Click, Ship, Waste – The Sustainability Myth on Vinted

by Jennifer Jesch

Photo by by Jennifer Jesch

Every day, thousands of young people click, pay, and buy secondhand clothes on Vinted, thinking they’re saving the planet, while endless parcels with all the plastic go around the world with clothes that are cheaper than the shipping and emissions. In this article, I will explore the tension between Vinted’s sustainable promises and the reality of the environmental impact by analyzing the platform, user behavior, and recent studies on secondhand fashion with the topics of packaging waste and consumer motivations. It is an important issue because we need to question who benefits from the secondhand hype, who takes the environmental costs, and how media and the consumer think of doing something positive for the environment through shopping. I argue that presenting Vinted as a 100% eco-friendly platform is misleading, because the hidden costs of logistics, packaging waste, CO₂ emissions and overconsumption are being ignored. While Vinted presents an image of effortless eco-friendly shopping, nobody talks about the hidden costs and the environmental damage of the secondhand platform. Vinted sales raises from 523 million euros in 2023 up to 740 million euros in 2024, these are more than 20% of Asos sales of last year (Rekvizitai.lt 2025).

Author's illustration based on data from PwC (2024), retrieved via Statista: Why people from Gen Y & Z buy secondhand

When we take a closer look why people buy so much more from Vinted, sustainability mostly plays a minor role, while the price is the main buying factor. 72% of the customers buy for the price and only 14% for the circular economy, but most of the users underestimate the ecological footprint associated with shipping and packaging (PwC 2024). A single Vinted purchase often comes wrapped in layers of packaging and delivery processes, creating CO2 emissions that are easily overlooked by consumers. Scholars argue that shopping on Vinted creates a false sense of eco-friendliness, facing the trade-offs between convenience, consumer behavior and the environmental impact (Brooks 2025).

This difference is very important, because it shows that secondhand shopping is not always sustainable but shaped by low price and impulse buys. A higher minimum price, for example 5 euros instead of 1 euro, might reduce excessive buying and guarantee that the cost of shipping is proportionate to the value of the item. By raising this critical question, we can see how Vinted could move closer to real sustainability instead of promoting shopping addiction. Through the arguments named above it is clear that Vinted as a fully eco-friendly platform is misleading, but with a few changes they could reduce overconsumption and focus on meaningful deals, promoting sales that make sense instead of ultra-cheap fast fashion items.

Consumers should be aware that secondhand shopping is not always as green as it seems. They have to check critical, if they really need the pieces or if it is another act of overconsumption and dopamine kick. Vinted could also improve their sustainability through explaining packaging, shipping and pricing practices for encouraging responsible consumption. After all, understanding these complexities is important for buyers and the company to make more informed decisions and buy more sustainable because each thoughtful purchase is a small step toward a fashion industry that truly values the planet.

Bibliography:

Brooks, A. (2025). The international second-hand clothing trade: Contributions to sustainability and the circular economy. Sustainability, 17(18), 8397. Retrieved from: https://doi.org/10.3390/su17188397

PwC. (17. Dezember, 2024). Umfrage zu den Gründen für den Kauf von Secondhand-Artikeln unter Angehörigen der Generation Y und Z in europäischen Ländern im Jahr 2024 [Graph]. In Statista. https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/1559672/umfrage/gruende-fuer-den-kauf-von-secondhand-artikeln/

Rekvizitai.lt. (29. April, 2025). Umsatz von Vinted in den Jahren 2019 bis 2024 (in Millionen Euro) [Graph]. In Statista. https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/1388721/umfrage/umsatz-von-vinted/

Bio:

Jennifer Jesch completed her BA in Fashion and Design Management at AMD – Akademie Mode & Design in Munich. She has gained experience in various areas of the fashion industry, including marketing, fashion design, campaign development, international management and many more. Currently, she works in the fashion industry at the shirt brand Eterna as textile designer and started her MA in Fashion Management at AMD. She also has an Instagram account on secondhand shopping (https://www.instagram.com/jenny.jsh/).