It Goes Forward: Redesigning the e-commerce return process to reduce small businesses’ environmental impact and costs

Innovation Fund Winner

Why this program?

  • Product returns cost European online retailers an average of €12.50 in logistical costs, on top of the financial depreciation of unsellable or discounted products. In the fashion sector, for example, up to 40% of items are returned.
  • Research by the European Environment Agency shows that the cost of return deliveries in 2021 was estimated at €60 billion, a 70% increase from five years earlier. Small businesses have a hard time competing with the “free return” option offered by larger competitors.
  • The environmental cost of returns is also increasing. The European Environment Agency estimates that 22-43% of all returned clothing bought online ends up being destroyed. Additionally, return logistics in Europe is estimated to create more than 10 million metric tons of carbon dioxide annually, equivalent to the emissions of 2 million cars in a year.

Program overview

It Goes Forward (IGF) addresses these environmental challenges by supporting small businesses in offering consumers the opportunity to pass on returned items directly to the next consumer. IGF’s innovative Return Article Forwarding (RAF) method is a Software as a Service (SaaS) solution that will support small online retailers to redesign the return process. 

The solution enables small online retailers to resell and send a return item straight from the product-returning consumer to the next, so that the returned item skips the warehouse. The moment a consumer registers a return online, the item is put for sale again at a discount on the retailer's own website. The discount is calculated by IGF’s discount algorithm, developed in collaboration with several universities and partner Doing The Math. 

This process is set to help boost the financial resilience and ecological performance of small businesses. A return that is sent directly to the next consumer reduces costs and CO2 emissions compared to being transported back to the warehouse. Unwanted returned goods can easily be resold through IGF’s platform, reducing the number of discarded returns at warehouses and minimizing shipping packaging.

With an average of 70% of returns consisting of a single item and a return reason that allows forwarding (such as 'wrong size' rather than poor quality), this method offers more choices for consumers. To incentivize consumers to purchase returned items, IGF’s solution offers them loyalty points for forwarding products and discounts for choosing returned items instead of new ones, while guaranteeing privacy and timely delivery.  

With the support of Mastercard Strive, IGF is developing more specific features for small businesses, including:

  • Plug-ins for e-commerce platforms like Shopify and Magento, widely used by small online retailers, to allow users to benefit from additional discount and matching algorithms and forecasting options.  
  • Product insurance and loyalty programs to boost credibility of the RAF method.
  • Real-time and periodic reporting on saved CO2 emissions, supporting small businesses’ decision making on environmental and sustainability efforts. 

About It Goes Forward

It Goes Forward is an award-winning Dutch start-up founded and led by Pepijn Stribos and Carl van Heijst. Both are alumni of the Erasmus University Rotterdam. Pepijn is autodidact and senior Tech Lead and Carl leads the sales and is a former management consultant. Together with their in-house team and partner Doing The Math, Return Article Forwarding combats the financial and ecological unsustainable status quo in (free) product return handling.  

“We are excited to be working with Mastercard Strive to bring Return Article Forwarding in the hands of small businesses. This grant enables us to customize our algorithms to small businesses, bring RAF to widely used e-commerce platforms and help boost the financial resilience and ecological performances and reporting of small businesses. Online retailers who previously had no alternative but to compete with larger retailers offering “free” return options now have more choices. We’re proud to provide them and their consumers with a sustainable option and a voice in shopping and returning more responsibly.”

Pepijn Stribos and Carl van Heijst

Co-Founders of It Goes Forward

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Implementation partners
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