What: PayPal-owned returns software and reverse logistics business Happy Returns localises drop-off and aggregates shipping to optimise customer experience and sustainable returns for customers like Everlane and Gymshark.

Why it is important: The business of returns is a USD 206 billion industry. In 2021, 20% of online-bought products were returned, contributing significantly to fashion's carbon footprint.

Consumers increasingly expect a convenient returns process, with the flexibility to return e-commerce orders in-person as well as via mail.

Happy Returns helps brands optimise their returns process to save money, retain revenue by promoting intelligent exchanges, boost sustainability, and make returns more delightful for shoppers.

Happy Returns offers an in-person, aggregated returns service through a network of more than 5,000 brick-and-mortar locations, such as FedEx, Staples, Ulta Beauty and Cost Plus World Market.

Consumers' refunds are immediately generated during the Return Bar drop-off, helping to maintain customer satisfaction and an NPS of 93, while merchants benefit from significantly reduced shipping costs and packaging waste and the Return Bar locations, such as Ulta Beauty, benefit from increased foot traffic. Happy Returns software is available to all merchants and software fees are waived for any merchants that offer PayPal as one of their payment methods to their shoppers.

The logistics, cost and volume of returns are a growing problem. As more shopping takes place online, return rates for e-commerce tend to be 3 to 4 times higher than brick-and-mortar.

Reverse logistics remove that friction of the mail for consumers: the wait, the hassle, the printing of labels. After starting the process online, a Happy Returns transaction takes about 30 seconds at one of our 5,000 Return Bars across the US, and the consumer will receive their refund instantly.

In terms of sustainability, Happy Returns, collects items dropped off at the physical locations box-free by shoppers, and then they are aggregated and shipped together in large, reusable and recycled totes rather than a cardboard box. Using the totes up to 100 times.

They then ship items from drop-off locations to the regional Return Hubs where they sort and label the returns and bulk-ship them back to the manufacturer. It's a two-step process that uses reusable packaging to eliminate cardboard and labels from the equation, and eliminates trips by densely packaging items into one-third of the box space.

A sustainability-focused logistics solution for fashion's returns