What is the meaning of Depop acquisition by Etsy

Although vintage and second-hand have always been two pillars of the fashion industry, there seems to have been, over the last few seasons, an unprecedented interest by the big players in the industry towards everything that is the secondary market, especially after making sustainability one of the most repeated and abused buzzwords. In this sense, the news of Etsy's acquisition of Depop for $1.6 billion dollars is very meaningful, a deal that is expected to be finalized in the third quarter of the year. 

It's a huge deal, which reflects well the success and potential of the second-hand market, especially in light of the numbers recorded by Depop only in 2020, with a turnover of over $20 million and a growth of +100% every year. The interest from Etsy, a huge e-commerce platform not specialized in fashion - last year the site had a turnover of $10.3 billion in sales, of which only a tenth were fashion items - testifies to how the second-hand market represents a very attractive and potentially very profitable sector even for those who wouldn't belong to that sector. 

As reported by BoF, the negotiations for the acquisition of Depop had been going on for about two years. In addition to the objective success of the platform, there are also other characteristics that have made the London start-up very interesting for Etsy: a loyal fan base, largely made of Gen Z buyers, and above all the very structure of the e-commerce, in which the sellers themselves are in charge of the sale and shipment of the goods, thus not relying on the platform itself. 

While Etsy has yet to reveal further details about its intentions for Depop's future, it's clear that the past few months have been pivotal in the growth of the second-hand market, a sector that Kering, who recently invested in Vestiaire Collective, has also entered. Growth on a global scale marked by the listing on the stock exchange of Poshmark (a reselling platform currently only available in the US, Canada and Australia) and TheRealReal, by the introduction of the 'pre-owned' section on Farfecth and by the landing in Italy of Vinted at the beginning of the year. All clues that certify that 2021 will also be the year of the second-hand.