By PYMNTS
Vendidit, an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered software platform focused on the secondary market for retail returns, launched Wednesday, February 7, 2024.
The company’s proprietary AI can connect retail sellers with secondary market buyers and process secondary buyer bids in a fraction of the time it used to take, Vendidit said in a Wednesday press release.
“The reverse logistics industry has been in the dark ages of technology and now Vendidit will change the game by bringing AI into the retail returns industry,” Gary Stephens, co-founder and CEO of Vendidit, said in the release. “It matches retailers, desperate to move returns out, with secondary buyers desperate for inventory – in seconds.”
This technology is expected to solve the problem of retailers having returns inventory they can’t sell efficiently and secondary market sellers lacking enough inventory or an efficient way to procure it, according to the release.
Returned items often end up in landfills or languish on shelves due to the absence of an efficient system for connecting buyers and sellers in the aftermarket, the release said.
Vendidit aims to fill this gap by providing an end-to-end software platform that connects qualified secondary market buyers with retail returns sellers, driving maximum value for returns, according to the release.
To streamline the entire process, Vendidit handles the bidding process, inventory databases, billing and other functions, the release said.
By leveraging AI technology and providing an efficient platform for connecting buyers and sellers, Vendidit aims to reduce waste, increase revenue and drive sustainability in the retail sector, per the release.
“It is not only an enormous business opportunity, it is truly doing good for the planet,” John Paul DeJoria, co-founder of Vendidit, said in the release.
Returns amounted to 14.5 percent of total retail sales in 2023, equivalent to about $743 billion, according to the National Retail Foundation.
In another recent effort to deal with this challenge, returns management platform Loop said Monday (February 5) that it has introduced new services for merchants and logistics providers.
These services allow for faster return processing, lower shipping costs, better insight and control over return policy abusers, fewer unnecessary returns and improved sustainability, Loop said.
