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In the last year, eBay has leaned more heavily into luxury resale. That’s included introducing new features and categories like authentication for watches, jewelry, handbags and sneakers, as well as launching new tools for sellers to manage listings for high-value products.
Tirath Kamdar, gm of global luxury at eBay, has been at the forefront of that change. Under his leadership, the platform’s luxury sales have grown by double digits in the last two years. The Authenticity Guarantee launched in 2020 was a first step, but the most impactful change has been the recent launch of a consignment model, Kamdar said.
“Consignment is what we’re really proud of,” Kamdar said. “When you get to a higher price point, the seller doesn’t want to do all the work of selling on their own. They want a white-glove service where we can take the high-value stuff from their closet and we’ll sell it for them.”
Under the consignment model, eBay does the work of photographing the item, pricing it and writing up the listing, and the customer gets paid when it sells. The model is a direct challenge to other luxury resale platforms like The RealReal which operate solely on a consignment basis.
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To bolster its luxury offerings, eBay has also made several acquisitions. For example, it bought the AI authentication company Certilogo in July.
The next big frontier in eBay’s luxury ambitions, Kamdar said, is working directly with brands. In April, the company launched a Certified by Brand program, in which companies like Zodiac Watches and Le Vian supply certified products directly to eBay and share the revenue. EBay currently has agreements with 40 luxury brands through this program with plans to sign more through next year.
“We’ve seen so many brands getting into resale this year,” Kamdar said, estimating that three to four times more brands are working directly with resale companies than in previous years. “I’m very proud of that project, and that’s going to be a major accelerator of our luxury strategy.”
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