Wire report
‘It’s become a nepo baby sport’: how secondhand fashion got so expensive
Thanks to gen Z resellers and platforms like Depop, thrifting has lost its subcultural roots - and ballooned into a $350bn business Vintage boutique owner Janelle Best has been rummaging in thrift shop bins since the 90s. When she started, she says, there was a stigma about it. “It was either you were a freak, or you were poor – and I was a freak.” At first, she did it to source stage outfits while playing in psych-rock bands. Then, in 2005, she started “casually reselling” on eBay. Ten years later she was trading as Desert Stars Vintage at street markets, and by 2023 she had opened a showroom specializing in upmarket silk dresses in her Williamsburg apartment. Even just a few years ago, she says, she still put in the hours at places like Goodwill. The bins, she says, “were a field day. There were so many fucking bangers.” And then, thrifting became a social media craze, she says, “and t
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Thanks to gen Z resellers and platforms like Depop, thrifting has lost its subcultural roots - and ballooned into a $350bn business Vintage boutique owner Janelle Best has been rummaging in thrift shop bins since the 90s. When she started, she says, there was a stigma about it. “It was either you were a freak, or you were poor – and I was a freak.” At first, she did it to source stage outfits while playing in psych-rock bands. Then, in 2005, she started “casually reselling” on eBay. Ten years later she was trading as Desert Stars Vintage at street markets, and by 2023 she had opened a showroom specializing in upmarket silk dresses in her Williamsburg apartment. Even just a few years ago, she says, she still put in the hours at places like Goodwill. The bins, she says, “were a field day. There were so many fucking bangers.” And then, thrifting became a social media craze, she says, “and t
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What happened
According to The Guardian’s linked report, ‘It’s become a nepo baby sport’: how secondhand fashion got so expensive, Thanks to gen Z resellers and platforms like Depop, thrifting has lost its subcultural roots - and ballooned into a $350bn business Vintage boutique owner Janelle Best has been rummaging in thrift shop bins since the 90s. When she started, she says, there was a stigma about it. “It was either you were a freak, or you were poor – and I was a freak.” At first, she did it to source stage outfits while playing in psych-rock bands. Then, in 2005, she started “casually reselling” on eBay. Ten years later she was trading as Desert Stars Vintage at street markets, and by 2023 she had opened a showroom specializing in upmarket silk dresses in her Williamsburg apartment. Even just a few years ago, she says, she still put in the hours at places like Goodwill. The bins, she says, “were a field day. There were so many fucking bangers.” And then, thrifting became a social media craze, she says, “and t
Context
The development sits in VINI’s Culture coverage for readers following arts, entertainment, fashion, film, music, celebrity, and the business of culture. The original report is linked so readers can check the source account, follow later updates, and compare new coverage against the first published record. The linked report is dated 2026-07-24T08:00:08+00:00.
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Open questions include whether primary sources issue follow-up statements, whether local or market impacts become clearer, and whether additional reporting changes the timeline or adds material context.
Source
Primary source: ‘It’s become a nepo baby sport’: how secondhand fashion got so expensive via The Guardian. VINI cites and links the source; it does not reproduce the publisher’s full article text without rights clearance.
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Source links
- ‘It’s become a nepo baby sport’: how secondhand fashion got so expensiveThe Guardian - 2026-07-24T08:00:08+00:00
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