Many spent free time during quarantine cleaning and organizing at home. Now a great way to responsibly part with all those perfectly good items you only wore once or twice is available at Eden Fashion Boutique.
The Bowling Green boutique, known for stylish, often vintage-inspired pieces, recently added something new with a resale option. Now, along with the new apparel and accessories, customers will also have the option of buying gently used pieces. It’s also an opportunity to exchange what’s in your closet for store credit, at 25%, or your item’s sale price.
Clean & sustainable
There are two reasons for the addition of resale to Eden’s business model, driven by customer interest over recent years— sustainability and minimalism.
“In talking with a lot of our customers, we recognize that when people buy something new, they want to take something out of their closet at the same time,” says store owner Kati Thompson. “It’s in keeping with minimalistic principles. We thought, ‘Why can’t we be the place that they take their closet clean-out (items), and also the place where they buy new items?’”
Concerns about not wanting to over-consume or contribute to retail waste are also a driving factor in current shopping habits, so a business model like this offers alternatives for people who prefer not to buy everything new. “For people that appreciate sustainability, we want to be their one-stop-shop where they can pass along some of those things that they’re done with and also purchase some new things that they love,” adds Thompson.
The store’s closure during quarantine provided time to make this change happen. Eden initiated pickup of clothes neatly bagged and placed on porches, with the promise of a gift card that would be waiting for that customer once the store reopened. Now that Eden is open for business, they are still doing local BG pickups, but customers can now also bring their items in the store.
What to expect
Eden accepts for resale from names like Anthropologie, Lululemon, and other higher-end brands. As Thompson puts it, she’d like the resale pieces to have an affordable price point, but with an aesthetic which is indistinguishable from their new pieces.
“People don’t actually know by just looking that they’re moving from the regular part of our shop into the resale shop,” says Thompson. “We’re choosing unique, beautiful pieces just like we always have for our regular retail store.”
Eden Fashion Boutique, 186 S. Main St., Bowling Green. 10am-6pm. Monday-Friday. 10am-5pm, Sunday. 419-601-8611. edenfashionboutiqe.com.