When Jess Potter and Davey Brown decided to start a family four years ago, they didn't take the decision lightly. Since meeting in 2014, the Cardiff couple had been on a gradual journey of reducing their environmental impact. The idea of adding more humans to the planet seemed at odds with their new lifestyle, and they worried about what their children's future would look like. "But human instinct took over, and we decided we did really want to have our own children", said Jess. "But we would make sure that if we did have them, we would only buy second-hand where we could."
It seemed like a great compromise. But while preparing to welcome their first child into the world, the couple realised just how hard it was not to buy new items for their newborn. "It just made me realise, if I'm finding it this hard, and I'm so committed to not buying new, there must be millions of people who just give up because it's just too challenging. It takes too long, there are too many websites. You just can't find what you're looking for, because everything's so spread out," Jess added.
While going to sleep one night, the expectant mum had a "lightbulb moment". It made sense to "bring it all together" on one platform, so that second-hand shoppers could compare listings on different online marketplaces and find exactly what they were looking for. It would bring much-needed cohesion to the huge yet fragmented second-hand online market, and in turn remove friction and inconvenience for people wanting to buy used items. She told Davey the following morning - and so the idea for Used and Loved was born. You can read all our Cardiff stories here.
Three years later, and the concept has has turned into a reality. The innovative website allows users to find the best deals before they're gone forever, saving time and money in the process. It currently lists items in the UK from eBay, Oxfam and several shops selling used and refurbished electronics. All users have to do is type what they're looking for in the search bar, and they'll be shown all listings that fit the description, which they can then organise by price and distance. And the platform's scope is vast: you can search anything and everything (except cars).
Used and Loved has been live since last November, and the couple have built up to 1,000 site visits a month, completely organically. But there are still exciting developments ahead for the burgeoning platform: it will soon feature other popular marketplaces like Gumtree, Shpock and Vinted, and more filters will be added, allowing users to refine the listings by colour, size and other criteria. They hope to eventually expand the website to include listings from all over the world. "We've also found the most popular wedding dress websites in the UK, and the website will have three of those," said Davey.
The couple, who are both 35, haven't always lived an eco-friendly lifestyle. Before they met, Jess was a "massive consumer", buying new things all the time. "Neither of us really knew much or cared about the planet," she admitted. But after meeting at Glastonbury Festival eight years ago, they embarked on a journey to be more more environmentally friendly.
It was a slow and steady transition as they changed their habits and lifestyle choices. A year after they met, they decided to make their first foray into the world of sustainable entrepreneurship. They set up a business called Tent Happy, which saw them rescue hundreds of abandoned tents and sleeping bags from festivals, before cleaning and re-selling them to customers or donating them to charity. But the physically demanding venture meant they were travelling up and down the country and spending lots of money on van hire and camping. Ultimately, the project wasn't profitable nor sustainable enough of them to continue, especially as it was around the time they were considering having children.
Getting Used and Loved off the ground over the last three years has admittedly also not been an easy task, and the pair are grateful for the invaluable help they've had from interns and advisors. Davey, who is a web developer, fit in working on the website around doing his own freelance work. He has been on a particularly steep learning curve, Jess explained. "He's had to learn so much really complex stuff that he didn't know how to do before. There's been periods of time where he spent a long time building something and then realised that actually, that wasn't the best way to do it. So we've needed to build it in a different way. So there's been lots of stopping and starting and going backwards."
It's also been a struggle financially, especially as the couple have since had a second child, who is now two years old. Explaining how they've been able to fund the growing business so far, Jess said: "I had a really well-paid job. I was the European HR manager for a global data analytics company, which is also how we've been able to do this, because I've been able to fund our living with that. But even with that it's been a real struggle financially. We've got our two kids, they're both in nursery full-time. That obviously costs a huge amount of money, and I've had two maternity leaves."
Last September, the couple took the plunge. Jess left her job, and they decided to go down the fundraising route instead. They will be launching a crowd funder this month. "We started seeing competitors pop up, and we realised that this really is needed - this really is something that is going to change the way people shop second-hand" said Jess. "And if we don't just pull our finger out and just put everything we have into it, we might miss out on this. We've spent the last three years on it , so we just couldn't let that happen at all."
Deciding to invest their time and money fully into Used and Loved has been a "huge risk", said the couple. They have put their house on the line and are about to sell their car to tide them over. They've even postponed their wedding until June 2024. But the risk is a very calculated one - and ultimately shows there utmost belief in the venture. "We know the potential of this and we know that we just need to get past this line, and then we'll be completely fine. We'll be better than fine. It'll be really successful. So it's just managing this in-between stage basically," said Jess.
The couple's website comes as the UK enjoys a boom in second-hand shopping. There are 18 million people who buy preloved items across the country, making up 27% of the population. Some 67 percent of people who buy second-hand say that they do so to save money, according to a YouGov survey from October last year - and Used and Loved has already proven to be a brilliant solution in this respect. One of couple's friends thanked them after he saved £150 on a £450 espresso machine using their website. "That's what we're aiming for - more of that," said Davey.
The website also has a blog with practical tips for buying second hand, which the couple have learnt from their own journey. Asked about the importance of second-hand shopping for the environment, Jess added: "It's really important to try and address any issues that are stopping people from buying second-hand, because it kind of has to be the way that we live moving forward. It really does terrify me what the future looks like. Before you had to think about your children's children, but now you actually need to think about what your grandparents are going to live through - because who knows what's going to happen? And if we don't do something about it, we'll be blindly walking into a catastrophe."
In the current cost of living crisis, the couple also hope Used and Loved can help those who are struggling. Pointing out that the cost of some second-hand items are increasing as well, Jess said: "[The second-hand market is] so fragmented that the people who really need the stuff because of the cost of living crisis don't know where to look or just can't access it. So we really want our website to be able to help help make that whole process easier for the people that need it."
She added: "One of the ideas that we've had for that is to create like a page dedicated to all the free things, for example, so that it's really easy to go by category of sofas or cutlery or whatever it might be that you need. And it will bring all the results together, which our website does anyway - but I want to make it as easy as possible for people to find just all the free stuff or the borrowing options." You can visit Used and Loved here. To get more stories like this sent straight to your inbox every single day, click here.
