Goodwill.com Hunting

A Graphical Analysis of Women's Tops Sold on Goodwill's Website

by J. Peter

After 10ish years of second-hand shopping, I've started to ask myself a lot of questions about the clothes I've been buying, like, "Did someone die in this?" or, "Have thrift stores always been this pricy?" (the answer to the former being, "yeah, probably"). In the absense of any conclusive answers, I tried to get the data myself.

I set up a script that collected information on listings for more than four million women's shirts for sale through Goodwill's website, going back to mid-2014. The information is deeply flawed—a Goodwill online auction is very different from a Goodwill store—but we can get an idea of how thrift store offerings have changed through the years. There's more info on data collection method below.

1. Are Used Clothes Getting More Expensive?

In short, yes. Or rather, maybe.