With the influx of fast fashion brands, resellers, and high inflation rates, thrift stores have had to adapt by increasing their prices.
Goodwill, Savers, and Salvation Army are a few of many widely known thrift stores across the United States. Thrift store prices have been rising at noticeable rates due to many factors. As more and more people buy from these thrift stores, it causes there to be a larger demand resulting in prices being increased.
The main contributor is the U.S. inflation rate being the highest it has been in nearly four decades. With the high inflation rates means high prices for everything. An increased amount of people are attempting to be frugal by buying secondhand products.
“I shop second hand because thrift stores provide used and reliable products for cheap,” said Cara Waldum, a senior.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there have been persistent supply and labor shortages and strong demand. The sizable demand is the cause of consumers finally gaining the confidence to go back to stores again after being at home for most of 2020. This wave of people then start regularly shopping at local thrift stores or other local boutiques. With notoriety comes popularity, and that means exceeding amounts of new customers.
Another large factor is the fact that buying from secondhand stores is trending. Popular social media apps are littered with tips and tricks about thrifting.
“I always see short videos on my feed about why I should thrift or where I should go to thrift at,” said Amanda Romain, a Goodwill shopper.
There are a multitude of videos on how to alter clothes that can be found at thrift stores. Another trend on social media is finding name brand clothing from second hand stores and reselling them at inflated prices. Sites like Depop or Mercari make it easy to sell anything which encourages the fad of resellers. All over social media people can be seen buying from thrift stores and promoting it as the less wasteful way to be fashionable.
“The purpose of a thrift store is to give clothes new life and prevent them from ending up in places like landfills,” said Tatum Ross, a senior.
According to Goodwill’s official website, thrifting is better for the environment because it causes less resource consumption, fewer things are getting thrown away, and it results in less chemical pollution. Regarding resource consumption, some natural resources are being used at a rate that’s faster than they can be produced.