Selling clothes can be a profitable side hustle. But in the world of fast fashion and dozens of online marketplaces, you need the right strategy – and that starts with knowing where to sell clothes online.
Before we share the best places to sell your apparel, let’s cover a few important things you need to know and analyze whether selling clothes is still profitable today.
A Few Things to Know About Where to Sell Clothes
- Online marketplaces will charge a fee and/or take a percentage of your sales – BUT you get easy access to buyers.
- If you want to succeed, you’ll need to sell items your audience is looking for and price yourself competitively.
- Niching can help you establish a profitable business.
Is Selling Clothes Profitable?
Selling clothes can be profitable, but you need the right strategy.
- You need a way to source clothing regularly if you want to turn this into a business. Thrift stores and wholesalers can be great options.
- You need to know your audience. Niching (choosing a certain style of clothing or target age group) will make it easier to find items that are in demand and will sell quickly.
- You need to price yourself competitively. If you price yourself too high, you’ll struggle to find buyers. If you price yourself too low, you’ll struggle to turn a profit.
Of course, you also need to know where to sell clothes because your audience may be using one platform and not another.
How Much Money Can You Make Selling Clothes Online?
Like any other side hustle, the amount you earn will depend on a lot of different factors:
- Whether you’re going to resell clothes you buy from thrift stores
- If you’re only selling clothes from your closet, how many pieces you have in your “inventory”
- Where you’re selling – some platforms have more fees than others
Let’s look at a few real-world examples.
- Haley Marie shared her story with The Slow Notion on how much she made selling clothes on the top marketplaces in one year. In total, she made $2,189.05 from selling 171 items at an average of $12.80 per item.
- @Contempo Closet claims to have made $3k in 30 days from reselling clothes.
You’ll likely need to experiment with different strategies to maximize your earnings, but many people find success by:
- Cross-listing items on multiple platforms to reach more potential buyers
- Selling new items consistently
And you also need to know the best places to sell your clothes.
Related: How to get traffic from Pinterest to your online store
Where To Sell Clothes Online – 7 Best Sites
1. Etsy
If you have unique clothing items to share, like rare vintage items or really niche clothing (think cottagecore), then Etsy is the place to sell your items. If you plan to make your own clothes, print t-shirts or embroider sweatshirts to sell, then Etsy is also the best marketplace for you.
There are millions of shoppers on Etsy, so you’ll have no problem reaching people.
Just look at a few of these successful listings:
- This Boho Wildflowers top has sold 11 times in the last 24 hours of writing this and has over 100 reviews.
- Etsy seller PrivateTailor has had over 26,000 sales, with items ranging from $39-$45 a piece.
Setting up an Etsy shop is straightforward, but you’ll need to do a few things to set yourself up for success.
Check out our guide on How to Start an Etsy Shop to get your shop up and running the RIGHT way.
2. Shopify
Want to know where to sell clothes to maximize your profits? Shopify is your best bet.
The Shopify platform makes it easy to set up your own e-commerce store online. Because it’s your own site, you won’t have to pay additional fees. Price your items accordingly, and you can easily turn your side hustle into a profitable business.
But there are a few caveats here:
- You’ll need to build your audience from scratch. Because you’re not selling your items on an established marketplace, you’ll have to find your own buyers.
- You’ll need to buy a domain and hosting.
- You’ll need to focus on online marketing, social media marketing, SEO and PPC to get sales.
It’s also important to make sure that you do your due diligence first and ensure there’s a market for whatever kind of clothing you want to sell.
Getting a Shopify shop up and running can be tricky. Check out our detailed guide on How to Set Up a Shopify Store to simplify things.
3. eBay
eBay is easily the most recognizable online marketplace, and it’s one of the top places to sell clothes online.
Many of the success stories you’ll find online are people who buy clothes from thrift stores and resell them on eBay.
One of those success stories is Kat Tretina, who makes $800 a month selling used clothes on eBay. She started out with a pair of jeans she bought for $5 — and those jeans sold on the marketplace for $50.
Here’s another inspiring story:
eBay charges $0.30 to put a listing on the marketplace and 6.35% on the sale amount (up to $7,500).
4. ThredUP
Want to know where to sell clothes consignment style? Try ThredUP. It works a little differently from other options on this list.
- ThredUP sends you a “clean out” kit, which you fill up with the clothes you want to sell.
- They inspect, photograph and list your clothing.
- When it sells, you get a portion of the sale.
For premium and designer brands like J.Crew or Gucci, you get up to 80%. For mid-priced brands (Gap, Zara, Nike, etc.), you get up to 60%.
And you can choose to get paid either in cash or store credit to use on ThredUP.
ThredUP works best if you just want to make some money off of getting rid of old items in your wardrobe. You have little control over pricing and the payouts aren’t great.
BUT you don’t have to do any heavy lifting. ThredUP takes care of photographing your items, creating listings, shipping and customer service. You just collect payment.
5. Poshmark
Poshmark makes selling easy and provides prepaid shipping labels for you to make selling even easier. Upload photos, set your price and add a description to create a listing. Users flock to the marketplace because it’s known for fast sales.
Fees are:
- $2.95 for anything under $15
- 20% for anything over $15
You can make thousands of dollars a month on Poshmark if you have a good source for clothing. Fees are steep, with 20% fees on more expensive items, but you’re paying for faster sales.
The platform opened in 2011 and has 80 million users worldwide. Over 200 million listings are on the site, and international expansion has been rolling out over the last five years. You can sell to users in the U.S., Canada and Australia.
English-speaking countries are a priority for expansion, but Poshmark has also expanded into India. If you want to sell across the world, Poshmark is a good option.
6. Depop
Depop doesn’t need an introduction – it’s been around forever. The company started in 2011 and was meant to be a social network of sorts. Today, the company calls itself a “place to discover fashion.” And it has millions of users.
Etsy purchased the brand in 2021, so it’s a strong brand that is going to be around for the foreseeable future.
Sellers benefit from the massive user base and:
- Easy sign-up process
- Up to four photos per listing
- Free listing fees
Fees can add up quickly. You’ll pay a 10% commission on sales plus a processing fee. If you boost your listing, that is an additional fee. But the platform’s massive user base means that you’ll make sales faster than on other marketplaces.
We’ve seen some sellers use Depop along with Facebook Marketplace and a few others to make $2,000 – $4,000 a month. If you have a way to source clothes that people want to buy, you’ll find that Depop is a great option because they have a user base that is ready to make purchases fast.
7. Vinted
Vinted offers a little of everything: clothes, pet items, entertainment and home goods. You’ll also find an uptick in luxury goods being sold, such as Prada and Louis Vuitton items, so there’s a demand for clothing at all pricing levels.
Getting started is easy, especially if you use the app, but there is a desktop version available, too.
Sellers can rapidly create listings by:
- Uploading a picture
- Adding a price
- Writing a description
Be sure to add multiple photos and to take close-up pictures of any imperfections. Listings are 100% fee, and the platform gives you the complete sale price of the item. You don’t get stuck with lower profit margins because of hefty fees.
One thing to note is that Vinted doesn’t insure high-value items, so you can be scammed when selling. Be diligent when selling expensive items.
Cleaning out your closet and selling clothes online is invigorating. You’ll have an easier time recuperating some of the money you spend when you sell on a platform, such as Vinted, where you don’t pay listing or commission fees.
If you plan on making your selling more of a side hustle of business, the sellers with the most success will use multiple platforms at the same time.
