The RealReal to Leverage EON’s Digital IDs to Drive Transparency
The RealReal will now leverage digital product IDs to enhance transparency and build consumer trust.
The luxury e-tailer has joined digital ID technology platform EON Exchange to provide consignors with a more streamlined selling experience and give authenticators an added layer of data about the products they take on.
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The partnership will allow owners of luxury items from EON’s growing network of brand partners (which includes Coach’s Coachtopia, Chloe and Gabriela Hearst) to scan the digital IDs embedded in their products, accessing provenance data, sale history, and the option to consign with The RealReal. If the item is accepted for sale, The RealReal will leverage data from the digital ID as a part of its verification process.
“Our mission at The RealReal is not only to extend the life of luxury items, but also to remove friction from the consignment process and boost the adoption of resale as much as possible,” The RealReal president and chief operating officer Rati Sahi Levesque said. “This partnership is far bigger than TRR. Together, we’re getting consumers and brands alike to understand the power of resale and keep well-made items in circulation.”
The partnership will provide “a seamless consignor experience” for The RealReal users “while adding another layer of trust to our marketplace and to the resale industry as a whole,” she added.
Digital IDs, also known as Digital Product Passports (DPPs), “enable products to speak to multiple stakeholders,” EON founder and CEO Natasha Franck told Sourcing Journal. The DPP can engage with the consumer, providing relevant product information and shepherding the resale process. “But equally important, it enables a product to be information accessible to the seller or resale partner.”
Franck said EON’s initial vision was to allow brands to track and trace the entire lifecycle of their products. With the booming popularity of the resale economy, DPPs also give them the chance to monetize their creations beyond the primary market. “When a brand signs up to EON they can decide on multiple different exchange partners, including many different resellers, so they can give customers a lot of options,” she explained. “Or, they could be more limited and say ‘Actually, you have to use our specific resale program’—they can really steward the direction of travel of products.”
Brands that utilize digital IDs in their products can now connect their products to The RealReal on an opt-in basis. “A lot of the brands that we work with are very interested in connecting their products to The RealReal in order to steward those products through a circular value chain,” Franck said. Even if they’re not capturing a secondary sale for themselves, they’re compelled by the desire to keep their products out of landfills and meet circularity goals.
Franck said she sees the use cases and capabilities of DPPs growing quickly. “In the future you’ll have a QR code or an NFC chip or some form of data carrier, and the customer will be able to scan that product and have it instantly identified and authenticated and even uploaded into a preferred resale channel, reducing all the friction associated with that sales process,” Franck said.
She also believes retroactive IDs could begin to be implemented widely for vintage products, or items initially produced without data-carrying technology like chips or QR codes. Luxury leather goods brand Mulberry authenticates the products that come through its Mulberry Pre-Loved resale program, issuing new IDs for old products. A reseller like The RealReal could work with EON partner brands to do the same for the products it consigns.
“Our goal was always to solve the data gap between brands and resellers, and we’re excited to see brands really rolling out and leveraging that that connection” in service of circularity, she added. The RealReal joins Vestiaire Collective and Archive, resale-focused businesses already using EON’s technology. With DPP legislation on its way, “there is not much time for brands to waste,” Franck said.
