I (finally) cleaned my closet and this was my experience

Disclaimer: I work for Carousell and am the head of the Hong Kong office. The views and opinions represent my own and are of my personal experience as a very happy casual seller on our marketplace this past week. I do not use a staff account and do not have an unfair advantage over anyone else in our community of sellers. This post was entirely voluntary, written by me, and was not asked of me by anyone at the company to be posted.

This past weekend, I decided to clean my closet, a task that I have been putting off for at least a year. The fact is that I had gained some weight over the past year and had clothes that no longer fit me that had been sitting there unused for apparent reasons. Rather than throwing them away and having them in landfills, I decided that I should give them a second life to someone else who wanted them and do my part to contribute to a more sustainable future. With that, I listed them for sale on....yes, you guessed it, on Carousell Group 's marketplace in Hong Kong.

Since I had never sold clothes on the app before, I was not sure how the responses would be or how much I could fetch for them. To my surprise, I sold almost all of them in under four days. I felt good that I could fetch some money for them, but more importantly, I wanted to do my part for sustainability and genuinely wanted them to go to someone else who could make good use of them.

Here's my cleaned-up and tidy closet that I am very happy about, and below is a tally of the number of clothes that found new owners.

• T-Shirts & Polo T's: 37
• Shorts & Pants: 12
• GMV (Value of Goods Sold): HK$3,210 (US$411)

Although I have previously bought and sold on Carousell, this would be the first time I had sold clothes in relatively high volume within a short period. Below are my observations and best practices, and safety tips for everyone's benefit.

Observations:

• Digital Payment was the most commonly used and accounted for about 80% of my transactions using HSBC's PayMe, the rest was in cash.
• Dealing: Meet up at MTR station was the most common request followed by courier service via quick logistics service.
• Lululemon Men's products are extremely popular. All the lululemon items were sold out within 12 hours of listing, followed by Nike, Abercrombie, and then Maison Kitsune within ~72 hours of listing.
• Round neck collar T-shirts were more popular than Polo Ts. Shorts/Pants moved relatively slower, but I did manage to sell several of them.
• Buyers were all of the high intent to buy, very genuine, extremely polite and courteous, and extremely punctual. They would even message me ahead to let me know they were on their way to the meet-up location. No one arrived late, some even early and waited, and none ghosted me. Some even made small chats and asked why I was selling so many clothes at once. I told them the truth. I was getting fat :-) Excellent buyer and community and of high quality indeed. I love that we have such a great community.

Best practices leading to seller success

• Take proper photos: be sure you have the front and back of the items, and the entire product is shown with photos of the labels/logos where possible.
• Write clear listing descriptions with Brand, Size, and Color in the title and description. Also, mark the condition of the items clearly as Used/New/Well Used, Heavily Used so that you are not misleading the buyers. Provide information such as a Size Chart/Fit Guide from the manufacturer's official website for ease of reference for the buyer. I simply posted links from websites in each listing description so that buyers could refer to them quickly.
• Price them appropriately: this one was tricky for me; I was not sure how I should be pricing used T-shirts and Shorts since I had never sold them before. So I used Carousell's price checker function. This was very useful and gave me suggestions on what the marketplace average prices were for Hong Kong. For items that I didn't price check, once I listed the item, it intuitively also let me know if some of the items were overpriced and that they may take longer to sell. The price suggestion function would suggest prices to me and let me provide a quick and easy option to change them if I wanted to. I loved this feature, and using it led to my success as a seller creating the Magic Moment.

• Be courteous and responsive: Please don't ghost or ignore potential buyers who enquire, and do respond as soon as practical. Be courteous if asked for a discount, and feel free to decline a lowballed offer politely. In a few instances, I declined to give a discount, but I explained that the price was very reasonable and once again pointed the buyer to our price checker function to indicate that it was within the market range of pricing. They ended up agreeing to the original price, and we successfully transacted. Happy Buyer, Happy Seller!
• Mark Items as Sold: Once the transaction has been completed and is no longer available, remember to mark them as sold. I found this useful, so I was not continuously fielding chats from interested parties. This was also very helpful in letting buyers know that the item was no longer available hence setting the right expectations.
• Ask for a Review: Ask the buyer for a review and rating once you have transacted. This helps build your credibility and trustworthiness for your future transactions and builds up your credit score in the community.

Safety Tips:

• Chat in-App Only: I did all my negotiations, chats, and transactions within the app and did not see a need to use another messaging platform. Do avoid chatting off the Carousell platform. It is best to stay within the app environment for safety reasons.
• Dealing: If you are meeting up, do it in a public location. In HK, MTR stations tend to be the most popular. However, be wary not to be in the way of MTR's daily operations and not to obstruct traffic, especially during peak hours. If you are doing courier delivery, let the buyer know when it is couriered off and snap a picture of the receipt, so they know to expect it to come their way.
• Payment: Payment apps are the safest and most convenient (FPS, Alipay, PayMe, WeChat). In my transactions, PayMe was used most frequently.
• Check Buyer's Ratings and Reviews: Doing some simple due diligence on buyers using the Reviews function always helps, and it's simple enough to see what others have said.
• More safety tips from Carousell or visit the newly launched Trust and Safety Center

I hope you have found this insightful and helps in your journey to declutter and be part of a greener future. Happy Carouselling at www.carousell.com