A 28-year-old has gone from cleaning toilets earning xp per hourmin wage? to raking in up to £50,000 a month by reselling old clothes online.
George Warrington, from West Yorkshire, grew up selling at car boot sales with his father and was always interested in reselling items, but didn’t see it as a viable career.
But the dad of two young kids started trawling charity shops looking for china to resell as a hobby.
After stumbling across a Nike T-shirt on sale for £1.50, he bought it and managed to resell it for £10, and the experience thrilled him.
By then, he was working as a personal trainer and would start his work day at 4.30am.
Then, after finishing his shift at 2pm, he would spend the afternoons buying stock, cleaning it, listing it online and posting off orders.
After 10 years in the fitness industry, he finally saved up a bit of cash and quit so he could become a full-time “reseller”.
He now makes between £40,000 and £50,000 a month by reselling thousands of clothing items a month that otherwise would have ended up in landfill.
He now has his own team, which includes his partner Megan Robinson, 25, and they house thousands of items in an old mill where everything is cleaned, listed, packaged and posted.
As well as the obvious financial rewards, George also appreciates the flexibility his job offers.
“I went from cleaning toilets to being a personal trainer, but it got to a point where I was making more money reselling than putting myself through the long hours in the gym,” he said.
“We have two kids at home that I wanted to spend time with, and reselling allows for a lot more flexibility.
“It’s a grind, but the fact that I can work with my partner, I can go and see my kids’ nativity play, or I can go and do the school run, makes it a better lifestyle too.”
Discovering live-stream auctions
A few years into reselling, George found out about live-streaming platform Whatnot, which helps him sell his items faster and more efficiently.
Whatnot viewers can watch George or Megan talking about the clothes they have on offer and bid on them instantly.
“We’ve been on Whatnot for six months now and have sold thousands of items by going live Monday to Friday,” George said.
“We have thousands of items which will be shown on the livestream and sold immediately, and we start everything at a pound and buyers bid on them.
He added that if he had listed those items on platforms online, they could be sitting there for years.
“Our record for livestream selling is 200 items in 54 minutes,” he said.
George is now hoping to sell a whopping 8,000 items this month.
If he sells every item for £10 – and many will sell for more – he’ll increase his monthly earnings to a massive £80,000.
His most popular pieces are from brands such as Nike, Adidas, Carhartt and Ralph Lauren.
“These items should have been going to landfill, they’ve had their chance in the market and they’ve already been worn,” he explained.
“I want to encourage people to be consistent: it’s not a get rich quick scheme – it takes time and hard work, but if you do it right, it definitely pays off.”
Tax implications of re-selling
SINCE January 1, digital platforms, including eBay, Airbnb, Etsy, Amazon and Vinted, must share seller information with HMRC as part of a crackdown.
You’ll only be affected if you sell a certain number of items or earn over a certain amount across one financial year.
Firms now have to pass on your data to HMRC if you sell 30 or more items a year or earn over €2,000 (the equivalent of £1,700) – check now if this applies to you.
This is because anyone selling items online might be liable to pay tax if they earn £1,000 or more.
If the money a member makes on online marketplaces over a year is less than the amount they paid for the items they are selling, then there is no tax to pay.
But those “trading” for profit might need to pay tax.
But new rules introduced at the beginning of January mean marketplaces must now pass on seller’s earnings directly to HMRC.
It is part of a wider tax crackdown to help ensure that those who boost their income via side hustles pay up what they owe.
This isn’t a new tax. Those who earn over £1,000 have always had to declare income and fill in a self-assessment tax return, but it gives the taxman greater visibility over what you earn.
