Kering is considering a direct move into the secondhand luxury market as the group looks for new ways to reconnect with customers and gain greater control over the resale of products from its brands.
The potential initiative could cover labels including Gucci, Balenciaga, and Saint Laurent. No launch has been confirmed, and the proposal remains under consideration.
A direct resale operation would allow Kering to manage authentication, product presentation, pricing, customer service, and data rather than leaving those relationships entirely to independent platforms and specialist secondhand retailers.
The proposal comes during a difficult period for the group. Kering reported first-half revenue of €7.22bn, down 3%, while Gucci generated €2.76bn, a reported decline of 9%. Sales through Gucci’s directly operated retail network fell by 6% on a comparable basis.
Net debt has been reduced substantially, from €8bn at the end of 2025 to €3.3bn, increasing the group’s capacity to pursue strategic change. Its immediate challenge remains restoring momentum at Gucci while protecting the positioning of its wider brand portfolio.
Luxury resale is no longer a peripheral market for collectors and bargain seekers. Digital platforms have made pre-owned products easier to authenticate, compare, and trade, while younger customers are often more willing to purchase items with a previous owner.
That growth creates both an opportunity and a loss of control for luxury groups. A product can change hands several times after its original sale, generating value and customer engagement without producing further revenue or data for the brand that made it.
A direct channel could alter that relationship by giving Kering visibility over resale customers who may not yet buy new products. It would also create a lower-cost entry point into brands where repeated price increases have placed many items beyond the reach of aspirational consumers.
Some of those customers may later purchase new accessories, beauty products, services, or future collections. Resale could therefore function as a customer acquisition channel rather than merely a separate source of transactional revenue.
Authentication provides another commercial rationale. Counterfeit products weaken trust and can expose buyers to significant losses, while a brand-backed service can offer greater certainty over provenance.
Delivering that assurance requires specialist inspection, product records, technology, training, and liability processes. A service that fails to identify counterfeits consistently could damage the same trust it is intended to strengthen.
Kering has already shown interest in circular business models, including through its investment in resale platform Vestiaire Collective. A move towards direct operation would represent a more substantial commitment and could create tension with platforms that have helped develop the market.
The economics are not straightforward. Resale involves acquiring or accepting stock, assessing condition, verifying authenticity, photographing individual items, setting prices, storing products, managing repairs, and handling returns.
Those processes are more labour-intensive than distributing standardised new inventory. They also create stock risk, since products vary in condition, demand, and eventual selling price.
Luxury brands must avoid weakening the primary market. If a direct resale channel offers plentiful recent products at substantially lower prices, some customers may delay buying new items.
Scarcity and price discipline remain central to luxury positioning, making inventory management especially sensitive. The structure of the service would therefore be decisive.
Kering could operate a marketplace, buy products outright, accept trade-ins, provide authentication, or work through a technology partner. Each model allocates stock risk, margin, customer ownership, and operational complexity differently.
Circularity also forms part of the commercial case. Extending the useful life of products can reduce pressure for continual new production, although the environmental benefit depends on collection, logistics, refurbishment, packaging, and whether resale supplements or increases overall consumption.
Luxury groups are reassessing their relationship with aspirational customers after several years of steep price increases. Higher prices protected exclusivity and margins during periods of strong demand, but they also widened the gap between entry-level consumers and leading brands.
A controlled secondhand channel could narrow that gap without reversing prices across the new-product range. It would also provide information about which products retain value, how long customers hold them, and which designs remain in demand after their original season.
Kering’s decision will depend on whether those strategic benefits outweigh the operating cost and potential disruption to existing channels. Ownership of the customer relationship increasingly extends beyond the first sale, leaving luxury groups to decide how much of the secondary market they are prepared to leave to others.
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