Happy Sunday, Hauties!
A couple of months ago, I went crazy clearing out my wardrobe. Before I knew it, I had sold or donated the vast majority of my clothes and now, I always feel like I have no clothes to wear.
As a grad student who spends the majority of her funds on flights between Copenhagen and New York City, I don’t have a lot of extra cash to spend on fun stuff such as ordering myself a brand new wardrobe. That’s pretty heartbreaking when you’re someone who loves clothes and the process of getting dressed as much as I do.
So, I’ve been a pretty heavy user of Vinted recently. Vinted has the same type of chaotic energy as your average in-person thrift store. But in the same way, it can also be a literal goldmine for preloved clothes. If I’m being honest, Vinted is normally a little bit too unorganized for my taste, but it has been a great first step in adding quality second-hand items to my sparse wardrobe for cheap.
If your wardrobe is in a state like mine, I wanted to share a few tips I’ve learned along the way to locate the good stuff on Vinted.
Tip #1: Personalizing your profile 🖥️
Okay, I know this tip is kind of boring, but the shopping process is quicker and way more manageable when you personalize your profile. So, begin by filling out your sizes: Profile → Personalization → Categories and sizes.
This saves you time by automatically showing you items in your size when you’re browsing. Next, start saving your searches by clicking on the little bookmarks in the top right of your search results.
📌 A note on sizing:
Sometimes, the sizing on vintage clothes run small so I’d say to add the sizes you normally wear as well as one to two sizes larger. Besides, Vinted is a pretty messy second-hand platform which means that the sizes, as well as brands and categories, are often listed incorrectly.
On the plus side, if you do find a listing that has been sized incorrectly or has a misspelling in the brand name, it has probably been available for a while. That means you might be able to get a good deal on the item as the seller could be willing to take an offer just to get rid of the item.
Tip #2: Know which brands to search for 🏷️
There are sooooo many brand names on Vinted. Assuming that you’re looking for the cheap, deadstock clothes from the 1990s, the way to go about it is really just to search for the brands that you know you like. That being said, how do you figure out which brands you like, let alone which brands even exist within the vintage shoposphere?
Enable 3rd party cookies or use another browser
I approached this two ways: (1) by looking through my wardrobe for the brands of the items I’ve thrifted previously, and (2) by typing in “brands Vinted” and “Vinted haul“ on TikTok. There is a whole community of people on TikTok sharing their Vinted finds, their favorite brands, and which keywords they use on Vinted. To get you started, here are the brands I search for on a regular basis:
For elevated basics: Anne Fontaine, Biaggini, Kookaï, Mexx, Morgan de Toi, Orsay, & Sinéquanone
For 1990s minimalism: Bisou Bisou, Cache Cache, Camaïeu, Estelle, & Express Design Studio
For glitzy evening wear: Internacionale, KIT, Monsoon, & XOXO
For vintage leather: Cigno Nero, Laguna, & Parragon
For knitwear: AGGI, Per Una, & René Derhy
PS. There is a larger supply of the brands mentioned above on the European site, but they pop up on the American site too from time to time!
Tip #3: Be specific—but not too specific 🔍
The first suggestions that comes up in the search bar when you’re typing in a brand name is always that particular brand followed by “Women,” “Kids,“ and “Men.“
Don’t click on either of those options; click on the suggestion that only has the brand name in it. If you click on one of the other options, the search engine will literally look for listings that mentions both the brand name and the category. Plus, sometimes, Vinted will only show you listings under the brand name you’re interested in if you search for it manually: Women → All → Brand.
Tip #4: Tweak the algorithm 🔧
My last, but arguably most important tip, is to tweak the algorithm in your favor. My hypothesis is that the algorithm takes everything you do on the app into account when it’s suggesting listings for you. That includes items you’ve searched for and listings you’ve looked at, but weren’t interested in and skipped past.
Vinted’s algorithm also seem to prioritize your favorited listings over your search history and your viewed listings. So, I favorite every listing (and I mean every listing) that I find interesting to get the algorithm to give me better suggestions on my home page.
The one caveat of doing that is that your inbox and notifications will skyrocket with little red notifications. If you can ignore that, then you’re good to go!
P.S. Sometimes, there’s gold to be found when you scroll down to “similar items” on listings. Keep that in mind when you find a listing you like. :)
That’s about all I have for you today. Do you know of any other deadstock brands to search for on Vinted? Or do you have any additional Vinted tips? I’d love to know!! Thank you so much for reading and for consistently showing up. It means the world to me.
Happy shopping!
Emma xxxx