Second Hand September 2025: The hidden cost of our wardrobes

This month sees the return of Oxfam's 'Second Hand September' campaign, which looks to highlight the issues that the world of fashion has created, including the negative impact it has on climate change.

What's in your wardrobe?

As well as the issues it helps to draw peoples' attention to, this year we were particularly struck by some statistics that it has published about the 'hidden costs of our wardrobes'.

By 2050 the amount of unworn clothes globally could almost stretch from Earth to Mars and back

1.6 billion unused items of clothes are currently owned by the UK population

99% of a UK clothing item's life is spent in the closet, only being worn for less than 5 days on average

The negative impact of all of this on the environment is clear, especially when we have a 'throwaway culture' that means there are tonnes of clothes that end up in landfill every year.

And with an estimated 5.5 million adults in the UK that cannot afford to buy clothes (Source: PSE UK), this makes these statistics even more worrying.

How to take part in Second Hand September (all year round)

To help try to combat this situation, there's several ways you can get involved in Second Hand September:

1. Recirculate your clothing - go through your wardrobe, cupboards and chest of drawers and sort out what you still want to wear and what you don't. Not only are you likely to uncover something you forgot you event bought, you will also find you have some items that are simply surplus to requirements.

2. Donate your unwanted clothes - as part of your habit of sorting through your clothes, you should then donate anything you are not going to wear again. This can include donating items to your local charity shop. Doing this not only frees up space in your wardrobe, but also helps put those clothes back into the world for someone else to own (which prevents them buying something new potentially). Plus you can directly help to support a wide range of charities.

3. Buy used, not new - whilst it might seem to be exciting to buy something new, there's also a huge amount of satisfaction and fun to be had in finding hidden second hand gems instead. This might be in your local charity shop, which over the years have become a brilliant source of high quality clothing, or even using one of the various online websites or apps, where you can often find brand new clothing for a fraction of the price.

We would urge you to not just do these things for a month, but instead commit to doing them all year round!

Looking for a quick, easy and FREE way to donate your unwanted clothes? Try the service from our partners reDonate. You can book a free collection straight from your doorstep AND we will then benefit from a donation to help fund our mission.