How to start an online thrift store

When you decide to start a new business, you must be passionate, driven, and confident enough about it. This is important for any type of business, even if it’s a thrift store, so you can make the most out of it and achieve excellent results.

Speaking of online thrift stores or second-hand shops, you need to be aware that this is a pretty competitive niche. Still, there is room for new entrepreneurs who are willing to research, innovate, and provide value.

So, let’s go through my step-by-step guide on how to start an online thrift store and learn everything you need to know about it.

1. Find your niche

If you’ve ever been to a thrift store, you know how messy and crowded they can get. You probably want your thrift store to be different. While a significant step toward better organization is opening an online second-hand shop, you first need to find your niche.

Before you finalize your idea, it’s crucial to conduct an analysis of your competitors, check out the latest thrift shop trends, and have clear business objectives.

One option is to go for a broader market if you want to achieve a more significant reach. However, you need to keep in mind that while a broad thrift store, like fashion, gives you access to a wider target audience, it comes with more intense competition and requires you to put significant effort and resources into establishing good market positioning.

On the other hand, micro-niche thrift shops, like vintage fashion, sustainable clothing, or luxury second-hand goods, target specific market segments and enable you to position your business better due to specializing in a particular field.

2. Develop a business plan

Your online thrift store also needs a well-crafted business plan. This can act as your guideline, as it will depict your online thrift store vision. More precisely, it shows your end goals and how to achieve them, helping you grow by implementing the right strategies.

To develop the best business plan, you need to cover key elements such as budgeting, sourcing, fulfillment strategies, marketing, and overall business goals. We will discuss these in the following paragraphs.

Inspiration can strike anytime – even on vacation, not just at your desk. So, keep a notebook or a digital file handy to write down ideas as they come. Whether it’s a creative marketing angle or a unique sourcing strategy, capturing those spontaneous thoughts can give your business plan a valuable edge.

3. Choose your business model

Your business model determines how you’ll organize everything. Therefore, you can consider going for the traditional resale model, dropshipping, or wholesale.

The traditional resale model is the most common one for thrift stores. It provides you with high control over the overall selling process, and you’ll earn higher profit margins. However, your costs increase as you need to get the inventory, set up the distribution, and maintain the storage.

If you decide to implement dropshipping, you’ll have low startup costs. This is because you’re just acting as the middleman between customers and the supplier who owns the products. You just need to develop an online store and list the products that are selling.

However, this model has its cons, such as lower profit margins, dependence on suppliers, and less control over quality and shipping.

Ultimately, wholesaling refers to bulk sales, meaning you may be the supplier for more retail thrift stores. While this model comes with a potential for high-volume sales, it requires a large capital investment, managing bulk inventory, and finding reliable retailers.

4. Build your brand

Branding is much more than just your logo, although this is a significant element of the process. In fact, you can think of branding as storytelling that lets you create a unique message in the minds of your consumers. Therefore, you need to have a strong, unique selling point (USP) that will align with the needs of your target audience.

Once you establish your brand identity, you need to think of branding essentials, like logo, colors, and messaging. More precisely, they need to align with your brand’s core message. Thus, once your customers see your logo, they will immediately think of your thrift store.

One great real-life example of a successful online thrift store is ThredUp. The company positioned itself as a convenient second-hand store that promotes sustainability. Also, it’s focusing on accessibility, providing more than 50,000 new arrivals daily.

5. Make the business legitimate

Registering your business is crucial. You need to pick the proper business structure for your needs, make sure you have all the necessary business licenses, and comply with tax laws. Each of these documents is crucial for protecting you and your business. Also, it makes you credible in the eyes of your target customers.

However, you need to be aware that each country has its own laws. That’s why you need to research the legal requirements on your country's official tax office website.

6. Find a supplier

Finding a supplier or sourcing your products is one of the most difficult parts of starting your online thrift store. You need to ensure reliability and product quality. Therefore, I suggest not to invest too much in your stock at the beginning. Instead, start with a smaller collection so you can test the quality of the supplier.

You should always consider checking the general condition of the products, browsing and comparing online prices, and checking labels (if you’re selling vintage items). Ultimately, if you want to find local suppliers, I’d suggest visiting other thrift stores that implement wholesaling, yard sales, eBay, or flea markets.

7. Find a place to store your products

After having your inventory, you need a place to store the products. In the start, you can use an extra space in your home, for example, such as an empty room, your basement, or a garage. However, once your thrift store starts growing, you need to find a larger space.

That’s why you should consider renting warehouse space, or you can even start working with third-party fulfillment services. However, you should also implement a proper organizing practice for your inventory.

One of my recommendations is to organize it as it’s classified on your website. For example, if you’re reselling women's clothes, then you might want to categorize the inventory into dresses, blouses, jeans, and skirts. This will allow you to easily find all of your items.

8. Set up your online store

Once you’ve handled the aspects I discussed above, you should start setting up your online store. There are many website builders that will help you launch your online store, such as Wix. This platform has everything you need, from custom domains to hosting and marketing tools, as well as design flexibility and payment processing options.

Due to its eCommerce features and its intuitive user interface, you can create a professional-looking online thrift store without any coding experience. Let’s take a look at the process of creating a website with Wix.

The first thing you need to do is to create products and product options. You need to add all of the products you offer, but also the different options, such as size or colors, so your customers can find the one that suits them the best. Even if your product comes in a different material, you can easily add that with the right website builder.

For example, imagine you’re selling vintage glasses. With Wix, you can add all of your products easily. Also, you can write all of the product information you like, such as the name of the product, whether it’s a new arrival, and add a short description about it.

You can also change the status of your inventory and the price, manage the category, or edit any other aspect you like with ease.

The next thing you need to do is create categories. This is crucial for the easy navigation of your customers, so they can easily find what they’re looking for without just browsing through a cluttered page of products.

What’s even better is that Wix lets you create a category and then, with the help of AI, make it responsive on different devices, such as desktops and smart phones.

Of course, once you’re done creating your inventory, you need to focus on the cashout aspects. Therefore, you must add a shopping cart, preferably a one-click cashout, and various payment methods.

In the meantime, you shouldn’t forget about promoting your products. This is where website builders designed for small business growth come in handy. Wix, for example, helps you choose from a few marketing templates that will help you raise your brand awareness. You can create ad campaigns, email marketing, or publish on social media.

Speaking of marketing activities, you also shouldn’t forget about SEO practices. This ensures you have a consistent and high-quality online thrift store that will rank high on search engines. Luckily, with Wix SEO, you can easily achieve this and not waste money on purchasing various SEO plugins.

Ultimately, website builders help you customize your online thrift store. So, if you want to add more life to your site, you can even create catchy videos and upload them on your homepage.

9. Set the right price for your products

Pricing thrift store items can be a bit tricky. You’re selling for less than the original price, but you still need to make some profit. Therefore, you need to consider all of the factors you’re exposed to, such as store rent, point-of-sale subscriptions, and marketing costs in your retail pricing strategy. As a result, you’ll be able to cover your eCommerce expenses and still make a profit.

But before you select your go-to pricing strategy, you need to consider two crucial things. These include calculating profit margins and setting competitive prices.

Calculating the profit margin is pretty simple. You just need to divide the amount of profit by the revenue and multiply by 100. Of course, part of the revenue is all of your raw costs, such as packaging, shipping, transaction or sales costs, and all fixed business costs (storage rent, website hosting, IT work, employees, and insurance).

Competitive pricing refers to setting your thrift store prices according to those of your competitors. That’s why you need to conduct an in-depth analysis of your competitors, explore their prices, and then set your own.

For example, if you have a broader niche, you might need to set a bit lower prices than your competitors so you can attract customers. However, if your niche is narrower, such as vintage items, then you have a bit more space to set higher prices.

Another pricing strategy you can use is the cost-plus pricing. This means that you should set the selling price of your thrift store items based on your costs plus a markup. For instance, if the sweater costs $15.00, and the markup is 50%, you should sell it for $22.50.

Ultimately, you can use psychological pricing. Basically, pricing an item at $19.99 instead of $20.00 plays a huge role in the minds of the customers when they’re making a purchasing decision. It often turns browsing into buying.

10. Market your store

To succeed with an online thrift store, simply having a website might not be enough. In other words, you’ll need to implement some digital marketing strategies to attract traffic and convert your visitors into paying customers.

One option is to use SEO. As I already briefly mentioned, SEO is all about improving your online store to increase its visibility and rank it higher on search engines. Thus, when people search for products related to your business, your website will appear higher in SERPs.

A similar, yet not organic, way to boost your website ranking is Google Ads. You pay a particular fee, and Google shows your site higher up.

Other marketing channels you can use are social media, like Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. People nowadays always scroll on their social media, so creating content about your business will attract customers.

Leveraging influencer marketing is also very effective. People tend to trust famous people, so collaborating with an influencer that’s interesting for your target audience might also bring you sales.

Last but not least, email marketing is not dead. Therefore, you need to craft powerful email campaigns for your target audience, with promotion of new arrivals, discounts, or even unique offers to your loyal consumers.

11. Prioritize customer service

In order to grow and expand your customer base, you need to build trust and improve your brand reputation. One approach that’s very helpful is prioritizing customer service. If you’re responsive and your customers feel like you’re willing to help, they’ll perceive you as a reputable brand.

Some of the best practices for handling inquiries, returns, and complaints are implementing a 24/7 live chat, email support, and ticketing system by filling out a form. You can also add a blog section, FAQ section, and a knowledge base.

However, if you’re wondering how to create a seamless customer experience to encourage repeat buyers, check out my tips below:

1. Keep it simple with quick and useful responses
2. Solve issues fast
3. Offer easy returns and exchanges
4. Stay accessible

Final thoughts

The thrift store niche is a very competitive field, and success takes time. Don’t be discouraged if you don’t see results as soon as you start. Remember that nobody makes millions overnight.

However, if you apply the steps I discussed in my guide and avoid copying content or using stock images, then you too can build a strong online thrift store. Consistency and adapting to market changes is the key to success.