Scavenger Life Episode 335: Strategizing Out of Our Own Sweatshop

Really unusual and somewhat alarming, that we have two stores and have not sold 1 item this weekend. The only reason I even know our stores are still online is that we received a bid for a purse today. Wow! Hopefully others are selling, because we are not. One store has nearly 700 items and the other has 125. Typically we sell on average 3-5 items per day. In fact, we spent the better part of this weekend actively listing, as well. Looking forward to hearing how others are doing!

RR Store Week Nov 12-18, 2017

Total Items in Store: 1,383
Items Sold: 33
Cost of Items Sold: $37.64
Total Sales: $590.63
Highest Price Sold: $85 (vintage 7-Up menu board)
Average Price Sold: $17.90
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $10.25
Number of items listed this week: 17

Kinda figured it would be a slow week. Still dealing with a health issue, but there is light at the end of the tunnel. Gotta keep plugging away when I can.

So this week I sold an item that I previously sold a few months ago. No clue how that happened. And it’s the second time; same thing hapened last month. Tomorrow I’m going to call ebay and see if I can at least get the defects removed. Such a strange glitch.

*Paul*

Soap poo 🙂

Can’t wait to listen in the morning and see what you spent $1000+ on… hope it’s an amazing cache!

Week November 12-18, 2017

Total Items in Store: 917
Items Sold: 32 (3 Amazon)
Cost of Items Sold: $270 (20.7% of sales)
Total Sales: $1,301.93
Highest Price Sold: $237.59 (1962 Barbie) & $150 (48 Star Bulldog Bunting Flag)
Average Price Sold: $40.69
Returns: 1
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 0
Promoted listings test: 20 sales, $910 (69.9% of total sales), $51.34 fees (5.6% of sales)

Tremendous week for me! Close to all time highs in volume & gross sales. That $40+ average sold is super nice too. Two big sales in the Barbie & the flag above, but also was selling $50 items left & right as well (11 total $50+ items sold). Also sold 6 items today to kick the week off really nice. One thing I’ve noticed is that I’m selling a lot more through promoted listings recently… since I started promoted listings back in January, a typical week would be 20%-35% of my sales, but for the past several weeks it has been 50%+. Not complaining, but interesting… perhaps with more users (including several unregistered users) around the holidays, the promoted listings are beneficial?

No listing this weekend as we are preparing to host Thanksgiving for my parents, my wife’s parents, and her sister. Grocery shopping, cleaning, laundry, and all the rest in preparation. I’m off work on Wednesday, so I might try to get a few things up and listed before the family chaos starts. 🙂

• This reply was modified 8 years, 2 months ago by Brian Treasures from Grandmas.
• This reply was modified 8 years, 2 months ago by Brian Treasures from Grandmas.
• This reply was modified 8 years, 2 months ago by Brian Treasures from Grandmas.

I haven’t even finished listening to the show yet–but I must know the story on the Hi Ball jacket! did the guy who bought the jacket for $50 not pay? did he return it? How did you determine that it is from the 20’s? I honestly couldn’t determine the age when I looked at the listing last week since the company made jackets until at least the 50’s, at any rate congratulations on the ending auction value–just proves that really old denim is still fetching high prices, and that auctions still work for some rare items. BTW, is the high bidder in Seattle?

11/12/17 – 11/18/17

Total Items In Store: 2,064
Items Sold: 11
Cost of Items Sold: $40 (around)
Total Sales: $411
HIghest Price Sold: $90 (Eddie Bauer Jacket)
Average Price Sold: 36.36
Returns: 1
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $ 43.44
Number of Items listed this week: 25

Just a so so week. I went hunting this week and looks like most everyone on ebay went also. But, even
while I was hunting, I was able to hunt down some New Dockers sweaters at an outlet shop on the cheap. The MSRP on them was $68. They were selling them $2.99 each with a 20% discount. I went all in on the “good” sweaters and bought 10 for $25.36 – including tax and the discount. Also got a Pokemon shirt for $0.84 and some Basketball Offical’s Black pants for $4.24.

Mark

Ryanne,
You made an excellent point about ebay teaching buyers that they can create a situation that allows them to keep items and their money and then repeat the behavior. This is one of the greatest areas of weaknesses for eBay. They are inconsistant with consistancy. They positively reinforce negative behaviors and/or behavior’s they say they do not want or approve of due to their lack of consistancy. This causes alot of chaos and drama and is a huge waste of time. Time spent trying to figure out their pattern of inconsistant consistancy could be spent sourcing, listing, and/or packing.

Nov 12 – Nov 18, 2017
Total Items in Store: 354
Items Sold: 20
Cost of Items Sold: approx. $20
Total Sales: $ 313.54 (but $220.57 if cashmere sweater/0 feedback customer doesn’t pay)
Highest Price Sold: $92.97 Armani cashmere sweater, but looks like they’re not going to pay, so let’s go with $47.99 for an avocado green chevron afghan.
Average Price Sold: $15.67 / $11.03 (low.. been auctioning off inventory I want to purge)
Returns: 0
International Sales: 1
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $55.48
Number of items listed this week: 16

Meal prepping really helped this past week. Smoothies for breakfast, salads for lunch or dinner… & sometimes also for breakfast if I didn’t remember to defrost a smoothie. This week will do it again, and hopefully up the ante w/ some hot food prep. Love the podcast talk about the airplane meals & soap conservation. Here’s to a good week of sales and not eating out.

Week of Nov. 12-18, 2017
Total Items in Store: 472
Items Sold: 25
Cost of Items Sold: $66
Total Sales: $574
Highest Price Sold: $59.50 (Red Wing fire fighter combat boots)
Average Price Sold: $22.96
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $121
Number of items listed this week: 21
Sold prices do not include shipping charges (we do not offer free shipping).
Store ratio: 2/3 used clothing, 1/3 non-clothing/yard sale type items.

Net “profit” for the week, $383 (after all fees and purchase costs). Average net sale $15.32, this week, ($17-$18 usually). Ave. profit per hour, $23 (includes listing & shipping 3-5 items per 2 hours worked), a little less than the usual $25-$30 per hour.

Had a great week selling snow boots and other cold weather items. 2/3 of inventory was priced at 15% off sale to get things moving and to sell winter items before Christmas. Money spent on new inventory during 6 thrift store visits ($121), and should bring in $700-800 in future sales.

Yesterday, a cashier at a thrift complimented me on my blanket lined, jeans jacket I was wearing. Told him I bought it at his company. And the jeans I was wearing, and the sweatshirt, and the belt and shoes ($18 total!).

Good morning! So excited to see the new mobile format for the forums here. 😃. I was just running November numbers and we have listed 274 items and sold 307. Not bad!

Anyhow, just wanted to log in and say thank you for being the one show that gets us through Monday morning shipping every week and Happy Thanksgiving!

Great podcast this week. Maximizing the value of my time is a huge preoccupation of mine on eBay. I am new, but I think I’ve done OK at keeping my sale price around $100… which does mean only an average of 4-5 sales per week. It means passing by a lot of stuff that could make money. I think I have done pretty well at getting even higher dollar sales, it seems like I can get $500+ every 3 weeks or so on average.

Many of those very big sales have one thing in common: *they are items used for productive purposes rather than personal luxury.* My current thinking is that this is how you scale. Organizations have deeper pockets than individuals, and even non-rich individuals are willing to spend more for things that help them make money, versus something cool for the house. Example: I just purchased a lot of 4 new inventory scanners for CAD$215, expecting to sell each for $200-300. We’ll see if that pans out for me, but if it does it will not be a grind!

The trick is finding this business/industrial/scientific/medical stuff… currently my obsession. I only really have one steady source of it at the moment.

Anyways… decent week this week, though it doesn’t look like it on paper.

Sales: CAD$416, 4 items, $104/item average
COGS: $15
Expenses: $353
Net profit: -$21
Hours: 7, hourly rate -$3
Notable sales: vintage IBM typewriter $5–>$175 (I CAN’T STOP FINDING & SELLING GIANT TYPEWRITERS PLZ HELP)
Listings: 11 items, at least $440

My expenses were through the roof because of the inventory scanners I mentioned above.

I had some GREAT scavenging this week though, feel really energized again. 54 blank specialty tape cassettes for $5, should get me $200+, lot of 4 Givenchy perfumes for $25, should get me $300+. Never sold perfume before, but I thought to look ’em up thanks to you guys.

…And a huge cache of about 300 sewing patterns for $10. Some new, some used, mostly from the 70s. So here’s where your podcast is very apropos – lot these things up or do the grind? Need some advice here.

If I lot them up I think I’d get about $200-300 without burning more than a few calories.
On the other hand, I think they’ll ship individually in an envelope with a stamp… mostly a bunch of $5-10 sales BUTTTTT looking at solds, the odd one goes for $40-100. So I would only need to find like 5 of those kind to make more money than a lot sale. Have any of you guys sold these things? How often do you find a good one in a random lot? How do you price them? I figure the time invested is… well, about 30 minutes cradle-to-grave for the lot sale, versus maybe 30 hours to photograph, list, pick, and ship all the individual ones. I can’t make up my mind which way to go. It all depends how much more I’ll get from the individual sales…

On the soap question. I love the idea that Ryanne makes detergent out of the slivers! That really is peak scavenger performance. I am partial to Jay’s method, but I find if you get a new soap out of the cupboard when the first one begins to be a sliver, and stick them together well, you can have an unbroken apostolic succession of soap without any strange multiple-sliver chimeras. Does this constitute one soap, or multiple soaps? I suppose it depends on your purposes in asking. Philosophers since antiquity have known this conundrum as the Soap of Theseus.

Total Items in Store: 909
Items Sold: 15
Cost of Items Sold: $80
Total Sales: $599
Profit: $519
Highest Price Sold: 165 Star Wars AT AT walker toy
Average Price Sold: $39.93
Average Profit: $34.60

What a sneaky week! It felt horrible, but in the end wasn’t terribly bad. I have two items that I don’t think will be paid for, so knock $75 off my numbers for them.

This week my wife challenged me to tackle my toys death pile. I have had unlisted toys taking up valuable space for over a year now. Well, challenge accepted! As I painfully make my way through cleaning, testing, and listing toys I realize why I quit: 90% of them aren’t worth the effort involved. When I first started this ebay business, retro toys and electronics were the backbone of it. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll still sell toys & electronics but my profit barrier is much higher. I’m basically to the point the sales price has to be $100+ to mess with an electronic toy. I’ve trashed or donated back multiple items out of this toy stash.

In other news, I bought a truck load of insulation to insulate my garage ceiling this week for the ebay room conversion. I’ve gone back & forth over whether to do blown in insulation in the walls. Some folks online say to do it, others say it’s a waste and can cause problems and insulating ceiling is good enough. Currently the garage walls have vinyl siding attached to foam insulation board, then empty joist spaces.

Oh did I mention truck? On that front I bought another truck on Thursday. This is my third one. I’ve made about $1200 selling the two trucks before it. I’ll definitely buy/sell 2-3 vehicles a year as part of my scavenger sales plan going forward.

Week of 11/12-11/18
Total Items in Store: 1,669
Number of Items Listed: 98
Number of Items Sold: 120 (includes 4 Bonanza, 2 TruGether, 10 Etsy)
Weekly STR: 30%
Total Product Sales: $3,462
Cost of Items Sold: $804
Gross Profit for Week: $2,321
Highest Item Sold: $140 – NEW Model Trailways Concord Stagecoach Wood Model Kit
Competition: Highest Priced Sale: Veronica CRUSHED the week and Veronica leads for the year 26-19.

Best. Week. Ever.

We had another Grand Slam Day on Tuesday (had a sale on all four platforms). Our expansion onto Etsy by leveraging SixBit has been solid as well, with 13 items sold since we started in late October. By using SixBit to have the info from our eBay listing, and just making the necessary changes to make the Etsy listing, it has made listing on Etsy efficient and profitable.

Our listing number took a little bit of a hit this week as I had to make an unexpected trip up to Missoula to pick up my dad and bring him down to Denver for a few weeks. 25 hours of driving in a 37 hour period…I feel like Bandit Darville…

We are dealing with some interesting shipping issues. We have a pair of Rock Revival Jeans that went to Saudi Arabia…but haven’t arrived. Tracking as stopped in Dammam since 10/24. We are most likely going to have to eat a refund, and I will just keep checking the tracking to see if they arrive.

Then we have a pair of Lucky Jeans that were shown as Delivered, but the buyer asked to have them sent to another address. He says that the original place refused the package and that they are supposed to be sent back to us. We will send on and bill him the second shipping charge if we get them. Tracking now shows as Forwarded, so we are watching it.

THEN, we have a pair of Rock Revival jeans that the tracking says “unable to deliver item, problem with address”. Buyer messaged us and we are on the lookout to see if they are returned so that we can verify the address and resend the jeans.

Very strange how they are all hitting now…but you know how things move in threes…

Total Items in Store: 405
Items Sold: 17
Cost of Items Sold: $127 + $13 free shipping
Total Sales: $510
Highest Price Sold: $63 Arts & Crafts Mug
Average Price Sold: $30
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $200+
Number of items listed this week: 3 ugh, so busy.

Pretty good week for me even without listing, though some days were completely dead so I’m having waves of sales. I have good luck with multiples and Pinterest with my new items. Super fun time this week sourcing an indy thrift Christmas Boutique. This store is manned by older ladies and located near an enclave in our town with homes in the multi-millions. They save their best and Christmas stuff all year for this event and I found some brand new Cutco, Williams Sonoma linens, Folkmanis puppets and other goodies. I was twice asked if I was a reseller that day so that was kind of a bummer. I just kind of sidestepped the question and told them about my youngest child. My contract work is very busy and we have family in town so very difficult to list at the moment. I got up at 3 am so I listened to the podcast and I’m posting this.

Thank you for the podcast and good luck with your high end items! I hope they do really well for you and move on soon. Don’t forget to consider spending more time in the urban areas to look for stellar deals too. Busy, well off working people (like your coffee machine movers) spin off good stuff due to convenience. I’m confident you would do well with that approach and get some shorter tail stuff in your mix. Best, Christine

Just listened to the podcast and can really relate to your thinking about spending more to sell fewer, more expensive items. My husband and I have been thinking along the same lines lately and spending more to acquire some original art and other valuables through online auctions. Also trying to discipline ourselves at estate sales: we won’t stay at a sale if it seems like we’ll only get a big pile of small items or if the organizers don’t seem to be discounting high-ticket items or working with resellers. A few more thoughts about listing less vs. more valuable:

– Only list less valuable items (ie, $10-25) that are fairly easy to ship (especially the $10 ones). Example: I recently bought a big container of vintage hat pins for $20 and can sell them in lots of 3-5 for $15-$20 each. Good example of what is worthwhile to sell for less as they are very easy to bundle and ship in an envelope. Compare this to a vintage oval framed print I just sold for $25: It wouldn’t fit into any ordinary size box so I spent almost an hour trying to find a box, wrap it so it wouldn’t bend, and make a custom box. Bad idea!

– Our sales strategy might change as we shift to more valuable items. I could be wrong on this, but I think that customer reviews and marketing might matter more to buyers who look for fine art or other high priced items on eBay. And you might get more repeat buyers. Personally, if I was going spend $1000-plus on a painting, I would care about and read the seller reviews and generally want to know more about them. Maybe buy a couple of smaller items first. To this end, I’m investing time in certain long-term efforts that don’t have an immediate payoff: ie, sending out a weekly customer newsletter (getting emails through Facebook ads).

– Appraisals. Looking into getting original art appraised. It makes me more confident in selling it and also helps me learn about the market. It’s nice to get higher selling prices but along with that is risk; I’m nervous about not sounding like I know what I’m talking about!

– Finally – interesting to hear about your knife sale. We just sold a vintage collectible knife that had Arabic lettering engraved on the blade, a carved lion head handle, and leather sheaf. Listed for $195; sold for $150. (purchased at a tag sale for $5).

Not huge volume and low selling avg price. Gearing up to get a lot done the early part of this week and then enjoying the Holiday. Thanksgiving is the best! hope everyone has a great week.

11/12-11/19

Total items in store (beginning of week): 780
Items sold: 12
Weekly sell through: % 1.54
Total Sales: $252.35 (no shipping)
Average price: $21.03
Cost of items sold: $35.19
Gross profit: $217.16
Highest item sold: Sony STR-K790 FM Stereo /FM-AM Receiver & Subwoofer & 5 speakers & Remote bundle – 68 dollars sale, cost 21 Dollars
New items listed: 93
Asking price of new items listed: $2005.93
Cost of new items listed: $82

Nov 13-19
Items in store: 785
Items sold: 27
Sales: $639.00
COGS: $53.25
Highest: $99 for pair of Blundstone boots for which I paid $3 at church thrift; followed by $59 French perfume promo hoodie ($2 at dame thrift) and a $50 talking vintage Vox Clock that cost $1 at yard sale.

I did also sell a pair of Gucci boots for $220 that I had stupidly bought for $175 in rookie days. I didn’t count that since I basically just made my money back.

Listen to the podcast this morning while packing up sales from the weekend. I’ve gone Keto/low carb too, and since May I’ve lost 29 lbs. I’d love to have your coconut flour recipe pizza. I usually make one with cheese and almond flour that’s pretty good.

I also pulled a Jay and went all in a bought a basket full of 59 Disney watches for Only $15 and two designer signatures ones for $50. All of them need new batteries. So I’m excited to get them listed.

Store Week 11/12/17 – 11/18/17

Total items in store: 1631
Items sold: 30
Cost of items sold: $22.10
Total sales: $886.10
Highest price sold: $140.00 (Vintage Halloween Die-Cut Decoration)
Average price sold: $29.54
Returns: 0
Money spent on new inventory this week: $72.00

Moved a lot of items this week! I was really excited to sell the Halloween decoration. This is one thing that I think I’d like to collect myself, but I can’t bear to keep them at these prices! I’ll post a link on the what sold forum.

Listened to your conversation about hotel soaps, etc. Certain brands can be re-sold on Ebay in lots. Bath and Body Works; Paul Mitchell; Neutrogena are lots I have sold in the past. I purchased an entire basket of travel sized hotels, shampoos, etc. from my thrift store…probably more than 1000 items for $50 and easily made 10x that grouping and selling.

Nov. 12 – 18
Total Items in Store: 877
Items Sold: 22
Total Sales (Gross Profit): $558
Highest Price: $50 (Vintage Walt Disney World Hat)
Average Price: $25
Returns: 1
Cost of Items Sold: $38
Costs of Items Purchased this Week: $48

It was a pretty average week for me as well. I sold a lot of lower dollar items at the beginning of the week, but then sales slowly dried up at the end of the week.

Went to an estate sale on Saturday. It was a bust. Barely anything that interested me. I ended up buying a couple electronics that I can probably make 10 or 20 bucks off of. But instead of calling it a day, I decided to try my luck at my favorite Goodwill outlet store. I did a lot better, finding all kinds of cool stuff including a brand new digital picture frame and a practically unworn vintage wool overcoat. I reckon I’ll make an easy $400 profit from everything.

I had one return this week. I sold an old metal fishing net float for $75. I got a message a few days after they’ve received it saying that it was made out of aluminum and not steel. Well (A) I never said it was steel. And (B) when I got it back, I did a magnet test and it was indeed made out of steel. I think they just had buyer’s remorse. Luckily, they didn’t try to cheat the system to get me to pay for shipping.

Have you tried Instant Pot Steel Cut Oats yet? They’re really easy and so flippin good! It’s just 1 part oats to 3 parts almond milk. Then add in whatever toppings you prefer. Pressure cook for 3 minutes and do a natural pressure release. Though if you’re trying to eat low-carb meals, they’re probably not something that you’d want to make often.

For the “soap poo” have you considered putting them in a little pouch and using them up that way? They sell them at fancy soap stores like Basin, but you could just as easily make one for free using a washcloth. It’s actually called a “soap saver bag” https://basin.com/soap-saver-bag/

This week was quite good for me. I don’t sell particularly holiday-ish items either, so my sales are consistently about $600-$800 a week. I’m trying to spend on inventory at yard sales mostly right now so I can hopefully get that up to $1000 a week. My COGS this week is low because I’m still selling items that I got for free from a house that a friend was flipping. She is always buying and flipping houses so I’m hopeful that she’ll buy another one with good stuff in it 🙂

Nov. 12 – 19
Total Items in Store: 999
Items Sold: 50
Total Sales (Gross Profit): $933.81
Highest Price: $54.95 (Vintage Lingerie Item)
Average Price: $18.68
Returns: 0
Cost of Items Sold: $24
Costs of Items Purchased this Week: $140 (sourced a lot which is unusual for me!)

Nov 12-18 2017

• Total Items in Store: 850
• Items Sold: 27 all ebay
• International 3 GSP
• Total Sales $2366
• Highest Price $700 Marilyn Monroe photos
• Average Price Sold: $88
• Returns: 0
• Cost of Items Sold: $720
• Cost of items purchased this week $112

Saw a pair of Reglor chalkware figurine lamps in pristine condition but were priced too high for me at $200.
I left my number to call me if they still had them after the sale.
They called, I went to look and offered $100 but they said no less than $150. Well they should have a very high resale so I agreed, I told them to be careful pulling the masking tape off they used for a price tag, she still pulled up two small flakes off the base, she felt bad and I ended up with them for $100, now I need to look into repairing the paint chips or perhaps selling as is.
They are quite impressive, tall gypsy dancers in red.

Comments on the podcast:

I have a much smaller store, but yet I have a reseller permit so that I don’t have to pay sales tax. It wasn’t difficult at all for me to get one in NJ. I can’t imagine that it would be difficult in VA if you have a registered business and a permit to collect sales tax. From the quick search I did, I think that is all you need in VA (but double-check that). Then you have to fill out a ST-10 form and submit that to your auction company.
https://www.tax.virginia.gov/sites/default/files/taxforms/exemption-certificates/any/st-10-any.pdf

I find that lots are bid up higher at auctions this time of year through the beginning of the next year. I went to one last week, and I didn’t buy anything until a few hours later when the crowd started to thin out a bit. And, yes, there are people who look through your stuff after a lot has been sold. I think that some people go just to hang out and look at the stuff, so they want to check out what you’ve bought. It is annoying.

Congrats on getting to a feedback of 9000! That’s quite some accomplishment. I’m at about 480 in my tiny little store, and I’m just excited that the color of my star will change at 500!

So here are my numbers:

Week of Nov 12-18
* Total Items in Store: 1178
* Items Sold: 22
* Cost of Items Sold: $22.68 + $60 Commission
* Total Sales: $458.78
* Highest Price Sold: $120 Wool fabric (on commission); $55 Williams-Sonoma pasta bowl set (non-commission)
* Average Price Sold: $20.85
* Returns: 0
* Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $34.50
* Number of items listed this week: 57

November 12 – 18th 2017
Total items in store: Etsy 482 // Ebay 624 (Items not crossposted I list different types of things on Etsy and Ebay)
Items Sold: Etsy 17 // Ebay 18
Cost of items Sold: Etsy $36.38 // Ebay $79.69
Total Sales: Etsy $209.45 // Ebay $323.24
Highest Price Sold: Keen Steel Toe Work Boots $45
Average Price Sold: $15.22
Returns: 0
Number of items listed this week: 20 (listed at $320)

Dealt with my files that vanished last week – rebuilt them from my backups. That took a lot of time unfortunately. Also had one mouse (probably actually a vole) get himself into my sump pump and another got into the house in the basement. Awesome. That is where I work and store all of my inventory. We caught those two but I am concerned more will get in, so I am having a pest company seal up all the holes they can find (for an absurd price) next Monday. For now, traps. Sometimes wish I was better at doing home repairs myself, but it will probably be much better done by an expert. So overall a pretty crappy listing week because of these issues.

My numbers for the week of 11/12/17:
Total Items in Store: 112
Items Sold: 17
Cost of Items Sold: $67
Total Sales: $533 + shipping
Highest Price Sold: $125 (Disney Castle)
Average Price Sold: $31.35
Returns: 0

Busy week as I prepare to host back to back Thanksgiving dinners…Thursday for my husband’s family and Friday for mine! But I am just finishing up my goal of getting all my seasonal stuff listed this week. Just a couple more pairs of boots to list. And I know I have one of those vintage troll head Christmas stockings in my deathpile somewhere!
I have a theory that eBay Search gives priority in Search ranking if you have a niche. My most recent experience in this is that I had purchased a cache of christmas collectibles from a lady…her entire collection. So had over a dozen of this one brand, different items listed. And I notice my listings are getting very high priority and I am selling them very quickly. It is definitely not the first time I’ve noticed this. But it seems like whenever I’m down to the “last one” (ie last pair of kids snow boots after selling a ton of them…) it will sit for much longer.
Hoping to come back and read through all the discussions above but I’ve got to start cooking! Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

That sounds like a neat experiment, but I would be worried about the additional insurance costs to be incurred on a stock that pricey. You don’t want to leave items that expensive hanging…have you considered using a service like u-pic to insure items? I believe there are other companies that also provide insurance that you can purchase per month, like unlimited plans.

It has been average this week (15-20 items out per day), but it has gotten busy over the past 24 hours. I had 40 packages to bring into the post office this morning! Glad I got the mail in that came in overnight out the door, as there are already another 4 packages ready to go out on Friday.

Hope everyone has busy Thanksgiving & Cyber Monday sales!

So, let me tell you how this snowbird handled her eBay inventory this year. Normally, we come to Arizona January, February and March. Last year, I only had about 200 items listed, so I was able to put it all into boxes in the back of my Ford Escape and bring it with me to Arizona. However, my transmission went out on the way down (not sure if it was due to the heavy inventory I loaded? I also had about 200,000 miles, so maybe it was just time). This year, we are here October through March and I have about 380 items listed. Since we came for a half a year, we brought many more items with us. I am a huge couponer and I couldn’t bring myself to pay full price for canned items, cleaning items, health & beauty items, etc. so we brought that with us as well as our bikes, etc. We ended up buying an enclosed trailer that I will be taking off our taxes as an item needed for my eBay business (since buying things at estate sales can sometimes need an enclosed trailer to bring home). Everything is in bins labels for identification purposes. It worked out well and I keep my bins in the trailer in the garage for extra protection.