And while eBay is the most popular place to buys such goods, garage sales and car-boot sales are popular across age groups too.
The cash-strapped young folks between 18-24 and prefer to shop online for resale/second hand items mostly for the cost and variety factors.
Older folks do second-hand shopping too, but the reasons they state are different, they like to support a charitable cause while still enjoying shopping.
Women state that they like to do it for the bargain hunting thrill, but men are a little slower to adopt second had shopping.
Younger people pick up more clothes and fashion items, while the older folks prefer to pick up Books or Furniture etc. Women are more likely to shop for Vintage clothes, Books and jewellery while men tend to pick up DVDs, Tools, Books and so on.
Some reports state that UK consumers have over £30bn worth of clothes in their wardrobes, of which 30 per cent haven’t been used for a year, and it is likely to be a similar figure across most developed and developing nations, so there definitely is a lot of stuff to be sold and bought!
Overall it looks like the second hand goods market is likely to continue growing, the mixed motivations of finding a bargain and supporting a cause (A charity or fashion with a conscience) seems to be resonating with consumers.
This fantastic infographic reveals a lot about the preferences of second-hand goods shoppers. (click on image to see the larger version)
Some research reports that are available for download (not the one by GMI) are linked below:
http://www.wrap.org.uk/content/study-consumer-second-hand-shopping-identify-re-use-behaviour-0
http://dominique-roux.e-monsite.com/medias/files/Roux-and-Guiot-RAM-English-edition-2008-23-4.pdf
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2135785
The "Resale" market: what consumers want.
