Message from the Publisher

By Tony Sciarrotta, Reverse Logistics Association

The returns industry has significantly changed in the past few years, and your Reverse Logistics Association has also changed for our global members and our community. Based on estimated retail returns in the USA in 2024 at $890 billion and a 16.9% rate, the global returns industry is far more than a $1 trillion industry. With this growing tsunami of returns, solutions are needed to stop the linear process of returns being liquidated as-is or going to landfills. Circularity is being recognized at more points of design, production, sales, and returns than ever before and the RLA membership has grown with many new companies bringing great ideas and solutions to our industry.

This year’s RLA Annual Conference again in Las Vegas will have more thought leaders on our stage and more industries represented. We are proud of the RLA Advisory Board industry leaders with companies like Sims moving into more lifecycle services, Liquidity Services moving into more returned goods sales to consumers, and ReturnPro developing more AI software to help make disposition decisions. Retailers and Manufacturers represent almost half of the RLA membership and attendance at RLA events .

As the National Retail Federation integrates the RLA more into their organization, we will see industry partners address the returns issues with new technologies and solutions. The NRF has already brought returns and reverse logistics into the education curriculum. The NRF and the RLA will focus on global events, webinars, surveys, and benchmarking to promote and offer the next best practices. We will help our members and the community address how to reduce returns, how to improve efficiency processing them, and how to maximize asset recovery for all returned products to become more circular.

Best regards,

Tony