Interesting Return Statistic

[this*old*attic]

I was watching Good Morning, America this a.m....

They interviewed the CEO or General Manager or whoever of the biggest secondary market company in the US.

They handle returns and/or buy  leftover goods from tiny stores to conglomerate chains.

Guess what the NATIONAL RETURN AVERAGE is?

Brick and Mortars - 8% of goods

Online Purchases - 20 to 25% of goods purchased

[mam98031]

Well not on Ebay.   Ebay would boot us all!

Dang you can have a single digit return rate in the Service Metrics and be in deep do do!

[femmefan1946]

That sounds high.

He may be talking about the companies he deals with. If a company handles their own problem transactions, he would not necessarily have a handle on their numbers.

WalMart claims a loss rate of one and a half percent, including shoptheft and employee shrinkage.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/08/21/walmart-and-theft-how-much-economically-speakiin...

When you’re a company as big as Wal-mart , everything about you is huge, even your losses from shoplifting.

The retailing giant says that it loses about $3 billion every year from theft, or 1% of its $300 billion in revenue, Reuters reports.

....

Shrinkage, however, isn't the amount of theft that would be cured by having more security. Because by no means all shrinkage is about customers shoplifting:

How big of a problem is shrinkage? For the typical vendor, it amounts to about 1.4 percent of sales, according to a 2014 survey by the National Retail Federation. About 38 percent of that is caused by shoplifting, an additional 35 percent via theft by employees, and the rest reflects damaged goods, cashier errors, and other administrative slip-ups.

Walmart's US sales are about that $300 billion, 35% of 1.4% of that is - $1.5 billion or so.

[this*old*attic]

That’s interesting info, too, but the gentleman wasn’t talking about shrinkage. It’s a returns percentage.

 It’s a high estimate, but I think we all shop and therefore return differently these days.

[m60driver]

I don't find the 20-25% average to be high at all.  I saw one program on CNBC that noted electronics returns were close to 30% with a 50% return rate of TVs purchased the weeks before the Superbowl.  As I said long before the advent of the Internet, as I was in retail long before the Internet, the retail mantra is that the masses are.........pick your own best rhyme word.

[vikingsandpintos]

I can't see the % being that high...  A quarter of all sales?? It must have been about something else, or in a weird market or category.  I think about all the stuff I buy, and can't remember the last thing I had to return. I think most people are that way also, just seems way too high!

[femmefan1946]

a 50% return rate of TVs purchased the weeks before the Superbowl.

Which is really nothing new.

For a wedding shower in 1958, my sister's future MIL ordered a new living room suite and kitchen table and chairs from Eaton's (Satisfaction Guaranteed or Your Money Refunded) for the occasion.

And returned them the next week.

[this*old*attic]

LOL! That sounds like something my mom would do!!! 

[pjcdn2005]

I can easily see the return rate for women's clothing being that high if not higher.

[18704d]

For almost the last ten years on this board,

I've been posting the return rates for eCommerce in general.

(Google)

It also looks like clothing has a 40% return rate eCommerce wide.

https://www.invespcro.com/blog/ecommerce-product-return-rate-statistics/

Lynn

fwiw,

Lynn

[jason_incognito]

TJ maxx maybe 7 years ago was around 35%.

It got so bad that they put a blurb in the bills for the credit card that pointed out that returns do not count toward your minimum payment.

[soh.maryl]

Those figures make sense to me.  When I buy at a B&M store, I can see the item, handle it, check for flaws and it's most usually a new item.  When I buy online, none of those are necessarily set in stone true.  We see lots of posts here that "listed as brand new in box, when received it was dirty, scratched and no box".  

[wheredidiputthatremote]

---

@this*old*attic wrote:

I was watching Good Morning, America this a.m....

They interviewed the CEO or General Manager or whoever of the biggest secondary market company in the US.

They handle returns and/or buy  leftover goods from tiny stores to conglomerate chains.

Guess what the NATIONAL RETURN AVERAGE is?

Brick and Mortars - 8% of goods

Online Purchases - 20 to 25% of goods purchased

---

Saw that too. But I could have sworn it was on Sunday Morning 🌞 on CBS.

[drusalina]

.... and this is why eBay raised the return fee to 5%.  The execs at eBay are laughing all the way to the bank.  They know that the return rate is high and this is how they make the investors think that eBay is making money.  

[sharingtheland]

---

@jason_incognito wrote:

TJ maxx maybe 7 years ago was around 35%.

It got so bad that they put a blurb in the bills for the credit card that pointed out that returns do not count toward your minimum payment.

---

Wow - TJ Maxx applied returns toward monthly payment amounts?  In all my years of shopping, which are many, with more than a few b&m accounts, never has a return been applied to payment due.  

I probably fit in the 25% range of internet returns when it comes to clothing.  Hit 66% the other day on golf shoes I  had ordered, and they were the only brand I have ever worn and in the size I've always worn.  **bleep** arthritis....