Calgary is king of Canada’s ‘second-hand’ economy
The goal was to merely clear out some household clutter and help a few friends do the same.
But soon after she launched a Facebook neighbourhood auction page two years ago, the concept snowballed into a relentlessly growing concern that now counts 13,000 members.
It’s only one confirmation of study results gleaned by online resale giant Kijiji that cite Calgary as Canada’s leader in the so-called second-hand economy.
“The only reason I did it is because I didn’t want to do a garage sale, which is so much trouble,” said Michelle Ferguson, administrator of the Tuscany and N.W. Bidding Wars Auction Site.
“It just blew up. It’s shocking how well it’s worked.”
According to the Kijiji study, Ferguson and friends’ efforts have helped drive Calgary’s participation in the second-hand economy well past the national average of 78 used items sold or purchased annually per person.
In Calgary, that number was 104, eclipsing even the overall average for Alberta, which counted 91 items.
That’s part of a second-hand economy in Canada worth $29 billion last year, up $1 billion from the previous year, or 1.4 per cent of Canada’s GDP, said Dr. Marie Connolly, an economics professor at the University of Quebec at Montreal.
“That’s slightly larger than earnings from agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting combined, and almost as large as the GDP of Newfoundland and Labrador,” she said.
It’s believed 82 per cent of Canadians are involved in some way in that second-hand economy, said Connolly.
The most-exchanged items are adult shoes and clothing, followed by books and DVDs, then baby clothing.
Games, particularly video games, came in fourth, with leisure items and crafts fifth in popularity, says the study.
The Internet and social media have vastly increased the outreach potential for such marketing while lowering the cost, said the professor.
“Young millennials in the 18- to 24-year range are much more likely to see the second-hand economy as a way to make an extra buck,” said Connolly.
“Calgary has high numbers in all these measures.”
The city’s status as the king of used merchandise can be traced to its traditionally strong economy that had residents purchasing lots of stuff in the good times, said Connolly.
Now that the economy’s soured, Calgarians feel the need or urge to make some extra dollars by unloading some of those things, or purchasing them on the cheap, she added.
“Income drives that spending across the board,” said Connolly.
Ferguson agrees, saying she has seen the effect of the struggling economy on the relentless auctioneering.
“Families are messaging me that they can pay their rent, they can pay their gas bills with this,” she said.
“There are a lot of people struggling out there.”
Even so, in many quarters in Calgary, “there’s a lot of money here; overspending is not a rarity in Calgary,” said Ferguson.
She got the bug for such auctioneering by purchasing an almost-brand-new PVR for a mere $15, something that’d normally fetch $350.
The vast majority of its users are women, something Ferguson insists is no coincidence.
“They’re the main shoppers for the kids and households, and they know prices,” said the Tuscany resident.
Recently, a quick glance at the Facebook site — of a kind that’s sprung up all over the city — offered goods ranging from bar stools, olive wood carvings, bed sheets, pillows, clothing and a walkie-talkie set.
A pair of tickets to a recent Flames-L.A. Kings game were posted with a base bid of $40 for the two.
Bidders post their offers on the page and arrange an exchange that often involves bins outside the sellers’ homes.
Those bins are hidden from view, but the system still relies on an honour system that’s worked exceedingly well, said Ferguson.
“In two years, we’ve only had two problems with the bins, and one of them was neighbourhood kids getting into them,” she said.
Connolly said whether those exchanges are through flea markets, garage sales, online purchases and social media offerings, the average second-hand savings for Canadians was $843 and earnings were $1,037.
Edmonton finished second to Calgary in the second-hand sales, but came in first in generosity in 2016. “Edmonton was tops in donations, in giving things away, which could be related to the Fort McMurray fires,” said Connolly.
“But in the year previous to that, it was also high.”