This week, in the runup to Labor Day, we're re-featuring top stories from the last few months across our key coverage topics.

When Karin Dillie joined Recurate, which partners with brands to build their resale programs, as VP of partnerships in 2021, she was coming off a four-year stint as an executive at The RealReal and had been at Sotheby’s for five years before that, so she had some strong opinions about used products. But perhaps the strongest was that those goods should not be referred to as “used” in Recurate’s marketing.

“It just sounds like something dirty,” Dillie, who today is head of sellers at electronics reseller Back Market, told Retail Brew. “A ‘used’ tissue is done; you’re not going to engage with that tissue again.”

Most of Recurate’s partners are clothing brands, and “the connotation of something dirty is not what you want people to think about when they’re buying something they’re going to put…on their body,” Dillie explained.

It would be hard to overstate the magnitude of growth of the resale market. In the US, the growth of the resale sector outpaced the overall retail sector by 7x in 2023, and will hit $73 billion by 2028, according to ThredUp’s latest annual resale report.

But as the industry gets more established, it has yet to settle on a single term for its merchandise.

Keep reading here.—AAN

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Target is set to open its 11th sortation center this week, in Detroit, Michigan, according to an updated fact sheet from the retailer.

Sortation centers are where orders shipped from Target stores are sorted, batched, and routed to your front door by third-party delivery partner Shipt. In 2023, the company announced a $100 million investment to build 15+ such facilities by 2026, with the goal of expanding its next-day delivery capabilities.

• These facilities operate downstream of stores, in keeping with Target’s “stores as hubs” strategy, which uses brick-and-mortar stores to fulfill delivery orders. Stores currently fulfill “more than 96% of total sales,” according to the company’s website.

Beyond stores: Yet Target’s sortation centers are effectively moving the fulfillment process outside stores. In fact, per the fact sheet, that’s their primary benefit.

Keep reading here.—AV

On Wednesdays, we wear pink spotlight Retail Brew’s readers. Want to be featured in an upcoming edition? Click here to introduce yourself.

We’re getting to know Retail Brew’s newest reporter, Vidhi Choudhary.

How would you describe your job to someone who doesn’t work in retail? I try to write stories that could potentially help retail executives do their jobs better. My endeavor is to give them information that can be used as action items, that might help them to stay ahead of the curve.

One thing we can’t guess about your job from your LinkedIn profile? That it’s a lot less glamorous than The Devil Wears Prada and a lot more like Spotlight. I think that movie is a more accurate description of a day in the life of a reporter, except in my case I get to work from home. And also, we do not get to keep any of the free stuff! In fact, we don’t get any free stuff.

What’s your favorite project you’ve worked on? In my previous role, I wrote a regular story about brand expansion for this women’s supplement brand called Ritual. The story did not move any journalistic boundaries, but I vividly remember feeling very differently about retail as a beat after speaking with the founder of Ritual. This quote from the founder Kat Schneider really stayed with me long after the end credits had rolled: “I do think Target represents this American Dream story. I’m a refugee. I was born in Ukraine and moved here with my family and being in a mass channel, there’s something so, so exciting and representative, something bigger than just selling product.”

Which emerging retail trend are you most excited about right now, and why? I’m very excited to see how the retail media landscape shapes up in the coming years. It’s one of those things if done right, could really turn into a money-spinner for that retailer. And that’s what we’ve seen at Amazon, thus far. But as competition in this space heats up, and as consolidation happens, I suspect that top pecking order in the retail industry might look very different.

What’s your go-to coffee order? Iced coffee with skim milk or almond milk, regardless of the season.

Worst piece of advice you’ve received? Nothing comes to mind. Knock on wood!

What was your favorite retail product when you were 15, and what’s your favorite retail product now? At 15, it would have to be something music-related, possibly my CD player. And now, it would probably be anything that can help me to sleep, sadly—eye masks to magnesium supplements and the whole nine yards.