Areseller is acompany or individual (merchant) that purchasesgoods orservices with the intention of selling them rather than consuming or using them. Individual resellers are often referred to asmiddle men. This is usually done for profit (but can be done at a loss). One example can be found in the industry oftelecommunications, where companies buy excess amounts of transmission capacity or call time from other carriers and resell it to smaller carriers. Resale can be seen in everyday life from yard sales to selling used cars.
According to theInstitute for Partner Education & Development, a reseller's product fulfillment–based business model includes a corporate reseller,retail seller, direct market reseller (DMR), and aninternet retailer (eTailer); less than 10 percent of its revenue comes from services.
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Resellers are known to conduct operations on theInternet through sites on the web.
Another common example of this is in the web hosting area, where a reseller will purchase bulkhosting from a supplier with the intention of reselling it to a number of consumers at a profit.
Software[1] andebooks are two products that are very easy to obtain by resellers. Their digital format makes them ideal for internet distribution. In many cases, such asbrandable software, the reseller can obtain even the right to change the name of the software and claim it as one's own and resell it on an ebook shop hosting platform.
A software reseller is a consultant who sells the software from large companies under a licence. They have no legal employment status with the parent company and generally operate on a freelance basis.[citation needed]
The companies visited to and pitched to by software resellers are oftensmall and medium enterprises (SMEs), local businesses and niche operators. This benefits the software house as they may not hold the resources for the legwork needed to spread their network on a lower scale.[citation needed] While it benefits the reseller because they can build up networks of smaller clients and become a single point of contact for them for every aspect concerned with the software, be it advice, training or updating.[citation needed]
Reselling creates a circulation of products, whether that be clothes, technology, books, etc. This circulation extends the lifespan of products and reduces the amount of waste in landfills.[citation needed] A used product purchased over a new one, such as clothing, is capable of saving about 1 kilograms of waste, 22 kilograms of CO2, and 3,040 liters of water.[2]
$175 billion is the amount that Global Data predicted for the total resale market of 2023 in the United States.[3] But in fact, Global Data confirms that this value was exceeded and in 2023 the total resale market reached approximately $193.7 billion.[4]
Dating back to theMiddle Ages, trading of secondhand clothing was common for impoverished communities. Although the concept of "thrifting" sprouted long before, it wasn't until the formation of official organizations such asThe Salvation Army andGoodwill that secondhand clothing/items flourished. Even though the popularity of resale/secondhand items fluctuates, it remains familiar in the 21st century.[5]
AI is being used in the works of resale, allowing resellers to automatically purchase high-demand products without actively being present. With such technology, resellers can focus on other important tasks all while getting their inventory at the best possible price with the help of AI. This doesn't mean that people should disregard their involvement with business purchases, as it remains essential for resellers to monitor expenses and participate in decision-making.[citation needed]
Media related toResellers at Wikimedia Commons
