Scavenger Life Episode 521: Evolving Ebay Relationship

Numbers and thoughts for last week:

Items in Store 1458
Items Sold 20
Total Sales $683.00
COGS $38.00
Total Profit $645.00
Average profit $32.25
Average sales price $34.15
New Listings 1
Items scavenged 12

Man, ebay has drastically taken a back seat to real life ™ the last few months. I barely have time to ship, much less list. I finally found an hour yesterday on the long weekend to do a bit of listing. My ebay plans for the summer have been completely blown up. That goal of getting to 2000 active listings is long gone. How is it July already???

I got a negative feedback this weekend. It was an international order and the item was damaged. I could have tried and worked with this guy to get him a refund and get the feedback revised but he was a bitter, unreasonable person with a language barrier. It wasn’t worth the effort it was gonna take. I just used the expanded character count to respond to the feedback and moved on with life.

Numbers and thoughts for this week

Items in Store 1457
Items Sold 17
Total Sales $714.00
COGS $87.00
Total Profit $627.00
Average profit $36.88
Average sales price $42.00
New Listings 16
Items scavenged 8

The only thought on my mind right now is that I simply must shut down sourcing. I’ve tapered it off greatly and pretty much only pick up high dollar items, but my listing time combined with my lack of space simply cannot support any more sourcing. Only getting high dollar items is STILL outpacing my listing ability time-wise. It’s not like I source alot either – 1-2 hours at thrifts a week and 1-2 hours doing yard sales on saturday.  That’s it. I’ve got enough items on hand to list for a year easy.

Weekly sales 7/4-7/10
Random Item Store
Total items 635
Items sold 20
New items listed 44
Gross sales $957.49
Net sales $724.84

Patch Store
Total items 2656
Items sold 46
New items listed 56
Gross sales $348.20
Net sales $265.42

Etsy
Orders 5
Gross sales $109.95
Net sales $93.46

Net sales total $1,083.72

Had a great week of sales, happy to see this now that eBay is my main stream of income. A good chunk of the profits came from a cb radio I found at an antique store for $20. I put it up for auction since it was the only one of that kind available online and it got bid up to $265.

Hopefully I can start netting over $1,000 a week regularly

Greetings!  Well I’ve put Ebay on the back burner for while and it seems Ebay also put me on the back burner.  A couple of sales here and there but really it wants the listing.  I’m doing a little R&R rather than listing still. The Pandemic Pounds are starting to come off and I’ve been feeling a lot less stressed.  We are catching up on a lot of medical screenings and appointments.  Get your colonoscopy Gen X friends!   I do need to get in the mood to sit and list at home, which I find harder after being forced to do my day job from home for over a year.

I’ve been thrifting pretty often and I’m proud to say that I graduated to that super fast scanner mode I used to see the long term resellers execute.  I can see with clarity a million things that are not worth my time.  I also feel like the stores are being heavily shopped, so I’m not sure if a lot of people are still getting government help and hitting up the thrifts in earnest. It seems I have more and more Gen Z competition too instead of just the old record and art guys.  Mainly I’m hunting for quality winter clothes for my son who is headed off to college in August.

Have a good week!  I’m following the social media for Luray Modern, etc. and you guys have such great taste.  Love it.  We’ll be spending time in the East but unfortunately not close enough to enjoy your Airbnb.

End of Quarter: Total Profit: $553.24 (Exceeded Goal by 32%)

Total Listed: 76 (eBay)

Items Sold: 3 (eBay)

Items Listed Last Two Weeks: 2 (Goal Achieved!)

Total Profit: $132.29

Average Profit Per Item: $44.13

Highest Profit: $100.55 (Used Men’s Gucci Watch)

Goal This Week: 0 (Family and House Issues)

Go For: I’m going to try to squeeze in time to list two items.

P.S. I finally ordered something by mistake.  I was looking at a particular used hoodie and ended up ordering the wrong size. They shipped before I noticed so I will just flip on Mercari.  I was on my phone and the size was in the title but got cut off.  Oof.

Numbers for the whole month of June 2021

Total listings: 1242
Items sold: 43
Sales: $918.57
Highest price sold: $62 – Small Rosenthal Tree of Life Menorah
Average price sold: $21.36
Cost of items sold: $154.00 / Average cost: 3.58 each
Spent on new inventory: $370.21
Number of items listed: 61

Since the eBay deadline was fast approaching for the required item specifics update, I spent the better part of a full day updating listings that eBay indicated needed fixing. Almost all of them were for books that already had all of the requested item specific information in the title.

Total Items in Store: 163

Items Sold: 9

Total Sales: $211.44

Highest Price Sold: $135 Breyer Vintage Collector Club horse

I echo many commenters – life got busy recently and eBay took a back seat for a while. Luckily I still had a trickle of sales, but I will need to get back in listing mode soon. Storeroom is full, but I did spend time organizing the shipping area so that will be easier to do. I do wish I had room for a dedicated photo setup, but I do what I can with what I have to work with.

One project I am working on is tracking and organizing my estate sale company information. There are some that are firm on prices, some negotiate, some make everything free the last day, some provide receipts. I have created a file to track that information so I can better decide where to spend my sourcing time. Great sales I will always attend, but hopefully I can save some time avoiding the mediocre ones with inflexible or high pricing.

Oh, and one strategy that has been working for me improving my listings is adding every detail I can think of when listing items that have competition. For instance I recently sold a vintage weekly appointment calendar with celebrity pictures. There were others for sale and none sold, so I put every darn celebrity name in the description, and sure enough mine sold. Did the same with a vintage Disneyland map, listing all the attractions that are no longer there, and vintage magazines I list with defunct advertisers (Western Airlines, Pan Am, railroads and the like) named and put in the photographs. So far my selling success is improved and in many cases I got more money than the identical items currently listed by others. It takes a bit more time, but I think it is helping!

7/4/21 – 7/10/21
Total Active Items (2 different stores): 340
Items Sold: 7
Gross Sales: $170.64
Highest Price Sold: $79 plus shipping – 1972 cruise book for the USS LEXINGTON training aircraft carrier.
Returns:  $15 (an INR for postcard sent without tracking to UK)
COGS: $5 (including consignment commissions but not including cost of any family castoffs sold)
New Listings: 0
$ Spent on New Inventory: $0

That was a great tip in the podcast for military to get in for mental health help under the guise of marriage counseling.

Hello!

Numbers for the last TWO weeks. I have made large investments in several really good online auctions that happened to be all in the last two weeks.

I am paying my FIL, who is looking for some extra cash, to pick these up out of town, which is working out really well and allowing me to expand my reach greatly and bid on stuff I otherwise wouldn’t. It’s beautiful.

Luckily I made a single really good sale that has more than covered these investments. (The last of my HVAC controllers, the best pick I ever made, have now sold to the same buyer.)

Sales (2 weeks): CAD$23,569, 13 sales, COGS: $1171, Fees: ~$3064, Postage: $134 –> Gross profit: $19,200

Expenses: $2211, New inventory: $11883 –> Cashflow: $6277

7/3/21-7/9/21

Total Items In Store: 2324
Items Sold: 36
Gross Sales: $964.64
Highest Price Sold: $150 – (Lot of Ceramic Insulation Tubes)
Average Price Sold: $26.80

Returns:  0 $0
Money Spent on New Inventory: $8
Number of items listed: 26

• Scavenge of the week: I bought a set of Callaway golf clubs with a high end bag and very nice pull cart at a yard sale for $50.  I tried the clubs and hit them about the same as my set, so decided to sell them as they are newer and worth more than mine.  I gave the bag to my son’s girlfriend who needed a bag and I kept the pull cart for myself.  My wife is keeping the 2 drivers to try out and will give me back the one she doesn’t want.  So far, I’ve sold 5 of the clubs for $247 and have 6 more still listed and will eventually list one of the drivers.
• Last week, my wife and I spent over a week in Omaha with my SIL who lost her son. Very sad, but I am blessed to have the freedom now to go and spend more than a week helping out the family.  I would never have been able to do that on short notice with no planned return date with my full time job.

I just came back from a week long vacation in Sanibel, Florida. My sister used a barter company to trade for a very upscale rental. My dad owns a business, but he is retired. My sister runs the company and uses a local barter company to get many items or services at wholesale. A member of the barter company can purchase items from them for credit, and then my sister uses that credit to get other things in the system.

Anyway, they had an extra room in the house that could fit two people, so my son and I decided to go. The one bummer was that Elsa (the tropical storm) came to visit on Tuesday, and most places on the island closed for safety.

Since we took the Autotrain down to Florida, which we had to board at the Lorton, VA train station, we left a day early to visit Luray. We were able to meet up with Jay at Broadporch Coffee the morning of July 3, and spend about 15 minutes just chatting and basically saying hello. The coffee shop is just wonderful, and business was hopping. We had an excellent breakfast with exceptional coffee. It was really nice to meet Jay in person and just chat.

I walked around in the downtown area after breakfast and saw a few other coffee shops in the area. None of them were busy. While I was in Broadporch, I overheard a customer talk about how much they loved the place. Jay and Ryanne (and their partners) are doing something right; that’s for sure.

The reason we took the Autotrain is so that I could pick up free stuff from my parents’ downsizing friends. During the pandemic, my parents couldn’t bring the stuff up as often as they normally do, so their garage was packed. We’ve agreed that they don’t need to do that anymore. I will take a plane to visit from now on. If they can’t refuse their friends, then they can only bring what they can take in their car and donate the rest.

The Autotrain, for those of you who aren’t aware of it, takes passengers and their cars from Lorton, VA to Sanford, FL (near Orlando) overnight. This is great for families traveling to Orlando or close by and snowbirds with homes or rentals in Florida. The big issue is that coach class is very uncomfortable for sleeping. This time, I paid extra for a “roomette” in the sleeper cars. I was able to lie down and get much more comfortable, but I was still in and out of sleep because of the noise and motion. My parents use coach and don’t seem to mind it as much.

I haven’t caught up enough to do my numbers, but I had a long handling time, so my sales were minimal. Maybe a bit over $100 with the highest being $25.

Hello, everybody! Long time since I’ve posted. I’ve still been listening each week and reading the forum responses semi-regularly, but just not logging in to post for some reason. In my world, it’s still just a very strange transitional time right now being able to travel/move freely about the cabin a lot more, but also it’s been one of the most love-hate seasons with eBay. On one hand, my sales have been glacially slow (it is weirdly comforting to see that I’m not the only one!), and on the other hand, with my store chock-full of 11k listings/12k items, I’ve been personally transitioning more into a maintenance mode rather than all-out empire building. I think I’d feel a little better about that transition if things weren’t so incredibly slow, but alas, we are all in a transition economy/market-wise, and in the middle of summer to boot!

So I’m working on being patient and doing eBay on my own terms rather than letting my sales direct my feelings about it. I feel confident that my weekly sales will eventually get around to acting like a 12k item store ought to be producing (in my opinion, and based on the 3+ years of data pre-pandemic I have on my store performance). Meanwhile, I’m shipping stuff out and searching for the gems only! The good news is, I’m keeping myself to about 15 hours a week of eBay, freeing up LOADS of time for other creative projects, which is the dream. All my creative projects are fueled by Broadporch coffee at this point, by the way lol! I’m still loving every single delivery I get!

By the way, I am happy to report that I’ve sold almost 100 copies of my book about my eBay store… that may not sound like much to some, but it’s more than I ever imagined I’d sell, and it’s not even a year old. So that’s pretty cool!

How about some store numbers?

July 4-10th, 2021
Active Listings: 10,951
Number of Items Sold: 31
Gross Sales: $709.97
COGs: $13.82
Highest Sale Item: $55.09 (Unbranded Vintage Blonde Scandinavian Display Doll)
Average Sale Price: $22.90
Returns: 2 (for fit)
Sourcing Cost: $0

It’s sobering. This is the slowest week I’ve had since June of 2020 (when I only had 4700 active listings), and today I’ve only sold one thing so far. I had three days last week where I sold one thing each day. I can’t even remember how long it’s been since that happened! Here’s to hoping for an acceleration for all of us. I’m very thankful to be part of this particular community; being able to see everyone’s numbers and hear your individual voices and experiences is a gift.

6-27-21 to 7-3-21
Total Items in Store: 1544
Items Sold: 7
Gross Sales: 281.87
Net Sales: 219.79
Cost of Items Sold: $ 3.50
Highest Price Sold: $ 99.00 coin set
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $ 4
Number of items listed this week: 20

7-4-21 to 7-10-21
Total Items in Store: 1559
Items Sold: 7
Gross Sales: 204.99
Net Sales: 145.56
Cost of Items Sold: $ 10
Highest Price Sold: $ 47.00 Uncirculated Eagle coin
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $ 15
Number of items listed this week: 25

Chugging along. Took the time to convert all of my listings over to free shipping this past week. It is easier for me to keep track of that way and simplifies my listing and business policies. Plus combining shipping is easy too.

Still trying to figure out how GSP and free shipping work together. I’ve had customers say that my listings do not mention I will ship outside the US and I’ve had customers order an item and all I have to do is ship it to KY for it to leave the US. Confusing.

I really enjoyed the video recommended in the other thread about listing tips. I will be using those tips going forward and working to update existing listings as possible.

Stay cool everyone!

I’ve really appreciated all of the openness and honesty around mental health in the recent episodes. I love scavenging, but it can be lonely being a scavenger, and the honesty in the podcast and on the forums reminds me that I’m part of a community and a way of thinking. It’s been inspiring me a lot lately.

In one of my posts in early June, I mentioned a goal of wanting to reach 3000 listings by the end of the summer. I was nervous to type it and put myself out there. I didn’t think I could or would get there, like most of us listing is not my favorite part eBay even though we are just hoarders if we don’t list or ship.

But I’ve been extremely productive recently, especially with a number of rainy days, so I might make it to 3000 listings (no jinx) a full month earlier than I planned, by the end of July. It feels great. The bubble has definitely burst for a lot of the less knowledgeable card sellers, but my sales have remained steady enough to cover the bills and new inventory and then some. Just wanted to share some hope in the slow season.

7/4/21 – 7/10/2021

Total items in store: 2858

Items sold: 52 (27 from best offer, 8 from seller initiated offer)

Gross sales: $2536.61 (up 103.6% from one year ago)

Net sales: $1754.86 (up 102.1% from one year ago)

Highest price sold (net): $149.87 — RJ Hampton autographed patch rookie card

For reference, Hampton is a talented but very unproven basketball player and this is one of his nicer autographed patch cards from one of the more expensive sets. You could, if you were inclined, buy a card with just his autograph from a lesser set for $10 or less. Or there are some of his cards that are even fancier and more expensive. So this should give you a good sense of how the modern card market works. There is a tremendous speculative frenzy around the popular players and sets every year in every sport.

I purchased this card a few months ago at auction (like almost everything I list) and then it sat in death piles until the day I listed it. It sold that same day, which is always a nice surprise. Between the time I bought the card and sold it, Hampton was traded to an underachieving team and should get a real chance to prove his worth next season. Maybe he’ll be amazing and the card will spike in value, in which case I hope my buyer makes a great profit on the card, too. But I always prefer to take the sale now. As long as I’m selling, there will always be more opportunities to buy.

Lowest price sold (net): $7.00 — Frank Robinson sketch card

This card is from the ultra-expensive Topps Transcendent set, which is a wild set that is sold almost exclusively to case breakers. I don’t deal in case breaks because I am a scavenger but they are a huge part of the contemporary card world. Essentially you buy a spot or multiple spots (often the spots are differentiated around a particular team or player) in a case (multiple boxes, usually 8 to 12) of a specific set of cards. Then the breaker opens the cards on camera and mails out the cards for each spot. For cheaper and less popular sets, each spot is relatively inexpensive ($20 or less) but for more expensive or brand new sets (like Topps Transcendent) each spot can cost hundreds of dollars. Spots also get more expensive depending on the popularity of a particular team or player.

Sometimes you get lucky and receive an amazing card, an autograph or artist’s sketch or beautiful piece of jersey. But more often your team doesn’t hit, or doesn’t hit anything good, so you receive nothing or a card like the one I sold that’s not worth much. If you want, you can immediately resell it through an eBay auction, usually through the same breaker who sold you the spot, so you never touch the card. Then someone like me buys it up when the bid goes for $3 or less, hoping to resell it for $10 a few months down the line. But you and the breaker don’t really care because you’re already thinking about the next break.

Is all of that a little bit sad? Maybe it is. It’s a shame because there is some real craftsmanship behind cards like this — this is a print of an artist’s sketch in a metal frame, and Frank Robinson (like all of the players in the set) is a baseball legend, not some random backup outfielder. Despite being limited to just 100 copies, the card’s not hard to find because of the nature of how it’s obtained (almost exclusively through breaks). So there are 11 other active listings for the same exact card, and the only reason mine sold was because it was the lowest priced one. Now that my sales are high enough to invest in better inventory, I prefer to buy and sell cards that are more unique, and have one or two other copies on eBay at any given time. This way I’m not constantly competing with other sellers on price. That might work for many sellers (and it’s very common with card sellers in particular) but I don’t enjoy it.

I’m also in the mega-slow sales rut too.  Sorry to hear you guys are also having the USPS pick up problem as well.  In my area, I haven’t been able to get a pick up done in the last 3 years. I’ve tried everything I can but have accepted it will not change.  We have more pressing issues here in Oakland including routine mail theft.  We’ve had our mail stolen 12-15 times in the last year. Its hard to explain to people that our situation is so bad here.

Darlin Dils,

I agree…I’ve always found that adding info for things like magazines, etc is well worth the time…my question is, do you put the info in the description only, or do you make custom item specifics as well?

So far I have done limited customizing of the item specifics – mainly for those things I know collectors search for. I listed a few magazines and under topics listed some of the advertisers, for my theme park maps I list popular but no longer present rides under character and so on. If I have a choice of category I will pick one with more item specifics I can use. So far it is working for me, either I sell something that others have listed but not sold or mine sells for more than the competition. Gotta find an ‘edge’ for some items, or at least find a way to get through to an interested buyer among all the other listings.

DarlinDils, thanks. I agree, the tactic can definitely give you a competitive edge, and I think for two reasons: 1. Buyers realize the item holds significance for them within their collecting interest. and 2. Buyers realize that the seller is more than a listing machine, the seller is someone who shares their interest in old stuff. I think that helps make a subtle connection between buyer and seller.