# Just some thoughts about ebay...



## clovis (May 13, 2002)

Most of my income is generated from ebay. I am a Power Seller with top rated seller status.

Sure, most of the stuff I sell on ebay needs a national market. Where else are you going to get $140 for a kevlar army helmet, and sell it within a few weeks time? I'm more than happy to use ebay as my source for selling most of my items.

At the same time, I wonder if ebay hasn't shot themselves in the foot with their pricing structure and final value fees.

IMO, it really isn't worth selling some items on ebay. Just this week, I took a box of items to our flea market booth. Normally, I would have listed them on ebay.

For instance, I bought a box of kitchen stuff at an auction. There were Onieda brand spoons, forks, and a nice corkscrew. A few years ago, I would have listed them on ebay. Today, I just marked them and took them to the flea market. I also took a Coleman stove, a nice catcher's mitt, catcher's equipment, an army mess kit, and a tool box. Hopefully, they'll sell quickly.

By the time I clean the item, take pictures, write an ad, upload the pictures (I'm on slow dial up, so it takes forever!), then take a chance that I got the shipping price right, box it up, and take it to the post office, sometimes it is easier to just slap a price tag on it and drop it off at the flea market. 

I can't believe that this isn't hurting ebay revenues. I bet I've marked over $200 worth of items in the past few weeks that, at one time, I would have sold on ebay. I'm guessing these items would have brought more than $300 on ebay. 

I used to say "If it doesn't sell on ebay, I can always take it to the flea market."

Now, I am beginning to say "If it doesn't sell at the flea market, I can always try ebay." 

Your thoughts?


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## CrashTestRanch (Jul 14, 2010)

I dumped my wholesale account 2 years ago, sold lot (bulk), couldn't take the changes, cut into my profits way too much, then several chinese sellers burnt me and paypal sided with them and I was out product and money ... that was it, never again, sold off what inventory I had left and cut my losses, ebay still bugs me about getting my account back, but never again ...


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## ErinP (Aug 23, 2007)

eBay works well for me. 
I too am a top rated Power Seller (though I might soon drop down to Bronze from Silver, which kind of bums me).

I run an online quilt shop. I have my own freestanding website as well as a store front at eBay. 

I chose my product for several reasons:

#1 Inventory does not go bad, get outdated, or become obsolete.
#2 My customer base is crafters and quilters. Usually women. Usually early 30s up to retirees. Generally speaking, a pretty easy-to-get-along with demographic. An honest demographic.
#3 It's easy to ship. Nothing breakable. Nothing heavy or cumbersome.
#4 Any listing will be for a minimum of 15 items (since there are usually 15 yards on a bolt). Ie, for every set of pictures I create, I'll be able to use it at least 15 times. 
#5 My wholesalers are professional companies who've been in business for many years.
#6 There are never any complaints about quality as my product is brand new.

Because of the reach of the web, I have the luxury of being a niche supplier. Unlike the quilt shops in town, I don't have to buy for _everyone_, including stuff I don't like. I just buy stuff _I_ like and people with similar tastes track me down. 

I've done the garage-sale type stuff on eBay (for that matter, I still clean out my closets by dumping it all on eBay), but my bread and butter is my fabric store.


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## SquashNut (Sep 25, 2005)

when you add the fees, shipping and what you need to make, it makes it expensive for the buyer. E-bay is does seem to have to many rules too. From what I understand they used to not have much in the way of rules. Now they are going over board..

It's probably good to have many out lets for your stuff, good business sense regardless of e-bay policy.


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