan to buy at least one secondhand item this holiday season. More than 70% say they’re open to giving or receiving a preowned gift. And 55% would rather unwrap a one-of-a-kind vintage or hard-to-find secondhand item in excellent condition, than a brand-new one tha…

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