For 40 years, Eileen Fisher has cultivated a very loyal — almost groupie — customer for its minimalist, classic and timeless styles. And now it taps that cult following to help boost its circular business and create a model for other apparel brands.
Eileen Fisher’s clothing “take back” program, Renew, has collected 2 million garments — about 20,000 per month — from customers since 2009. The Eileen Fisher team and its partners get hands-on sorting, cleaning and repairing returned items. Many pieces get repaired and resold in the brick-and-mortar stores and online, while those that are too far gone are often downcycled into art, pillow cases and other products, said Carmen Gama, director of circular design at Eileen Fisher, during a panel at GreenBiz’s Circularity 23 conference this week in Seattle.
Here are six business lessons Eileen Fisher has learned since it launched the program that can help guide others designing and scaling circular products and businesses too.
1. Make it easy for customers
Eileen Fisher has more than 60 retail stores across the country, where customers can easily drop off used clothing. The company also gives customers the option to mail clothes directly to its warehouses. As a small incentive, each item, no matter what the condition, gets a $5 credit. Refurbished items are then sold both in-store and online to create the same shopping experience as new clothes.
2. Learn from what you get back
“When you see damaged goods all day long, you get a lot of information,” Gama said.
The Eileen Fisher team examines the clothes customers return to gain valuable insights and potential improvements on its products — such as a pair of leather pants that keeps coming back after years of wear with the same split down the side seam, or how a certain