Second-hand, a key step towards a new consumer society

Second-hand goods have made their way into the minds of the French. It has become a veritable social phenomenon, marking an irreversible change in our relationship with consumption. Because it reconciles economic and environmental issues that are directly relevant to our lives, with deep-seated human aspirations, second-hand is here to stay.

Firstly, because it perpetuates a very old, universal economic practice, to which technology has given an unprecedented dimension. What used to be a problem was getting people to talk to each other, the difficulty of reaching a sufficient number of potential buyers beyond one's own immediate circle. To put it another way: we sold second-hand, when the opportunity arose. Platform technology has made it possible to systematize and aggregate what were previously diffuse market flows.

Thanks to this, second-hand trade enables buyers to save money by finding the same item at a lower price, thus improving their purchasing power. The same goes for the seller: it's a way of optimizing what you "store", and freeing up what you no longer need. In economic parlance, it's a way to stop immobilizing assets. And objects that are no longer needed represent sleeping purchasing power... Here again, platform technology creates a liquid market for these objects. For private individuals, resale used to be complicated; now it's a commonplace gesture. The power to buy has been joined by the power to sell.

But the desire to "consume differently" is underpinned by other powerful factors, notably the quest for more responsible consumption. Global awareness of the ecological transition has led to a change in purchasing behavior. Everyone wants to make a contribution, however modest. Everyone understands that second-hand goods mean lower-carbon consumption, and therefore a direct impact on global warming.

A more sociological look also shows that second-hand goods are the expression of a fundamental aspiration that is part and parcel of human society. Second-hand is a form of sharing, a way of releasing products you once enjoyed but no longer need (your children have grown up, your tastes have changed...) so that others can enjoy them in turn.

Purchases "for life" have become the exception. More and more, we buy an object for its use value, at a given moment and often for a limited duration. Once the pleasure has worn off, or the need has passed, we resell it. The object has also become a service.

Last but not least, second-hand is the source of a unique pleasure: that of unearthing that rare object no longer found on the shelves... Today, people hunt more online than at the flea market. So, in addition to the rationality of the purchase, the notion of pleasure is at the very heart of the shopping experience. In fact, the growth in second-hand purchases is mainly concentrated in three "queen" categories: leisure, fashion and high-tech.

The second-hand trade therefore meets the need for rationality and economic efficiency, the ecological imperative, the need to share and the search for pleasure. It is anything but the management of resource scarcity in a sadly Malthusian world. This mode of consumption is absolutely complementary to the purchase of new products, which is also booming, and still indispensable, if only for innovation, to bring different, better-performing products to market. New is the guarantee of progress!

Far from taking an overly clear-cut stance on the subject and calling for degrowth, we can see that our best future lies in the balance between new and second-hand. Each object will live a richer life cycle, first as a new product, then passing from hand to hand, each time regaining greater use value, right through to recycling.

In this balance, a new consumer society takes shape, correcting the excesses of past decades and finally taking the measure of ecological challenges, while preserving what lies at the heart of the act of buying: pleasure.

By Fabien VERSAVAU, CEO, Rakuten France