Patched! ‘My friends keep doing big charity shop hauls - please help’
Patched advises someone whose friends are buying way too many clothes… but from charity shops so it’s complicated.
Patched is a new members-only series where people can write to me with a fashion (or fashion-adjacent) question that's bothering them, and I will reply with a 300-400 word letter from an anti-capitalist perspective.
I have chosen the title Patched as reminder for me that at this critical time we need repair and regeneration as well as analysis. I will keep unpicking and unravelling the fashion industry but with Patched I want to make space to explore mending - solutions to both personal and structural problems, occasionally with the aid of expert witnesses.
Is there something you would like to ask? Email me DearPatched@proton.me
Patched - is it okay to massively over-shop if it's second-hand?
Dear Patched,
My friends are fashion obsessed, send help!
I have a group of friends who I go charity shop shopping with but they treat charity shops as an opportunity to get a massive “haul” of clothes, some of which they don’t necessarily want but they aren’t bothered because they can so easily resell on clothing resale apps like Vinted and Depop. They also get hauls from these apps too.
I wanted to know if you think that although second hand is best, that it’s actually fuelling the problem of consumerism? And do you think apps like Depop and Vinted will replace high street charity shops?
Thank you, Lisa in Dublin.
Dear Lisa,
Thank you for your letter. Most of the time, we don’t know why people are buying things from charity shops or who they are buying it for (and frankly it’s no-one else's business) BUT you have the interesting dilemma of knowing exactly what is going on here and it’s making you uncomfortable because it is a bit ick.
I called in an expert witness – by which I mean I went to quiz the manager of a local charity shop. She said she doesn’t mind people buying to resell so long as people pay the charity shop what they’ve asked for and do not haggle. Behind the scenes at charity shops is a never-ending mountain of clothes and getting rid of as many of them as possible while making money for the charity takes priority.
That said, this mountain of clothes is a sign of a deeply unhealthy system, and not everything done in the name of charity is a good thing. 100 billion bits of clothing are produced every year, most of them from the slash fashion system but also from expensive outlets. The ability to 'give clothes to charity' or attempt to resell them, means charity shops and the resale system absolutely contribute to the idea that ‘this is fine’:
Charity shop behaviour also requires an intersectional lens – especially regarding class. Charity shops have a social role of providing good quality clothing to people who can’t afford to buy it new. If a good coat or a once-expensive pair of jeans is merely a bargain or part of a haul rather than the difference between owning a warm coat or having nothing, then people should stop and think and not grab everything.
I don’t think resale apps will replace charity shops, not least because sites like Depop are not yet truly profitable. Where they are useful though is in reducing the stigma of second-hand clothing and preparing people for a different kind of clothing economy. Ultimately one that is based around small personal wardrobes and large community warehouses where clothes and shoes can be swapped, borrowed and mended.
Your friends sound very into clothing abundance and the social nature of fashion, I wonder if they could be convinced to channel some of this energy into organising a swap party or free shop for a charity or political cause? Then there’d be the opportunity to naturally talk about the environmental and human consequences of fashion whilst being confronted by mountains of clothes piled in a room.
In solidarity, Tansy.
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