What: The phenomenon of customers abusing the e-commerce system is growing in China too.

Why it is important: Such a twist could lead to generating a significant amount of losses for many players including brands.

“Wardrobing” (‘fraudulent returns’ or ‘deshopping’), a phenomenon well known by Western e-commerce operators, is growing traction in China too: more and more customers order products, wear them once, and return them.

The phenomenon, thought to represent a total cost of $25.3b in the US in 2020, is favored in China for a series of factors:

• Return policies in China are still very generous,
• Lifestream sales are important in the country, and could also generate the temptation to feature the products and then return them,
• It might very well become more and more socially acceptable

Given the size of the market, such a trend is not good news for either e-commerce operators or brands.

“Wardrobing” is a threat in China