Minitrade.ca Launches Kids Clothing Exchange Service

When former fashion design professional and mother-of-two Isabelle Doucet had her first child in 2008, she knew she wanted to make a change in her career. Meanwhile, as her children outgrew their clothes, she became overwhelmed with all of the extra clothing she had lying around the house.

Doucet looked online for a solution but could only find local exchanges on Facebook and via classified websites (like Craigslist) – where parents had to buy clothes in bulk (i.e. a box of clothes for $50).

“I couldn’t find a place online where I could select gently used children’s clothing piece by piece,” says Doucet. “My daughter is four years old now but she already has her own sense of style and wants to pick out her all of her clothes.”

Doucet decided to launch her own online business, Minitrade.ca, where she and a team of part-time professionals would sort through, photograph and post online all of the clothing that is sent in from Canadian parents to buy or exchange.

“Busy parents today don’t have the time to take pictures and list each individual item up for sale on online classified websites,” says Doucet. “We make it as easy as possible for parents to clean out old clothes and we help them save money on updated, bigger clothing items to fit their growing kids (ages zero to seven years old).”

Last month, Minitrade.ca launched across Canada with “over 1,200 pieces to browse through per day and growing,” says Doucet.

The new Minitrade service collects gently used children’s clothes from parents for free in exchange for credits to shop on the website.

It’s easy to get started. Just sign-up for free on Minitrade.ca. From there, users can either browse for new clothes or clean-out their children’s closet by shipping their old clothes to be sold on the website. The company will send you a Minitrade bag directly to your front door – free of charge. Just fill the bag with clean and freshly laundered, lightly used-to-new condition children’s clothes that were purchased within the last two years. Once the bag is ready for pick-up, Minitrade will arrange and cover the shipping costs.

All clothing on Minitrade can be purchased with cash and/or credits. The company only selects popular brands to be re-sold as the sizes and fit are easier for other parents to predict.