Buy and sell on social media
Kijiji and Craigslist now face competition from the likes of Facebook and Instagram
Debby Thompson is a maker from way back when her children were toddlers and she would put them down for a nap and go to work in her basement, making wooden dolls for sale at craft shows.
Now that her children are adults, Thompson has returned to working with wood — except this time she is repurposing old furniture with paint and instead of selling her wares at craft shows, she is focusing on social media to sell her projects.
She sells her labours of love on VarageSale, a buying and selling tool that is one of the new kids on the block in the world of what used to be called classified ads, part of the burgeoning trade in second-hand goods on social media websites and apps.
She likes it better than Craigslist, where the focus on getting a deal can be disheartening.
“They always want to talk you down in price,” Thompson said.
Unlike Craigslist, which poached the classified ads business from newspapers in the 1990s, VarageSale requires members to log in using Facebook Connect, permitting access to their name and a profile photo, lifting the cloak of anonymity. Each request for membership is manually reviewed.
It’s an innovation that is proving popular with women — 80 per cent of VarageSale’s membership is female, and business has doubled in a year, according to VarageSale chief executive officer Andrew Sider.
“It’s all based on real identity and it’s really that identity, we found, that totally transforms behaviour,” Sider said.
“It creates this accountable system where people respond to messages sooner, they don’t send rude messages, they show up to appointments instead of no-showing, or when they’re not going to make it, they send you a message.”
Sider said an internal company analysis recently found VarageSale ahead of Kijiji in “buy and sell” listings in some Canadian cities.
“I think there’s some evidence that a disruption is happening,” Sider said.
Kijiji and Craigslist disrupted print classifieds and moved much of them online. Now social-media selling is disrupting Kijiji and Craigslist, according to Janet Bannister, who is in a position to know — she founded Kijiji in Canada and is now a member of the board of directors at VarageSale.
“It creates what feels like a friendlier and more social place to buy and sell,” Bannister said.
Second-hand sellers are using social media platforms such as Instagram, posting items for sale using hashtags, such as #Torontobuyandsell or #buyandsell, or #buyandsellkicks. Sellers are also using the newly launched Facebook Marketplace.
And about 450 million people globally manage and visit specialized Facebook buy-and-sell groups monthly, to trade, swap, buy and discuss Lululemon bras and hockey cards, horse tack and wheel rims.
A big attraction is the cost of selling, which is zero, as compared to eBay or Amazon.
“There are no fees. Free is good,” said Charlene Hodder, an administrator of Lululemon 911, where members buy and sell Lululemon products, quickly.
“I’ve met girls that I would call some of my best friends,” said Hodder, who lives in Fredericton.
“This community — we have chat groups, we have try-on groups, all these little-sister groups. There are hundreds of us that really do truly feel like we know each other. I’ve met probably a dozen of these girls in real life.”
Hodder doesn’t make money on the sales that take place on her Facebook page.
In response to the popularity of the buy-and-sell groups being founded on Facebook, the social media network last year launched Facebook Marketplace, where users can post items for sale and buyers can search by category or geography. The service is available in the U.S., the U.K., Australia and New Zealand and was launched in Canada in July.
“Buy-and-sell groups are great community builders for us,” according to a Facebook spokesperson.
The market for second-hand goods is expanding in other directions.
ThredUP, the largest online thrift store in the world, recently began shipping to Canada.
Launched eight years ago in San Francisco, it now does business in 26 countries, according to James Reinhart, co-founder and CEO. ThredUP pegs the apparel resale market in the U.S. at $18 billion (U.S.) a year.
“I think increasingly, customers are shopping online and I think increasingly, customers don’t want to pay full price,” Reinhart said.
Kijiji pegs the value of the secondhand market in Canada at $29 billion for all items, including apparel.
Despite the increased competition from social-media selling sites, Kijiji hit traffic records in April and May, with more than 17.3 million unique visits each month, according to Matthew McKenzien with Kijiji Canada.
“Comparatively, others are just starting out while we maintain critical mass and unparalleled inventory,” McKenzie said in an email.
Craigslist saw a slight decline in traffic between November 2016 and July 2017, down to 2.6 million visitors a month from 3 million, according to Darrick Li with comScore Canada.
That’s still well within the site’s typical range of 2.5-3.5 million unique visitors a month.
“I wouldn’t necessarily say they need to press the panic button at Craigslist,” Li said.