Zara UK customers offered in-house swap, mend and donate service

MADRID (Reuters) -Zara said on Friday it will launch an in-house service for British customers to sell, repair or donate second-hand clothes, moving the Spanish brand into a growing part of the market.

The platform, to be launched on Nov. 3, will be available through Zara stores, its website and a mobile app.

It is the first time Inditex, the fashion group that owns Zara, has offered a service to resell its products. The company said the initiative would contribute to the reduction of waste and the consumption of raw materials, without clarifying if it would expand the service to other markets.

The Zara Pre-Owned platform brings in-house the success of second-hand Zara clothing sales on other online platforms and among shoppers on social networks such as Instagram.

The resale space will be organised by product categories, with detailed information for each item including current images provided by the seller and original product information provided by Zara, the company said.

Zara is following other fast fashion brands such as its main competitor H&M in offering products for resale at a time when the global second-hand apparel market is growing.

The global second-hand clothing market is estimated at $71.2 billion in 2022, according to a Future Market Insights report published in September.

Future Market Insights expects the market to grow by 14.8% a year in the next decade as people embrace the environmental benefits of using second-hand clothes.

Zara already offers customers the option to donate its clothing to charities in several markets.

Zara customers in Britain will also have the option repair their garments from any season, either in-store or applying online.

Inditex has 100 stores in Britain, including 60 Zara shops.

(Reporting by Corina PonsEditing by Mark Potter and Charlie Devereux)