Bringing transparency to returns to help customers shop more consciously

At Zalando, we’re committed to offering a seamless shopping experience that also supports more sustainable choices. One key part of that experience, and something our customers deeply value, is the ability to make an order, try the items at home, and, if needed, easily return those they don’t want to keep. In short: bringing the fitting room to your home.  

This is why we offer easy and convenient returns since our foundation in 2008. However, while most customers use our returns policy responsibly, some, unfortunately, don’t. As a result, a few months ago we updated our terms and conditions to address this problem. 

Disproportionately high return rates are not just a challenge for Zalando, they’re a widespread issue across the fashion ecommerce industry. And this comes at a cost: it affects product availability for other customers, places strain on our operations and partners, and contributes to avoidable environmental impact.

We always took pride in raising the bar of the fashion industry, through our seamless experience and technological innovations, and once again, we want to lead a change in the industry. We are taking initial steps to help customers in their shopping decisions and increase transparency when it comes to returns:

1. We are establishing a warning system. Customers whose return activity reaches disproportionately high levels will receive an email warning. This proactive step gives them the opportunity to reflect on their behavior, discover the solutions we provide to avoid returns, and adjust before further measures are taken.
    
2. We are introducing restrictions in case of abuse. For the small number of users who continue with a disproportionately high return behavior, we will apply restrictions to their shopping experience, and in the most severe cases that consistently continue with this behaviour, their account will be paused for 12 months. While these customers won’t be able to make any new purchases during this period, they still can access their accounts, return items from any open orders, browse through the app or exercise their data protection rights. 
   
   These measures affect only a very small fraction of our customer base. For the vast majority, nothing changes.

Reducing returns starts with all of us

We believe that reducing unnecessary returns is a shared responsibility, and we’re doing our part to help. That starts with offering better product information and smarter tools so you can make the right choice the first time.

1. Enhanced product representation: including videos, 360º pics on our product pages, more detailed product descriptions and even augmented reality try on experiences.
    
2. Providing size advice: size-related returns are the number one reason why customers return an item. That’s why we have different solutions in place to help you find the right size, from flagging if an item’s size runs small or large to providing personalized recommendations based on your behaviour and body measurements. We are also working on a virtual fitting room where customers will be able to create a 3D avatar of themselves and see how different sizes of an item look on them.  

In fact, customers can receive better recommendations by updating their size profile: they can share what fits well (and what doesn’t), reference sizes from items they bought somewhere else, or add their body measurements to receive tailored suggestions. With this information, we can improve our recommendation algorithms and help you find what fits the first time. 

Today we are taking the first steps but we are already exploring additional ways to support this initiative in the future. These changes are about fairness, responsibility, and sustainability. By increasing transparency and addressing the small number of cases where the policy is abused, we can continue offering convenient returns to the vast majority of customers who use them responsibly.