About buying & selling New With Tags Lululemon items on eBay
Hello Lulu Lovers everywhere. I am writing to make a public service announcement regarding selling New With Tags Lululemon items on eBay. I’m not writing about those of you who bought something a long time ago, and just forgot about it in your closet, then realizing it was still there decided to make some extra cash on it- that’s fine. This post is for people who buy very popular items on Lululemon.com when they are first released, with the explicit intention of reselling them. I’m also not talking about people who live no where near a store & don’t want to pay return shipping if they think they can make a few bucks on the one extra size they bought. I’m talking about people who do it for a living. A good example is Top Car Broker on eBay. She always has tons of NWTs items on eBay. Always highly sought after, future unicorns, for above retail. Don’t know what a unicorn is? Check out my post on Lululemon Slang.
These often sell out on Lululemon.com in a matter of hours. For example, she currently has listings for 22 Gratitude Wraps, which just came out on Monday and sold out completely in two days. She currently has them listed for $170.94, each. They retailed for $118. They definitely would have sold for that, and I think it’s wrong to use information acquired in the community (she belongs to many of the chat groups) against the community itself. However, Lululemon does have the right to refuse to sell to her, if they want to. I’ve heard of them refusing to sell to others for various reasons (they return too much, they sell on eBay- like she does, they buy too much in different sizes), or so the buyers (customers) say. Lululemon never issues anything in writing, the customers just are no longer able to process orders online, then they call GEC and they just say something vague. They are still able to buy in-store, but you can’t buy the quantities in-store like you can online, particularly with regards to markdowns. I think TopCarBroker has a friend with a yoga studio, or a strategic partner store (I believe they receive their merchandise at a discount) and then she resells it and they split the profit OR she does just order online and for some reason Lululemon does nothing to stop it. I have no doubt that they know who she is and what she does. I know that my account would be flagged if I spend 2500 on Gratitude Wraps. Which is why I wonder how it is that year over year, she gets away with it. I regard it as taking advantage of the community, others may see it as a business opportunity. Those of you who do: Please start, this will create competition & perhaps it will run her out of business. Thank you.
I know there may be people who disagree with me, but I hope you can see it from the perspective of a true Lulu Addict & if you can’t that’s OK too. Just leave your opinion in the comments below. Thanks for reading!
UPDATE
I wrote an update to this post. You can find it here.
Amen! Drives me crazy how rude and selfish people are! I found 3 wraps posted in Kijiji listed for $250 by the same person!!
Wow! That’s intense! Thanks for commenting 🙂
Thank you for this post. Totally agree! In the American civil war these opportunists were known as carpetbaggers. However, she is able to do this because people will buy from her. As long as there is a demand there will be people like her taking advantage.
Have you considered alerting LLL? It might be interesting to hear their response…. In fact I think I’ll send them a note with a link to her eBay store. Maybe if more people did that they’d track her down and put a stop to it.
I agree, as long as there is demand, people will continue to buy. I think they do know about her, but I appreciate you taking the initiative to contact them! Maybe post a reply of what they say? Thanks in advance if you’re able to- if not, don’t sweat it. Thanks for your comment!
Will do – just sent them a note with the link to her “store” and asked them what their policy is about this.
Response received today from Lululemon….
Thank you for reaching out to lululemon athletica. I wanted to thank you for this information and let you know that I will definitely be passing it along to our Brand Protection Team. We take the issue of re-selling very seriously and this information is very helpful. As you may know, we are not affiliated with websites or resellers other than our own ecommerce channels. The only URLs that are legitimate lululemon channels are:
? lululemon.com
? lululemon.com.au
? lululemon.com.nz
? lululemon.co.uk
? lululemon.com.hk
It?s important for our guests to know that we definitely do not support reselling our products. As you know, we strive to offer a best-in-class experience for our guests, both online and in stores, where we can educate on the technical features of each garment and make sure each guest leaves with product that best supports their sweaty pursuits. We don?t recommend that our guests purchase from third party sellers because it does not give our guests access to that experience and a guest could potentially spend money on product that does not represent the quality that we stand so firmly behind.
Thanks a lot for taking the initiative to write to them & for posting back with their reply, I really appreciate it. I’ll be keeping an eye on her eBay account to see if anything happens. Even if it just slowed down a little, I would consider that a step in the right direction. I mean 22 Gratitude Wraps? That’s pretty excessive. Thanks again for replying!
You are welcome. Couldn’t agree with you more!
I also wonder how TopCarBroker gets away with so much resale on eBay. I’ve heard of people who’s online account on LLL got shut down for ordering one item in two sizes, even though they’ve had no history of multiple orders.
I agree, JenO. I’ve heard of the same thing. I’ve wondered many times why some are flagged, while others are left alone. Thanks for your comment!
apparently they didn’t do much about her – I see she still has a boatload of stuff on there and the most irritating thing is she is in Canada and charging in USD!!! Hate that.
Yes, I guess they can’t do much, otherwise, I suppose they would have :-/