posted on June 7, 2003 06:13:15 PM new
Assumption: You pay anywhere from $40 to $4000 for an auction that is antique glass or porcelain. The item or items arrive so filthy that when you clean it the rag turns black.
Queston: Do you leave the seller a neg or neutral?
I have really narrowed my criteria for bidding in the past six months, so having an antique item arrive cased in filth is rare for me, because I am better able to select professional eBay sellers who would never photograph or ship dirty filthy disgusting objects. But occassionally when I get something that arrives really dirty, it makes me shudder with distaste to even handle it. I think to myself what kind of filthy disgusting house does the seller live in that they can handle a dirt encrusted item and not want to clean it for their buyer. Really, I think the seller must have hogs living in their house, and chickens up in the rafters.
When a seller puts in their auction that they didn't clean an item because they didn't want to damage it, I click right out. I think, what a moron, how can someone not wash glass or porcelain, and they think Windex or good old dish soap and water will some how hurt porcelain and glass. I think, wow what a lazy slob, I sure am not going to bid on their auction and get some filthy thing in the mail.
But every now and then a seller sends me something that is truly filthy, and I think I should leave a neg or neutral, particularly because no mention of the layers of grime were mentioned in the auction. How do you handle your feedback in similar situations?
posted on June 7, 2003 06:31:37 PM new
I guess it depends on what you sell. I sell antique and vintage jewelry and collectibles and I for one don't clean it. I leave that up to the collector. Jewelry is especially tough because the older jewelry may have old glue. I don't want to be the one to pop a stone by cleaning the item. I probably would clean porcelain or glass items, though. I wouldn't leave a neg since the fact that it wasn't clean was mentioned in the auction. I personally don't see what the fuss is about. Wouldn't you have cleaned it yourself anyway? Just because the new clothes in the store look clean, doesn't mean they are.
Cheryl
My religion is simple, my religion is kindness.
--Dalai Llama
[ edited by CBlev65252 on Jun 7, 2003 06:33 PM ]
posted on June 7, 2003 06:35:09 PM new
Why someone wouldn't clean glass before taking a picture is beyond me. I've never met a piece of glass that didn't look better clean.
The only time I don't clean something thoroughly is if there is a sticker that would be damaged. I clean around it though.
Plus, I mark all of my glass with an invisible mark. Should there be a problem, the buyer would have no reason at all to need to clean anything I sell.
I'm not sure what I'd do if I got dirty glass. I'd probably be tempted to neutral.
posted on June 7, 2003 06:48:24 PM new
CBlev65252, I don't buy jewelry. I buy a lot of 19th century art glass, and French and German porcelain objects, such as vases. I am not referring to the seller not being able to get all of the residue out of the inside of a vase. I am referring to when an object arrives so encased in grime and filth that it takes more than one rag to clean it, and all of the rags turn black. It is really disgusting. Such sellers must be real filthy pigs and live in incredibly filthy conditions.
posted on June 7, 2003 07:06:53 PM new
or maybe they bought the piece at a yard sale. Are you leaving feeback for the item or on the sellers percieved lifestyle? Was it damaged? Was the picture in the auction depective? Did it come well packaged? Was it on time? Those should be the criteria for feedback not how you have determined that the sellers lives since you really have no history there,
They could have inherited from Great Aunt Polly - someone told them it was valuable, they are not well versed in the genre and after catching an episode of Antique Road Show where someone cleaned a priceless antique and cut it's value in half decided to leave it alone and let the buyer deal with it.
posted on June 7, 2003 08:22:38 PM new
To answer your question, if the item arrived timely, safely packed and was what you bid on, you leave a positive or no feedback whatsoever.
However, in the interests of preventing any further offenses to your sensibilities, here are some suggestions.
If the picture isn't perfectly, beautifully, crystal clear (with the piece showing the supposed filth or lack thereof) you might just possibly consider:
A. Write the seller and ask if the piece is clean or dirty.
B. Write the seller and ask them for a better picture. Maybe have them include a picture of their home.
C. Take some of that Windex and/or dish soap and clean your glasses. Then do the same with your monitor.
Sorry, cuppa, you're not getting any sympathy from me. You see, you bid, you win, you get.
I once spent a couple of hours cleaning up an old KitchenAid mixer because I didn't ask... I resold it on eBay and made a very tidy profit.
posted on June 7, 2003 08:32:26 PM new
there used to be a seller here, the same one with the used pizza box, that sent a vase with not only dirt inside, but old cigarette butts and dead bugs....now that is disgusting. he was always upset by the negs he got for his packaging skills. LOL!
posted on June 7, 2003 08:39:46 PM new
That ID is NARU. I remember it because I have a friend with a similar name.
After seeing some of the comments here about getting dirty stuff, it makes me wonder about some of these sellers. Cruddy glass is one thing but a crusty Kitchen Aid is something else! Ewww.
posted on June 7, 2003 09:16:19 PM new
Yeah, Jens, it wasn't pleasant. I really didn't want to keep it or use it but I wasn't about to put it on eBay unless it was clean and nice.
The next one I bought was completely pristine, likely never used. One of my treasures...
The way to know?? Shine a flashlight into the slots at the back of the motor head. That's where the flour, crumbs, etc., collects.
posted on June 7, 2003 09:23:30 PM new
I mostly buy china and glassware and I don't like it when the pieces arrive dirty even though most of them can be cleaned fairly easily.
What I object to are the terrible packaging materials like stained mattress padding, paper towels with yellow stains, cereal packages and frozen meat packages still with crumbs inside. Some of the foam padding in packages has had really bad smells and things like that creep me out.
If the item is okay but arrives filthy and the packaging is disgusting I usually don't post feedback at all and I don't buy from the seller again. Some that have had the highest shipping and handling costs have had the most disgusting packaging.
posted on June 7, 2003 09:30:43 PM new
Well on this last item that got me real annoyed, the glaze on the vase is dark, so you cannot see the dirt in the photos. Actually cleaning the vase lightened up the glaze by quite a few shades. The seller went on and on and on about how exceptional the quality of the porcelain was, that this piece was real special, and said nothing about it being filthy dirty. I paid promptly with Paypal. Eleven days after my Paypal payment I emailed the seller to ask where the item was. On day 12, the seller responded that she had taken two days off so hadn't gotten around to mailing the item yet. She mailed the item on day 13. It arrived in the filthy condition I described. It doesn't matter whether it was inherited from great Aunt Edna. It is extremely unprofessional to sell dirt encrusted items to buyers, and not disclose in the auction text that the item requires serious cleaning. It is an aspect of the item's condition if it is covered in grime, filth and dirt. Say the item was a book and it arrived so dirty you didn't even want to hold it. It means the seller lied about the condition if no mention was made about the book being encrusted with old food, pages stained with coffee and mustard, etc. It is the same thing with porcelain and glass.
posted on June 7, 2003 09:40:15 PM new
I have ruined two items that I sold and decided to clean up before shipping. That was fun trying to explain to the buyer! I have also scratched, dropped, and accidently took the paint off items before I've listed them. I wouldn't leave dead bugs in a vase, and I do wash the dishes that I sell, but I'm too paranoid to clean anything else anymore. Call me clumsey!
posted on June 7, 2003 09:40:55 PM new
You know, Kiara, I'm with you all the way.
I do my absolute best to pack things the way I would want them to arrive. Prolly go overboard. I get teased about the tissue paper/satin ribbon first wrap.
I do recycle boxes but only if they have little or no printing on them. It doesn't take much time to stick a piece of tape over the writing and I just think it's nicer to have a good clean box arrive than one with advertising written all over it.
It annoys me to get something packed in newspapers, dirty old re-used boxes, twigs in the peanuts, etc.
On a slightly different note, one seller shipped my package and, in his email to let me know he'd done that, commented that the shipping had gone way over what I'd paid him. I waited until the package arrived. He had used over 2 pounds of newspaper to pack a cookie jar. Left newsprint ink all over the jar, too.
Needless to say, I didn't offer to pay the excess. He should have packed it in bubble or peanuts or some other lightweight material. I wonder if the savings he thought he was getting by using old newspapers was offset by the several dollars in extra shipping he paid? Hmmmm....
posted on June 7, 2003 09:47:28 PM new
Kiara, I agree with you. Disgusting packaging materials takes me over the edge.
It is like there is a certain percentage of eBay sellers who grew up in a different world, one alien to me. I am not referring to economic level because how much money you have or don't have doesn't equate to being clean or dirty. It is more like there are these sellers who accept handling filthy germy things as being a totally normal part of their daily life. I can't imagine how they live. My brain can't grasp it, other than to take a mental picture of a television stereotype of a decaying trailer in the middle of a junk yard of rusting machine parts and leaking oil barrels, with cockroaches scurrying about and rats nesting in old tires. Then if you enter the trailer, dishes are on the floor, encrusted with molding pieces of pizza. The windows are so dirty you can't see in and out. Cat poop is everywhere. The stench is awful. And there is an eBay seller hunched in front of a computer, listing auctions.
posted on June 7, 2003 09:53:35 PM new
I wouldn't think that a clean person would sell a filthy item, no matter where they got it. They would clean it before selling it.
posted on June 7, 2003 09:54:43 PM new
Lucy, we must have purchased from the same seller. The same thing happened to me within the last few months. I purchased an awesome vase. I was the winning bidder at more than $200 over the reserve price. I paid promptly via Paypal. The seller emails me to say that shipping cost him $4.00 more than I paid. When I get the large vase, it is packed in wads and wads of newspaper, at least 3-4 pounds of the heavy paper. I didn't send the seller more money, since I felt he could have used lighter packaging materials.
You're lucky your vase arrived intact! Should have been filled inside with tissue paper and then wrapped in layers and layers of bubble, then double-boxed.
In my case, it was one of those sellers who doesn't put the shipping in the auction. Because I wanted the cookie jar, I wrote for an estimate ahead of time. Which was a good thing for me, seeing how it turned out.
Obviously he just guesstimated what it would take to pack the thing.
Incidentally, the seller of the pristine vintage KitchenAid mixer I bought also underestimated shipping cost - by around $15.00. I wasn't surprised because her S/H in the auction seemed way low. She said not a word to me but when it arrived I could see she had taken quite a beating on it.
She sent it USPS, packed very well. I sent her a check for the extra shipping because I could see it was just inexperience on her part, not trying to cut corners by using newspaper for padding.
posted on June 7, 2003 10:31:50 PM new
Oh gosh, Kiara!!! I think I saw that guy looking in the train window when I was on the way from Florida to California!
So, Tea, after all this, what feedback do you think you'll leave? Hopefully it will be a tactful positive with maybe a little nudge pointing out the dirt and the slow shipping, which I think played a big part in causing your anger.
posted on June 7, 2003 10:33:55 PM new
I don't sell glass but I did find a very inexpensive and ultra lightweight packing material for some of my packages.... balloons. I buy a couple bags of small part balloons at 2 for $1.00 and they last me a month. Plenty of "give" and no measurable additional weight for pennies a box and I've had more than one buyer comment on the "inventiveness" of my packing materials in feedback and a couple thank me for the idea as they have adopted it now to save on their packaging and shipping costs as well.
[ edited by neonmania on Jun 7, 2003 10:34 PM ]
posted on June 7, 2003 10:54:15 PM new
Lucy, I will probably leave no feedback or leave a neutral. The vase is quite nice, after getting all of the dirt off it. The piece is professionally painted, quite well done.
I don't know how other people learn antiques. Some people are lucky enough to be born into a family with a member who is knowledgable, and they learn growing up.
However, I have to teach myself everything. I am at expert level in some areas now. What I do, because eBay sales slow down so much over the summer, is I take my focus away from eBay sales and use the summer months to increase my knowledge. I purchase more reference books, mostly out-of-print editions, and read the books from cover to cover. I buy stuff on eBay that captures my attention. I go to the shows. I take road trips to go to shows that require an overnight stay, antiquing there and back. A large part of making money with antiques is being able to recognize a mark, or pontil, or shape, or an artist's methodology, and knowing that what you see is such and such, from a certain region, made during a certain time period. This summer, this specific vase is part of my learning curve. Right now, it is sitting on a table in my bedroom, next to a lamp, looking quite attractive. When I identify it, sometime in the future, I will consign it to an auction house, sell it to a customer through my home, or decide to keep it for myself for the time being.
Here is a recent example. Earlier this year I was at a large antique show. From many booths away I saw a set of pitchers (hope Roadsmith is reading this one) and recognized the artist's work as being by Braquemond, a French artist who was the first European artist to combine European and Japanese methods of decorating in one etching, later known as Japonisme. The vendor told me the set was English. Well her loss if she is that ignorant. I haggled her down to $300. I contacted my customers, got an offer of $2500. I decided to list the set on eBay, and the winning bidder was a Braquemond collector living in New York, and the auction ended at over $3000. I made a huge profit, and gained another contact, a Braquemond collector, since I can recognize Braquemond's work anywhere.
My point is I thirst for knowledge. I want to be able to recognize more and more with respect to what it is, rarity and desirability.
posted on June 9, 2003 02:42:50 AM new
Hi hotcup ... recently bought a "like-new" golf jacket for my son ... it arrived, ummm, 'clean', the jacket wrapped in a clear plastic bag, BUT when i took it out of the packaging, I was really shocked and disgusted to see cat hairs all over the outside and lining ... took it outside to try to shake the heck out of it, then relaundered it... I decided to not leave any feedback.
Speaking of dirty glass, I have a quite big pink glass pedestaled bowl that I dug out of hiding last week ... I tried to clean it with lots of things, but there are a few areas on it that still have some spots that look white-ish like hard water stains... i have even scrubbed at them with oil and very fine steel wool .... but there's still some spots that just don't seem to come off ... any suggestions? ...
posted on June 9, 2003 05:32:46 AM new
I have to disagree about cleaning glass/porcelain items, as others have said you can damage the piece...however if it is a kitchen item, there is absolutely no reason not to be cleaned...
Other items that should not be cleaned before selling are coins.... DO NOT clean them....it can lower the value substantially..
posted on June 9, 2003 07:47:35 AM new
aintrichyet:
I bought a 10 cent yellow depression glass flower bud vase, very thin, but had a white water ring around the top about an inch wide. Wouldn't come off using anything! My girlfriend said use rubbing compound, like you use on a car. Took it right off and didn't damage the vase a bit, it looked like new. She also said you can grind out a small chip with it. Takes a lot of patience though and a LOT of rubbing.
posted on June 9, 2003 08:22:33 AM new
I didn't realise the original piece was a painted piece, which makes a huge difference. A layer of grime can loosen paint from glass and porcelain and when you clean the piece, the paint comes off unless you are an expert restorationist (and sometimes even then).
Glass also frequently is coated or treated to achieve special effects, like an iris (rainbow) finish or a matte finish, that can be damaged if not kept clean.
One of the most disgusting auction items I ever won was a lot of vintage Swarovski crystal beads. The lot included beads in a particular color and shape that I needed to complete a wedding order and some beads in the "aspirin" shape that I love. The seller's picture was awful, but these beads come in stock numbers, colors and sizes and the seller clearly knew what they had and wanted a fair price for them.
At least it seemed fair until they arrived and I realized they were each and every one coated with that disgusting yellow sticky film that comes from long-term exposure to heavy cigarette smoke. Every bead with an iris/AB coating had been etched by nicotine. Fortunately, there was a vintage bead dealer at our local flea market who was able to recommend a cleaning solution that wouldn't cause further damage, and I did salvage most of them - but I definitely considered a neg or at least a neutral over the beads' condition.
The same thing happened to me within the last few months. I purchased an awesome vase. I was the winning bidder at more than $200 over the reserve price. I paid promptly via Paypal. The seller emails me to say that shipping cost him $4.00 more than I paid. When I get the large vase, it is packed in wads and wads of newspaper, at least 3-4 pounds of the heavy paper. I didn't send the seller more money, since I felt he could have used lighter packaging materials.
