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A year into motherhood and I can confirm two things: babies grow too fast and clothing them is an expensive business.
My decision was to rent my daughter Stella’s wardrobe. Warm coats, bathing suits, pajamas, sandals – all can be borrowed for a monthly subscription from any number of services such as Bundlee, Lullaloop and thelittleloop, among others.
Through Or Collective I pay £36 a month for 10 items that I can keep until Stella outgrows them, the season changes or I just fancy a change. Clothes appear in the mail and some are brand new with tags.
Renting children’s clothing is one of the latest chapters in how “thing libraries” are becoming an increasingly common way to save money, space and waste. The theory is simple: instead of buying a household item or a garment or some piece of equipment that you might use once or twice, you take it out and return it.
London-based Library of Things has opened three new locations in the city this year and plans two more. Co-founder Rebecca Trevalyan says their mission is to make “borrowing better than buying.”
“We really want to make renting mainstream, make it more accessible, convenient and socially rewarding than buying something from Amazon,” she says.
There are many success stories of previous borrowers from her locations. A man hired a metal detector to find the wedding ring he lost on a campsite in Sussex and found it within 20 minutes. Another hired a planer for £11 a day to repair two doors in her flat after being quoted £245 for a handyman to come in and do the three-hour job.
In Wales, Benthyg Cymru operates a network of more than two dozen libraries across the country. And the Edinburgh Tool Library has thousands to choose from. In Bath you can book a cargo bike delivery and collection to collect your item from the share and repair shop.
All libraries have a selection of items that people may generally find too bulky, expensive, or not useful enough to purchase. Some want to try something to see if it’s worth the investment. The number one most popular thing to borrow is a carpet cleaner, followed by a cordless drill and hand sander, according to Trevalyan.
You can borrow a projector and popcorn machine for movie nights, a speaker and a sound system for parties. “In the summer, we see a lot more garden items being used: shears, hedge trimmers, lawnmowers, adventure tents, ice cream machines and gazebos for barbecues,” says Trevalyan.
Typically, consumers view items online, then select a location and date to pick them up. Unlike a book library, there are fees charged daily. A manual pressure washer is £12 a day, while garden shears are £3.50 with Library of Things. Each listing indicates how bulky and heavy the item is to get home.
“There was an air fryer recently – there was an air fryer craze and we wanted to introduce it so people could see if they really wanted to buy one,” says Trevalyan.
One in 10 people are now choosing to rent rather than buy brand new, a rising number from 2022, according to data from Barclaycard Payments and economic analysts Development Economics.
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Linda Weston, managing director of Barclaycard Payments, says rising living costs and a shift to more sustainable habits are changing shopping habits. “Our data shows that we are increasingly choosing to shop second-hand or hire items for a short period of time, rather than buying outright. The trend permeates a number of sectors, from childcare to pet care and from fashion to fitness.”
A number of new companies and offshoots of existing brands have sprung up hoping to capitalize on the trend. Wilko has just launched ‘Wilkohire’ where customers can borrow tools, equipment for painting and decorating, gardening or landscaping. Schuh works with Hirestreet, a popular clothing rental website, to rent shoes.
Interrupted Art offers paintings, drawings and photography by subscription. You can order a new work delivered and hung in your home before it’s replaced by something else every 10 weeks for £66 a month.
Apparently there are savings to be had as long as you are happy not to own items or want to resell them when not in use.
According to the Or Collective website I have saved £640 in the last two months. Not that I’d ever spend that much—the clothes I borrow from brands like Bobo Choses and Tinycottons are far more expensive than I could ever justify, which is part of the appeal of the service. As a result, my daughter is much better dressed than I am. However, you can buy them at a discounted price if you get particularly attached.
Now we need bigger toys, so I signed up for Whirli, a toy library subscription service, to borrow a walker and a climbing frame. Meanwhile, companies like Baboodle allow you to rent bulky equipment – such as travel cots, lounge chairs, buggies and high chairs – so that after a few months of use you don’t have to buy a semi-detached house with a garage to store it all.
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