By Emma McCourt – Strategic marketing specialist working for World’s Biggest Garage Sale. She has expertise in fashion, mass customisation, and brand engagement
This Brisbane-based company generate profit for purpose by re-commercing unwanted consumer goods, now they are now taking their unique business model global.
Think for a moment about your home… how many goods do you have stored away in cupboards, drawers, or piling up in the corner of your garage? Dormant goods that you don’t use but you don’t want to give away. Nationwide, Australians have $43.5 billion worth of unwanted goods sitting in their homes.
Now think about your business… as a retailer how much is dead inventory costing your company’s bottom line? It is estimated that even in operationally efficient companies 20-30% of inventory will be dead or obsolete.
Imagine these goods – obsolete, unwanted, unused – could be reactivated into the economy and have their value maximised to generate profit, benefit the environment and create opportunities for local communities.
Welcome to the World’s Biggest Garage Sale business model – a company pioneering the circular economy in the Australian retail and consumer industries.
The World’s Biggest Garage Sale (WBGS) is a Brisbane-based start-up, designing solutions to commercialise the circular economy through the activation of dormant goods for good. Started in 2013 by social entrepreneurs Yasmin and Leigh Grigaliunas, it began as a charity event – a garage sale – to repurpose dormant (unused or unwanted) goods in the family home and raise money for cancer research. When the couple asked their friends to donate their own unused dormant goods they did, and so did hundreds of other members of the community as word spread about the event. Five years and five events later, WBGS have raised $314K for a number of charity benefactors and created a social impact value worth $1.7 million to the global economy.
The WBGS business model is based in the principles of the circular economy, which is predicted to be worth $26 billion in Australia over the next 7-years. By maximising the value of goods that already exist in the economy through recycle, repurpose, reuse, and re-commerce the company effectively diverts goods from landfill, draws wealth from waste, and creates employment opportunities in the community. Currently, WBGS hosts large-scale local re-commerce events and is developing a digital platform enabling communities globally to reproduce these large-scale re-commerce events through a digital toolkit, this allows WBGS to provide positive impact for people, planet and profit for purpose on a global level.
WBGS are proud to be partnering with the National Retail Association and look forward to a rewarding partnership full of growth and future opportunity.