Bloomingdale’s is making a major push into the luxury resale market with a new initiative.
The department store is teaming up with Rebag on a multifaceted partnership that brings roughly 2,500 luxury designer accessories to several Bloomingdale’s stores across the country and to the retailer’s website.
“The idea was to create something really premium,” said Rebag chief executive officer Charles Gorra. “At Rebag, we carry about 100-plus brands. We focus mostly on handbags, watches, jewelry and small accessories and, essentially, we partnered with [Bloomingdales’] merchandising team and we’re only curating at Bloomingdale’s the very high-end of our range.”
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The partnership brings secondhand luxury handbags, jewelry and watches to Bloomingdale’s, including brands the retailer doesn’t already offer in specific accessories categories such as Van Cleef & Arpels, Hermès, Goyard, Rolex, Cartier and others.
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“We really want to respond to what the customer is looking for, and we know that there is demand out there for authentic, yet really curated, pre-owned merchandise,” said Jennifer Jones, senior vice president and general merchandising manager of women’s accessories at Bloomingdale’s. “So certainly that’s an important goal, but really driving this luxury fashion — particularly in fine jewelry — is very important to us.”
There are three parts to Bloomingdale’s partnership with Rebag. The first is a 300-square-foot in-store kiosk where Rebag will showcase select secondhand luxury accessories for purchase. The resale platform is also bringing its buyback program in-store, where shoppers can sell their used luxury accessories. More items will also be available through Bloomingdale’s website.
It was important for Bloomingdale’s to have this in-store component for the partnership as the retailer has seen a growing interest among customers in the resale market.
“We really view our customers and how they shop with us,” Jones said. “They’re omni customers. They like to shop in-store, they like to shop online and we want to be able to meet the customer demand where they are looking. We have a broad base of customers who like to shop in different ways, but we find our most powerful customer is a customer that shops through all channels. That’s really where we see the unlock — giving our customer access in all places that they wish to shop with us.”
Rebag’s in-store experience will be offered at Bloomingdale’s locations at The Mall at Short Hills in White Plains, N.Y.; Town Center in Boca Raton, Fla.; Westfield Fashion Square in Sherman Oaks, Calif., and Fashion Valley Mall in San Diego.
This is Bloomingdale’s latest venture in the resale category, and the first to go into stores. The retailer also has a partnership with resale platform MyGemma offered on the Bloomingdale’s website.
“To create the first circular experience between firsthand and secondhand — that’s our goal and it’s Bloomingdale’s goal,” Gorra said. “Bloomingdale’s is also very interested in curating other brands that we can bring. They’re interested in elevating that experience and interested in positioning our sales in front of the Bloomingdale’s customers who are obviously luxury shoppers and used to this environment and show them a new type of offering.”