24
votes
ReTuna shopping mall in Sweden is the first in the world to sell only secondhand and repurposed items – established in 2015, it's a municipality-led experiment in circular consumption
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- Title
- How Sweden's 'secondhand only' shopping mall is changing retail
- Authors
- Mary-Ann Ball
- Published
- Aug 29 2025
- Word count
- 628 words
I'd like to point out that all consumer models are only possible because of public funding and government support. I'd like for the subsidizing of cooperations to end and for them to contribute fairly towards their use of people, resources, infrastructure and land. Even, or especially, the amount of waste they generate.
Could you break your argument down a little, as I have trouble grasping how all consumer models are tied to public funding and government support?
I am not chocobean, but here is what I think they are getting at: How does the business get water? Sewer? Power? How do they transport things to sell from the factory to the consumer? How do customers get to the store? The answer to all of that is the massive amount of government infrastructure that we often take for granted.
Short answer: Corporations only exist as legal concept, an abstraction of ownership which is gennerally used to share ownership and thus deflect responsibility and minimize consequences for the owners.
The existence of corporations (and all business models more elaborate than a gift economy) depend on strong property law enforcement, common infrastructure, and a relatively stable form of currency.
Sure, those things could exist in absence of any public funding. But then you've basically formed fuedalism as each owner has to form their own defense force, their own system for exchange of goods, and their own infrastructure.
I hope this elevates a secondary (adjacent maybe?) industry, an industry to help repair and maintain the life of these second hand items.
I bought a used jacket last fall. The jacket price was unbelievable. The look and the quality are long lasting. The only problem? The sleeves were too long.
It took more time, money, effort, and frustration to get the sleeves shortened that I might as well have bought a custom made jacket and paid full retail price. I went to virtually every tailor in a 15 mile radius of me. And I couldn't just call to ask because they don't answer phones, it's usually a one person shop and the owner/tailor doesn't have the time nor wants to answer the phone. So I had to drive from one tailor to another asking if they could shortened the sleeves.
Most people don't have the time or patience like I did to deal with this.