New Beginnings: (but just the weekly numbers)

08/29/21 – 09/04/21

Total Items In Store: 3882
Items Sold: 13
Total Sales: $ 570.93
Highest Price Sold: $ 100 (Vintage Electronics)
Average Price Sold: $ 43.92
Money Spent on New Inventory: $ 125.58
Number of items listed: 66

Gut Sales Report for the week: Seemed a bit slow to me, but I had so higher ASP items sell, so the total sales were higher than I thought they would be.

Focus for the week (and this past summer): This was the last week of the summer trying to get 100 items a week listed because my summer help goes back to school this week.

Scavenge of the week: I found an older digital camera for cheap that looks like it may sell for decent money.

Thoughts for the week: Going through podcast withdrawal. Can anyone relate? However, still having the forum here helps. I am very happy with the photos and listing my help and I have been able to do this summer.
I have nearly 500 more listings now than I did in May.

Mark S

Total Listed: 72

Items Sold: 5

Items Listed: 4 (Exceeded goal by 2)

Items Ended: 4 (Ended clothes and shoes w/ severe flaws)

Total Profit: $109.50

Average Profit Per Item: $21.90

Highest Profit: $50.29 (“The 60s” TV Miniseries DVD)

Goal This Week: 2

Numbers for the whole month of August 2021

Total listings: 1234
Items sold: 95
Sales: $2,177.75
Highest price sold: $210 – 1994 Tailsman Magic Game (never played)
Average price sold: $22.92
Cost of items sold: $329.53 / Average cost: 3.47 each
Spent on new inventory: $114.50
Number of items listed: 70

I think this was the best sales month I ever had. A lot of it was due to a few large lots of old PC, Apple II, and PlayStation II games. I lucked out on the 1994 Tailsman game, as it had a damaged box, they only wanted $1.00 for it.

Thanks, R&J for all these years of great entertainment, information, instructions, and sharing our life with all of us trash elves.

We have a granddaughter at Liberty University this year and went to visit this weekend. There is no “good” way to get there from South Bend, IN and the way down was mostly 2 lane highways, through tiny towns, and up and down a mountain on very curvy roads.  We tried a different route going home, and hey!  Luray is 20 minutes off 29 that direction, and no way was I going to be that close and  not visit Broad Porch!

First, let me say that Luray was a huge surprise! I always pictured it being one of these one or two stoplight towns like the zillion we went through on this trip. Not at all! It is absolutely charming and bigger than we had ever pictured –  even has a Walmart!  Still old and small but super quaint and I wish I could remember how you found it. ( No podcast to answer, sigh!)

So we get downtown to Broad Porch.  Wow!  You guys did an amazing job!!  It was Sunday am, Labor Day weekend, so perhaps a bit busier than normal, but I counted at least 35 customers inside besides your employees, and at one point there was a bit of a line outside!  We had  to wait in line quite a while, but we didn’t mind.  It was so much fun to look around and see the things you had talked about on your podcast —  the reclaimed hardwood floors, the chairs, the harvest table, the picture of the lady drinking coffee and smoking, etc.  Wish we could have stayed to eat on the deck, but we already were adding to a 14 hour drive, but it was worth it!

2 bags of coffee, Southern Split and Cameroon, of course, a chocolate croissant and some kind of apricot toast thing (hmm).

Again, miss the podcast but wishing you the best.  Thanks for the memories!

I’m glad you are still posting your numbers Jay and keeping the forum open.

I had my store off for 3 weeks in August and off for 3 days so far in September so my numbers are horrendous!  I’ve also been too focused on listing clothing on ebay and Poshmark over the last year and my numbers reflect it.  They are slow sellers but in such abundance here near Atlanta plus easy to store and ship and I like scavenging it.  I need to pivot back towards hard goods for awhile or I’m not going to make it as full time seller much longer.

Store still closed. Once I’m able to go home my daughter is very interested in learning the whole eBay process.
Moved out of ICU yesterday to normal room. Progress is SLOW but progress is progress!
It’s hard to imagine being able to do normal things right now – very mentally taxing. Not being able to breathe is about as terrifying as things get.

A bit sad to wake up Monday with the knowledge no new show is coming.  Fortunately, I never went all the way back to the beginning to listen since my podcast app didn’t go back that far.  I’m going to start listening on YouTube so I can listen while I work.  If I space it out I figure I’ve got a few more years to listen. 🙂

Had a busy and fun week listing.  Posted a lot of high dollar items, so took extra time for researching.  I cherry picked some old german beer steins from a local estate sale that had a lot.  I got lucky and the estate sale pricer had simply priced them all the same even though there were drastic differences in quality.  It was an online estate sale with fixed prices.  This was my first time buying online where it wasn’t an auction.  At pick up they had everything that hadn’t sold available for offers and I picked up a few more.  All but one were from the 19th century.

Had two high dollar sales this week, a vintage Aladdin Blue Flame Heater that I purchased for $7 and sold for $200 and a Case hunting knife that I paid $5 and sold for $150.  Those two really saved my week.

Sales Report for: 9/4/21
Total Items in Store: 1142
Items Sold: 8
Gross Sales (Not including shipping and tax): $466.21
Net Sales (After fees): $393.09
Cost of Items Sold: $54.60
COGS Percent 13.89%
Net Profit Margin: 72.60%
Highest Price Sold: $199.95 Vintage Aladdin Blue Flame Heater
Average Price Sold: $58.28
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory: $0.00
Sold via promoted listings: 4
Promoted Percentage: 50.00%
Average Days Listed: 300
Longest Listed: 884
New items listed: 33

I have a project management certification where I have to meet 60 hours of ongoing education every three years. Seems like not a big deal, but I stopped working on them during the pandemic because the in-person meetings were cancelled. For some reason, I didn’t think to listen to online webinars. So, I’ve got five more I have to listen to in the next few weeks, and that is what I will be doing Monday mornings 🙂 . I should probably keep listening so this doesn’t happen to me again in three years time, although I’ll be happy to substitute the podcast if you guys decide to do one here and there.

My sales are still slow. I had three trips in August, so I have hardly listed. I was able to somewhat get back on the bandwagon last week, and I hope to do better this week.

Week of Aug 29 – Sept 4
Total Items in Store: 1353 eBay, 39 Etsy
Items Sold: 9 eBay
Cost of Items Sold: $11.50 + $0 Commission
Total Sales: $155.80 eBay
Highest Price Sold: $42 Set of gold tone appetizer knives in box
Average price: $17.30
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 7

Just popping in to say that I missed the podcast.  I started out on a couple of listings but I’m not in hard core effort mode for sure.  Both kids – college freshman and high school in person – are going through major transitions but I do have more time if not mental energy.  It’s a bit rough but I look forward to doing what Ebay I can.  Sales are a little better.

I’m glad you posted here to let us know how you are doing!  🙂  Sales improvement probably is tied to listing, let’s face it.

I drove by an estate sale and decided to go in (way past opening).  It was picked but I still found an overlooked vintage cartoon stationery box that has sold for $60 and some envelopes for shipping.

As far as content goes, I wanted to give a quick plug to Lavender Clothesline on Youtube.  I like to watch the videos where she decides to pass on things and she talks about hard goods a lot and decision making.  Honorable mention to The Niche Lady.  She picks a lot of stuff I wouldn’t but also knows and shows some brands I’m not familiar with.  She also shows pictures of the comps she looked up on the screen.  I don’t watch much television but I enjoy some of the videos.

Hey Everyone!

Jay, thanks for your posts. So happy to see a continuance of our community! I’m going to try to be more communicative myself.

We had a good week of sales for us and this weekend has been pretty good as well!

Lots of stuff still to list, a LOT of books and magazines (which I really like) Small stuff and lots of vintage clothing and FLAX shirts.

Our numbers are here:

Our Store Week August 29-September 4, 2021

Total Items in Store: 1957
Items Sold: 17
Gross Sales: $872.38 (including eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Net Sales: $539.49 (minus eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Cost of Items Sold: $24.36
Cost of helpers: $0
Highest Price Sold: $120 Sci-Fi lst HC Book – Legends from the End of Time
Average Price Sold: $51.35
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $50.61

Number of items listed this week: 50

Retro,  Way to go and keep improving! Glad to hear it!

Crystal & Jules of JulesBijouxVintage

I’ll take written updates!  Congrats on the sales.

My numbers for the past 2 weeks.

8-22-21 to 8-28-21
Total Items in Store: 1672
Items Sold: 8
Gross Sales:$198.32
Net Sales:$130.98
Cost of Items Sold: $ 7
Highest Price Sold: $ 50 Captain Kirk Silver coin
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $ 0
Number of items listed this week: 25

8-29-21 to 9-4-21
Total Items in Store: 1689
Items Sold: 7
Gross Sales:$528.79
Net Sales:$409.43
Cost of Items Sold: $ 6
Highest Price Sold: $ 350.00 Sealed pack of baseball cards
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $ 0
Number of items listed this week: 20

Baseball cards for the win this week. Things seem to be picking up as I’m getting more offers and messages. Guessing that has to do with school being open now for most (all?) of the US. Experimenting with ending and relisting some items this week. I’ll mention how it goes when I post next week.

Get well soon Retro! Be safe everyone. My MIL has it too. Luckily she has been vaccinated since she works in a doctors office. For her, it has just been a bad cold. She says she is already feeling better. Unfortunately she has to isolate for 10 days which means not getting paid for 10 days.

Weekly sales 8/29 – 9/04
Random Item Store
Total items 1004
Items sold 34
New items listed 88
Gross sales $760.65
Net sales $394.99

Patch Store
Total items 3148
Items sold 35
New items listed 164
Gross sales $288.42
Net sales $163.90

Etsy
Orders 11
Gross sales $75.75
Net sales $64.39

Gross sales total $1,124.82
Net sales total $623.28

Another meh week for me but it could be worse and I’m staying steady with listing the same amount of items every day. Hopefully things will start picking up in the next couple weeks.

Thanks for continuing to interact via the forum.  I’ve listened since almost the very beginning and it felt like my kids (about your ages) were dropping outta sight when you decided to end the podcast!  I’m really sorry for not taking the time to leave more feedback and participating in your discussions, I’m hoping to do better with that now.  I often think of Ryanne’s mom and her ebay store vs their wintering in the south.  We also go south for the winter and it’s a dilemma for us also.  Ryanne did I hear you say your mom gave you her ebay inventory?  I assume she’s no longer selling?

My week picked up, but I did very little listing last week.  I did do a complete inventory (something I’ve never done in the 20+ years we’ve been selling on eBay) and the results were frightening.  I bet half of the items in my eBay inventory were no longer listed in my store!    I couldn’t believe it!  Now I am keeping a daily log of the active number so I can spot an issue.

Our Store Week August 29-September 4, 2021

Total Items in Store:527
Items Sold: 16
Gross Sales: $668.31 (including eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Net Sales: $453.35 (minus eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Cost of Items Sold: $12
Highest Price Sold: $64.99 (crocheted tablecloth)
Average Price Sold: $41.77
Returns: 1 (crocheted tablecloth)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $5.00
Number of items listed this week: 5

This is my 3rd return this month that the color or fit wasn’t right and the buyer chose “item not as described”.  This trend is so irritating and abusive to sellers.  The buyer even put in the comment for  returning the tablecloth that it wasn’t the right color of purple to match her dining room!  I’m starting to avoid putting the color in the listing and just picking the option of multicolor.  I’ll give customer service a call, but I haven’t had much luck lately with getting them to side with the buyer.

8/01/21 – 8/31/21
Total Active Items (2 different stores): 355
Items Sold: 36
Gross Sales: $910.31 (not incl shipping or taxes)
Highest Price Sold: $77 plus shipping – US Navy ship plaque.
Returns: 0
COGS: $214.49 (including consignment commissions but not including original cost of any family castoffs sold)
New Listings: 67
$ Spent on New Inventory: $12

I’m providing August totals because I think I missed a week or two in there. The month seemed exceptionally slow but my gross ended up not too far off my typical annual average of $250 a week. I have upped my listing game and I do need to keep it up.

As for “The End”, I can’t really improve on the many kind words said in replies to your last episode other than to echo the recurring message that your podcasts have had a consistent positive effect on me like they have had on so many others, and in many ways, large and small. Thank you. And thanks for continuing to provide your unique forum of crowd-sourced content. Speaking of that, I rang your tip jar today to become a patron, and I encourage others who find value here to do the same if they have not already.  Also, without the podcast to spread the word on YouTube, how do you think we can get eBay sellers who haven’t found you yet to visit and join the conversation?

8/29/2021 – 9/4/2021

Total items in store: 3282

Items sold: 63

Gross sales: $2360.73 (up 49% from one year ago)

Net sales: $1690.16 (up 48% from one year ago)

Lowest price sold (net): $5.81 — very low grade gumball machine hockey cards of Harry Watson and John Chad

Both of these went to the same buyer along with a third similar card that was a few bucks more. These were low priced leftovers from a lot purchase of low grade vintage hockey cards where the sale of one card months ago covered the entire lot price. I always love these low dollar sales even though I don’t recommend building your inventory around them.

Highest price sold (net): $122.59 — Sony Michel Panini One

This was my only sale over $100 this week, and it happened the day after Sony Michel was traded to a new team. I would estimate that between 25% and 50% of my sales happen because the player on the card is in the news for a good game (especially during playoff season) or they are acquired by a new team. It’s nice because it adds an extra incentive to get particular cards listed if the player is on a hot streak or their team is poised for a possible championship.

Panini One is a set that’s been around for just a few years, and the One in the set name refers to the number of cards in the box. I hate the concept (primarily because the retail cost of 1 card is $100 to $200) but the cards are very nice looking. The value of the card in the box is based on a number of factors: the player on the card, the rarity (serial number) of the card and perhaps the type of jersey in the card. Here is a lower value card of Sony Michel from my store which has a higher serial number and plain jersey pieces. This was much more likely to pull from a box than the card I sold, and a lesser player in this style of card will sell for just a few bucks.

Opening boxes is like going to the casino and putting all your money down on one hand or one number at the roulette table. I don’t know why anyone does it but I am not a gambler.

But I’m sure part of what keeps gamblers going is that every so often they get lucky. For example, this Kyler Murray card (not mine) is one of the most valuable in the Panini One set. He was the top quarterback drafted that year so his rarest autographs are still very expensive a few years later. Still nowhere near the price of the best Tom Brady autographs or other star quarterbacks from the set, but if Murray has a good season this year, who knows. If he does well, his cards will go up in value and the new buyer can make a profit too. But if he is just average, or gets hurt, or struggles, then the new buyer will have to decide whether to buy, sell or hold. Multiply that by thousands of different players, cards and sets and that’s how the eBay card ecosystem works.

It must be so easy to sell two $1000 items in a week and make $2000 for just a few minutes work. But that’s much less repeatable than an average sales price of $37.47. There are far more buyers out there with a weekly budget of $20 to $200 than a weekly budget of $1000 and up. So my philosophy (learned from our beloved podcast) has been to keep listing and eventually the buyers find you. And in doing that, you’ll get an odd high priced sale here and there. But build up the store and the $20 and $40 sales will add up over time.

Just a heads up: ebay is running a promo …get 50% off your FVFs when making sales through Seller Initiated Offers…limited time only, some exceptions apply, etc…..details here (read the terms and Conditions):

https://pages.ebay.com/promo/2021/0819/sio.html/