£3m and counting… Charity Super.Mkt plans raft of new UK stores

There’s no suppressing Charity Super.Mkt’s appetite for opening stores in major cities across the UK.

Having already sold £3 million worth of second-hand fashion since opening its first set of doors in January 2023, the aim is more of the same.

Citing figures that charity retail and resale fashion’s “expected to grow 11 times faster than the broader retail clothing sector by 2025”, the pop-up specialist is planning to open a dozen stores next year “catering to a rise in interest in shopping for preloved items”, it said.

The upcoming temporary store sites will include Edinburgh, Leeds, Sheffield, and London’s Canary Wharf financial district. The latest is in London’s high-profile Spitalfields, which opened at the end of November. And early news was that the store was “struggling to keep up with demand on the opening day”.

The initiative, which continues to bring together major charities — in fact 55 of them on both local and national levels — includes Age UK, Oxfam, Barnardo’s, Traid and RSPCA. 

In two years it’s managed to secure some high-profile spaces in16 locations since it first launched in a former Topshop in London’s Brent Cross shopping centre. Sites have also included the former Fenwick store on London’s Bond Street.

Apart from raising those much-needed funds for charities, it said its pop-up store have prevented a huge amount of textile waste from reaching landfill.

Wayne Hemingway, the former Red or Dead designer who helped launch the project said that Charity Super.Mkt’s large stores in prominent locations “were vital to fly the flag for secondhand amid heavy competition from fast fashion”.

He said: “It is almost like a battle for hearts and minds. It is very convenient to be able to go to the high street and they are going to fix [the latest fashion] for you … to break that habit and say there’s another option is vital.”

Hemingway also noted that secondhand shoppers “tended not to be interested in fast fashion, looking for quality brands or vintage items that held their value and had longevity.”

Maria Chenoweth, a co-founder of Charity Super.Mkt, added: “Our mission remains pushing charity retail into the spaces and places it would otherwise not access, raising funds for their vital work both here in the UK and globally.”