posted on January 12, 2005 07:45:54 PM new
I L@@ked EVERYWHERE! Can't find WHERE to CLOSE that e bay Store! Are they Crazy?? from $9$ to $15 overnight! Not getting MY money. Nope! and I just did the 30 days trial,10 days left. Sold NOTHING there....Thanks!
posted on January 12, 2005 08:11:16 PM new
Lucy,,,THANKS you! $15.00 a month? Sales down and fees going UP! Insane what kind of idiots run e bay? Who cares, I feel SOON I too will be GONE, gone, gone. Back to the CASH and carry it off Swapmeets in 05 for me too.....It was a good 4 years,,,,,but, e bay, they's be a CHARGIN' for the Worst.....
posted on January 12, 2005 08:21:18 PM new
I'm with you, Jack. After almost six years selling on eBay I think it's time to hang it up.
No fun any more...
Remember when we watched for our auctions to show up in search and then counted the bids instead of hoping now for a hit or two?
My big issue now is how do I get all this stuff out of my house? I absolutely detest yard sales and the thrift where I volunteer is inundated with donations.
Hey! I just had an inspiration! San Luis Garbage Company! They pick up every Monday, just like clockwork!
posted on January 12, 2005 08:46:52 PM new
I feel very disheartened over these latest fee hikes. I don't understand the thinking at Ebay at all. I was ready to open a store, Lucy, thanks to your encouragement. I was about 3 inches from opening one. Now this.
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Is it true that the only difference between a yard sale and a trash pickup is how close to the road the stuff is placed?
posted on January 12, 2005 08:47:23 PM new
Lucy,,,,,,tons of stuff here was bought strickly for selling on e bay,,,back at the swapmeet,,,I'll be LUCKY to get what I PAID for it.....past few months been buying ONLY with Higher level SHOW type swapmeets in my mind (Rosebowl, Car Shows, Motorcycle shows etc. )and then,,,,,RAIN!!!!!!!!!!! $2000.00 in lost sales from RAIN!!!!!! I'd HATE to sell this stuff back at the local College swapmeet,,,,,that's where I BOUGHT it CHEAP!!!!
posted on January 13, 2005 04:33:31 AM new
<<My big issue now is how do I get all this stuff out of my house? I absolutely detest yard sales and the thrift where I volunteer is inundated with donations. >>
No one locally should know you do eBay, so what I did was have a yard sale and promoted it toward the new eBay sellers. They have no way of knowing I tried 4-6 times to sell each item and it didn't sell.
You know using words like "cleaning out; estate sale; vintage items; need to sell quick; must sell everything; etc." It worked great, they were here like vultures 2 hours before I said we were starting and bought it all. They asked questions or mentioned eBay, and I played dumb - didn't lie but didn't know anything either. Can't wait to do it again as soon as the weather gets nice.
Why not do the same in your catagory as a wholesale lot!!?? Throw in a few "hooks" (good things, easily identifable as resaleable) and the rest, the stuff that hasn't sold. I love the ones that say - in a box, from an estate, as is, hasn't been sorted through! Yeah right!!!!
Not everyone is as astute as the readers of this board, so there will those chomping at the bit to get yours and mine 'lots'!!! Gonna go get started on that myself. This should be fun!!! Louise
posted on January 13, 2005 08:24:08 AM new
Here in Kentucky they are opening what they call Peddlers Malls all over the state. They take an old Walmart,K-Mart or whatever that has went under in the past and let people build a booth which they paid rent of $120.00 a month rent and you keep your booth stocked. They pay you a check once a month minus your rent. They also pay all the sales tax,which you deduct when you file your form to the state. We have set one so far and plan to set two more this year. If I have to I will back way off of E-Bay and stick with this. So far its doing well,we took in almost $1,000 last month,would have went over but they were closed for bad weather.
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Two men sit behind bars,one sees mud the other sees stars.
posted on January 13, 2005 08:30:30 AM new
Hi all,
I'm thinking of putting this stuff on eBay in big lots. With the flat rate priority boxes I should be able to keep the S/H reasonable.
Now if I can just keep myself from fiddling around with pictures of every single thing in the lot... The goal, after all, is to get it out of my house as quickly and simply as possible.
posted on January 13, 2005 11:22:09 AM new
After all of Tom's encouragement and others...I was just about to open up a store. I really wanted to start off making this ebay thing a home business for me. A way to make extra money and way to help my soon-to-married older kids. Buy my daughter a wedding dress of her dreams.
I am just selling off the stuff in my house, being a collector of vintage stuff and a saver of things that have *become* vintage stuff! But all of it is just going for a few dollars here and there.
Back issue magazines that I sold a few years ago for $50 are now going for $12. Books are totally dead, no hits, no nothing.
But I see that I put in so much time and when I'm not on the computer I'm *thinking* about ebay and my sales and what to sell next and how to best describe it, etc etc...it really isn't worth all of this.
Any home business suggestions? I am an artist and could make and sell.
Boy, I should think of some starting some thread where we can all lift our spirits a little.
posted on January 13, 2005 12:12:36 PM new
I finally sat down and did an excel sheet to help me with the comparison and math...and Jack's right.
I was under the impression yesterday that the 8% was for everything auctions and stores. With it just being for stores that changes the formula a lot.
I only have 280 items in the store now...I would have to have a lot more then that in it and items over $25.00 to make it viable.
I had actually taken everything out of the store before a December vacation and then relisted them as auctions on 10 cent listing day. I sold over 520 items and made more in one day then I usually make in a month.
There is a lesson there. I really don't need a store. I will be closing mine on Feb 17th.
posted on January 13, 2005 12:19:15 PM new
A little heads-up...
I closed my store the other night and this morning it occurred to me I needed to revise the descriptions in my (few) auctions to remove the reference and link to the now non-existent store.
posted on January 13, 2005 12:35:59 PM new
Does anyone know of a good alternative to an ebay store? Has anyone tried the Yahoo small business ecommerce site yet? I am looking to open up an off ebay presence before it is too late. How about Vendio stores?
posted on January 13, 2005 01:35:51 PM new
I checked out zshops. Seems pretty cool. Has anyone else tried it? I see some big compaines like ToysRus use amazon to sell their items.
posted on January 13, 2005 02:00:48 PM new
"rivki
You said you are an artist. What kind of artist? What do you do? Portraits, pencil drawings?"
thanks for asking Gtootie (and sorry to be off topic here...everyone just ignore...)
You name it, I love all media. I am a watercolorist, collagist, I construct things, I do fabric art. I am very painstaking in my work and so it just takes too much time to be worth it to sell on ebay.
I've seen those "mini watercolors" some artists sell on ebay. I guess they make them small so they can do a bunch of them, but all that effort for $6.00?
I've made fabric collage purses with vintage silks and velvet and embroidery, but 2 weeks of handwork to make a couple of dollars? I dunno.
zShops are good if you are willing to use it as your main website. Relying on Amazon to send business there is not going to work out well. zShops are not always included in the main Amazon search (sound familiar?)
If you sell books, CDs or other media, by all meas try Amazon. Other things that aren't in their UPS/ISBN database are a little arguable. I break even there, but don't do too much business from Amazon.
Someone asked about Yahoo shopping. Their $39.99 is a good deal if you know HTML and have a lot of time to spend learning the system. It's extremely powerful, but takes a lot of time to learn. I'm an experience HTML/PHP developer, so it was simpler for me to design my own ecommerce site than figure out their system. But it looks great for less-technical people. If you just want web hosting, there are cheaper alternatives... try http://www.ipower.com
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Replay Media - The best source for board games, card games and miniatures on the web!
http://www.replaymedia.com
[ edited by replaymedia on Jan 13, 2005 02:19 PM ]
posted on January 13, 2005 03:34:19 PM new
<< Has anyone tried the Yahoo small business ecommerce site yet?>>
When I 1st moved back here to NY I worked for a guy who had a Yahoo store. If you are willing to do the work and have the cash to back yourself up, it is a great thing. The 1st year I was there he pulled in 1.5 mil gross, with no merchandise on hand - all drop shipped. I worked in the basement next to the washer and dryer and got to listen to the wife arguing with the kids all day. His store is http://celebrityappliance.com/. At one time he did the whole site himself and worked full time at a Deli while I did the office. He was a beast to work for at at my age, didn't need it.
Some of the major elements you need for a Yahoo store is a business account; Excel - to upload the info to their site on the spreadsheet and a fax machine. Yahoo faxed over every order so we had a hard copy to process.
Hey maybe I can make some bucks selling his drop ship list!!! He used the Deli as the B&M location when people, like Krups, needed to know he was an actual store and not just an internet store.
posted on January 13, 2005 05:10:49 PM new
I closed my E-bay store until I can redo the ads. I will probably stick most of it on Amazon for a while. I have heard the Z-shop listings are not so great. I just up my prices to cover their fees they pull on Marketplace listings.That way I only pay for what sells. Some items are worth listing,but a lot are not. Bad place to try to sell books,DVDs or videos.
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Two men sit behind bars,one sees mud the other sees stars.
posted on January 13, 2005 08:27:50 PM new
Well I JUST paid .35 to LIST an auction on Bid-it. com not really complaining but that is NOT FREE. We'll see what happens there MY item is a HOT seller. relist, relist, relist. over and over and over and......
It is Really sparse in there iff'in ya ask me. When there are NO Golfers, I start to wonder.
