When you get too many Christmas gifts, or gifts you just don’t care for, what do you do? Some people just keep them or regift them, but 20 to 30% of all merchandise these days is returned for money or store credit. What happens to all that returned merchandise? It was once up to each individual retailer to deal with returns, but the retail industry has now developed a complicated and centralized infrastructure to receive, sort, classify, and dispose of unwanted goods. And that system ramps into high gear after Christmas.
Inmar Intelligence is one of the larger third-party logistics companies that deals with half a billion returned items every year. Amanda Mull of The Atlantic visited their returns-processing center in Breinigsville, Pennsylvania, where each item is inspected by a materials handler who follows the standards set by the various companies they contract with. Returned items are inspected, judged, and then either repackaged for sale, sold to a resale company, donated, recycled, or destroyed. Find out how all this happens at The Atlantic. -via Nag on the Lake
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Source: neatorama