What to resell on Vinted: the best categories for UK sellers

What should you resell on Vinted? No list answers that for everyone. A category only pays if you can buy it cheaply near where you live, recognise it without getting it wrong, and sell it to someone who is looking for it. All three depend on you as much as on the market.

So this article gives no margin percentages and no selling times: nobody can guarantee them, and a figure without a source would not help you decide. It offers a way of judging a category, then goes through the families of items that suit reselling in Britain, with the brands you actually meet on a charity shop rail, what to check before you buy and when demand picks up.

It ends with the categories better left alone when you are starting out, and with a method for testing one on a small batch before you put real money into it.

Four questions to judge a category

• Do people search for it by name? An item sells when someone types its brand or its type into the search bar. “Barbour wax jacket” is searched for, “pretty floral top” is not
• Can I buy it cheaply, and regularly? A category with no source within reach is not a category, it is a stroke of luck
• Does it leave a gain in pounds, not just a good ratio? An item bought for 50p and sold for £1.50 has tripled without paying for the time spent on it
• Can I judge its condition and authenticity myself? If the answer takes an expert, the category is not one to start with

For the third question, the first filter is the rule of three explained in our guide to getting started with Vinted reselling: the realistic resale price should be at least three times what you pay. For the first, go back over your titles with our guide to the keywords that attract buyers, because a good category under a vague title stays invisible.

The calendar sits on top of that grid. Some families sell all year, others for a few weeks. That does not change when to list, which is always straight away, only when to relist.

The families of items that suit reselling in the UK

Branded children’s clothes

This is the most approachable family. A child’s garment is given up because it has become too small, not because it is worn out, and parents happily buy second-hand what will only be worn for a season. The labels that hold their value are the ones that cost real money new: JoJo Maman Bébé, Frugi, Boden, Joules, Polarn O. Pyret. Next and M&S hold up when the item is as good as new, ideally in a bundle.

• Where to find them: nearly new sales, school fairs, car boot sales in family areas, bundles from private sellers
• What to check: knees, collars, cuffs, elastic, stains on vests and sleepsuits, poppers that still close
• In the listing: the age or the months exactly as printed on the label, and bundles of a single size for the small pieces
• When to relist: at each change of season and ahead of the new school year. Our guide to what sells on Vinted in October and November follows one of those changes week by week, half-term included

Footwear: trainers, boots and leather

Adidas Samba and Gazelle, Nike Air Force 1, New Balance, Converse and Vans on the trainer side. Dr. Martens, Clarks Originals, Birkenstock and Hunter wellies on the other. A shoe keeps its value for as long as the sole is not worn down, and the sole is the first thing a buyer will go looking at.

• Clean them, then photograph the sole, the heel and the inside, not just the side view
• Give the UK size from the label, add the EU size if it is printed, and say whether the style comes up small or large
• Favour the middle of the range, roughly UK 4 to 7 in women’s styles and UK 8 to 10 in men’s: those are the sizes most people wear

The British high street, one notch up

Boden, Seasalt, White Stuff, Fat Face, Joules, Toast, Whistles, Hobbs, Jigsaw, Reiss. These labels have loyal customers who search by brand and sometimes by the name of a print or a style: put it in the title when it appears on the label. They turn up in charity shops in comfortable towns, and in bundles from private sellers.

The weak point of this family is the buying price. A charity shop that prices by brand knows what these labels are worth, and three times the ticket becomes hard to reach. Do the sums before you pay, photograph the composition label (linen, wool and viscose are not worth the same) and mention any bobbling, which is common on fine knits. Write the UK dress size as the label gives it.

Outdoor and country

Barbour wax jackets, Berghaus and Rab shells, Patagonia and The North Face fleeces, Musto sailing kit, proper leather walking boots. These things are expensive new and last for years, so they reach the second-hand market in good condition. Ranges sold new at low prices, on the other hand, leave too small a gap to be worth reselling one at a time.

Here the buyer is paying for features as much as for a label. Write what the tag says: the membrane, whether the hood detaches, the lining, the fill of a down jacket. Say honestly whether the fabric still sheds water, and for a waxed jacket whether it needs rewaxing. A pair of ski trousers found in May goes online in May, then gets relisted in autumn when families start planning the winter.

Vintage and heritage

Levi’s 501s, leather jackets, nineties tracksuit tops from Adidas, Umbro or Kappa, Fred Perry and Ben Sherman, older Laura Ashley dresses. And a very British corner of the market: tweed jackets, where a Harris Tweed label with its orb mark is something buyers look for by name.

This is the family where knowledge counts most. You need to be able to date an item so as not to pay a vintage price for a reissue. The label is your first tool: a logo the brand no longer uses, a “Made in England” or “Made in USA” line, a period zip are the clues a vintage buyer looks at. Photograph them, and always give the measurements taken flat, because old sizes do not match current ones.

Football shirts and branded sportswear

Track tops, logo sweatshirts, leggings and sports bras from specialist gym brands, and above all football shirts. For a shirt, the club, the season and the name on the back matter as much as the condition: a buyer searches for a club and a year, so write both. On everything else, check for cracked logos, tired elastane and bobbling on the inner thigh, which knocks pounds off a pair of leggings.

Coats, tailoring and occasion wear

Wool coats, trench coats, blazers and suits are bulky, so they are often given away: charity shops have plenty of them at modest prices. The same goes for the dress worn once to a wedding. The composition label sets the price (pure wool, cashmere, linen) and the flat measurements make the sale: shoulders, back length, sleeve. Name the occasion in the title, since “wedding guest dress” is what buyers type, and bear in mind that a coat makes a large parcel, which the buyer adds to the price shown.

Value ranges: plenty of volume, little margin

Primark, George, F&F, Tu, and a good share of what Zara and H&M sell: these fill the car boot tables and the private bundles. They do find buyers, but at prices that rarely leave more than a pound or two once packaging and the trip are counted. They have their place as a sideline: whatever arrives in a bundle anyway can leave as a bundle, grouped by size. Building a whole activity on them means packing a great deal to earn very little. Our method to calculate your Vinted resale margin shows why the gain per item matters more than the number of sales.

Categories to leave alone when you start

• Luxury (handbags, fine leather goods): you need to authenticate, tie up serious money and carry the risk of a dispute
• Limited-edition trainers: copies are plentiful and hard to spot without experience
• Worn underwear and swimwear: many buyers avoid them for hygiene reasons. New with tags is a different matter
• Clothes sold new for next to nothing: the gap between new and second-hand is too thin to leave a margin
• Damaged “project” pieces: they are only worth it if you really know how to mend them

Test a category with a small batch

No list replaces a trial. Your area, your eye and your photos are part of the result. The test takes four steps:

• Buy five to ten items from the same family, from a single source, noting what each one cost
• List the whole batch at once, with the same care for every listing
• For each item, record views, favourites and messages, then the date and the price it sold for
• After a few weeks, compare what went at the price you planned, what was haggled down and what interested nobody

There are three ways to read it. If everything goes very quickly, you were probably too low: raise your prices on the next batch. If views pile up with no favourites and no messages, the price is probably what is putting buyers off. If nobody sees your listings at all, look at the title and the cover photo before blaming the category.

For the test to measure the category rather than your photography, take care over the first image. If it is not up to scratch, Pikmatic’s photo enhancement (three free, then sold in packs) reworks it: the room behind the item disappears, the light is evened out and the item is set upright in the middle of the frame. Compare the two versions, make sure the label has not changed, and hold on to the original if you would rather.

Out of season: list now, relist later

A wool coat found in April, a new swimsuit in November: out-of-season buys are the cheapest, because nobody wants them that day. That is no reason to put them away. A live listing can cross paths with the buyer packing for a trip or planning ahead, while an item in a box crosses paths with no one. List when you buy, then relist when the season comes round. For the day and the hour of that relist, see our article on the best time to post on Vinted.

That leaves finding the stock: our guide to sourcing items for Vinted resale compares the sources one by one. And once two or three categories are running side by side, the limit is no longer what you pick, it is how organised you are: see how to go about running a Vinted shop with a lot of items.

Frequently asked questions