From thrift to thought leadership: How Beyond Retro is shaping the future of vintage retail

Vintage shopping continues to be a favoured means of sustainable consumption. A pioneer in this field is Beyond Retro; once a small-scale London boutique, now a renowned European retailer and global purveyor of vintage fashion through its parent company, Bank & Vogue.

Beyond Retro was co-founded by Canadian entrepreneur Steven Bethell back in 2002, at a time when the demand for vintage shopping was still relatively new, yet fast-evolving. However, unlike many others in its field, Beyond Retro had a vision of not only selling pre-loved garments, but using the fabrics of those deemed unwearable to make new products, putting the material itself first.

It is the extent of material available to Beyond Retro that makes such a model so viable, underlining the expanse of used fabrics readily available to recycle. Together with Bank & Vogue, the aim is to pass on knowledge to other brands and retailers – some potential future partners – as to what is possible within this realm.

From Europe to the US: Evolving opportunities in new markets

Such a mission has helped fuel Beyond Retro’s growth in Europe, and now the company has also been venturing into the new, largely untapped market of the US. Here, the retailer has established a partnership with ThredUp, offering a selection of its vintage clothing through the resale platform, marking the first time its products are available to US consumers.

“ThredUp has a cross-America reach. Having something on an e-commerce platform, rather than brick-and-mortar, which is very regional, offers national exposure,” Bethell said in conversation with FashionUnited. “What it allows is for vintage to be offered to places where it isn’t readily available in America right now. Vintage is currently a very urban offering, but places like Idaho and Boise don’t have that same depth.”

The launch showed that the momentum was very much there, with positive results already blooming in the US, possibly paving way for further expansion. From this comes new challenges, however, and a sense of reluctance hangs over the possibility of additional growth. For a company like Beyond Retro, the vastness of the US market means that competition actually comes from fast fashion giants like Shein and Temu, not so much other vintage boutiques.

As such, it makes local markets closer to home, where the brand already has a well-established name, more appealing in terms of next steps. With an existing presence in Sweden and Finland, Denmark is therefore the most logical path, though what shape this move will take is not yet clear. “There’s a considered approach to growth rather than just an ill-considered one,” Bethell noted.

Cohesive collaboration with people at the heart

Where Beyond Retro has been growing more swiftly is through brand and retail partners, many of whom it works with on exclusive collections utilising recycled materials. Such partners have spanned from luxury brand Coach to local Cornish retailer Sea Salt, and have included everything from patchworked denim outerwear to elevated accessories, once again demonstrating the range of what is possible.

“It’s more than just brand alignment, it’s people alignment,”

When asked how Beyond Retro selects its partners, Bethell said: “The main thing is to see if there’s a shared brain chemistry. It sounds obvious, but it’s not. Brands are made up of people, some of whom want to impact change. What we do at Beyond Retro is find those champions who understand that the nature of fashion and the way things are made needs to change. It’s more than just brand alignment, it’s people alignment.”

Working with brands that represent contrasting parts of the industry also gives Beyond Retro a broad depth of understanding how such labels work in these, often new, settings. In the case of Coach, creative director Stuart Vevers has already taken up the responsibility of redefining what luxury can look like under the umbrella of circularity, from the use of regenerative leather to the launch of sub-brand Coachtopia, which prioritises circular design. With Beyond Retro, these efforts extended into a line of upcycled bags and patchwork garments, both released in stores earlier this year.

The scale of such a brand does present challenges in collaborative projects. “Smaller brands may be more nimble, the product can be turned around quicker,” Bethell noted. “However, whether working with Converse, Wrangler or Coach, those larger brands bring a sophistication to the process that is really admirable and have a depth to be able to put the energy into figuring out how we are making a difference. Where you give up nimbleness and speed-to-market, you gain a very considered and thoughtful approach and the resources to be able to deep dive into the topic.”

Cross-industry collaboration has long been touted as imperative for scaling circular programmes. For Bethell, this and personal curiosity is the driver behind Beyond Retro’s own partnerships. “It’s more than just about the scale of opportunity,” Bethell stated. “It’s also about the growth of our own people at Bank & Vogue and Beyond Retro. Our job as managers of the brand is to question how we personally learn and grow. We could just play within the vintage community, but for our own personal growth – in everything from production to marketing to accounting – playing with somebody at the ‘Wimbledon’ level makes us all raise our game.”

Out of chaos comes possibility: The changing face of pre-loved wholesale

This extends into Bank & Vogue’s wholesale service, which launched in 2016 and has since become exactly what Bethell envisioned; a division that blurs the lines between those who sell new and those who sell vintage. “The dream when we started 20 years ago was to make an impact on the landscape of fashion through used clothing. Now, having large-scale retailers come to us and say they’d legitimately like to have our collections, and to then continue to have it because it’s working, is pretty exciting.”

Bank & Vogue, serving as both a wholesaler and the parent company of Beyond Retro, has seen steady growth both pre-pandemic to now, Bethell said. The shift in demand has been present in a more extensive range of companies and countries coming to the business in search of entry into the vintage landscape. This has only been bolstered by the discourse and changes surrounding tariffs, which have helped to fuel some kind of fire for the secondhand market. With Bank & Vogue able to source pre-used materials within the US borders – meaning they are duty-free – the firm has an advantage over ultra fast fashion, for which many companies are now facing increased costs when importing into the region.

On this topic, which has been one of grave concern for many in the industry, Bethell said: “My job is not to bemoan the terrain in which I have to operate on. I have to just understand it and embrace it. Right now, the terrain is actually very helpful for secondhand trade. Where there are tariffs and border restrictions, domestic thrift does better.”

Bank & Vogue has had to adjust, sometimes hourly, to this swiftly evolving landscape, yet for Bethell, “the biggest challenge is the uncertainty created in an environment where you’re imperiled by choice”. “On the other hand,” he continued, “there are opportunities in times of chaos, and we just have to lay in wait and be patient. That’s a little bit of a challenge: waiting it out.”

“Where there are tariffs and border restrictions, domestic thrift does better,”

Elsewhere, as complexities in the macropolitical and economic climate unfold, businesses in fashion are turning to Bank & Vogue for advice on how to tackle the resulting challenges. Bethell sees the company’s job as helping clients get ahead of such shifts and build some resilience in the way of inventory or shopping rates.

It is imperative that companies are aware of evolving issues that impact their operations, Bethell said. Whether this be from the closed border between Thailand and Cambodia for commercial use, to Mexicans avoiding entry into the US to buy used clothing for fear of ICE arrests, to political unrest in Bolivia, which has “brought the secondhand clothing trade in the region to an effective halt”.

Shaping legislation to encourage circular participation

As a business, Bank & Vogue also ensures that it is involved in the dialogue surrounding sustainability legislation, another fast-changing area defining business practices. Bethell himself serves as a board member of Accelerating Circularity and SMART, working within the NGOs on pathways to scaling a circular economy and contributing to evolving legislation, such as California’s Responsible Textile Recovery Act.

Bethell called the Act, also known as SB 707, a “landmark bill” that was going to set the standard in the Americas. How it will be implemented is still under assessment and as advisory meetings continue to take place, the worry is that its requirements continue to be watered down, akin to the European Union, where sustainability-centric regulatory framework has started to be withdrawn or changed to respond to backlash from disagreeing parties.

In the UK, meanwhile, discussions over what regulation would look like have garnered little progress. As politicians mull programmes like an Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) scheme, among other things, Bethell said there is actually more of a need to encourage participation in the circular economy, calling for benefits to be implemented on practices like selling secondhand clothing or minimum requirements for the use of post-consumer material in fibre.

Yet, while discussions surrounding issues like recycling infrastructure, or the lack thereof, circulate, to Bethell, the real thing that is missing is demand. “Without a customer, there’s no business. It’s the biggest Achilles heel in all these EPR schemes; do they create demand? The real issue is demand for fibre, and I feel that if any legislation that is put forward doesn’t push on fibre demand, then we have nothing,” he noted.

The evolving landscape of regulation and legislation is a one of patience for Bethell, akin to the way he does business, which also involves waiting. As such, it is yet to be seen where Bank & Vogue and Beyond Retro go next, with many upcoming projects under tight wraps. “I’m really humbled by some leadership in this space, and it gives me hope. Some of the products I see coming through our factory floor are really engaging, I’m excited about it. I can’t wait till I can shout about these projects,” Bethell concluded.