The Numbers: Week of September 24-30, 2023

It really was a quiet week for me also. One “no sales” day and a few very low sales days… made me want to experiment with the new “Promoted Listing Advance” option. (Where you pay in advance for clicks.) What a joke and a waste of money. I put in a budget max of $5 daily. I immediately started getting clicks. Right away. Within less than a minute hit the budget. Not a single sale or offer, which was very disappointing. There is a report you can download to see the keywords searched that led to the clicks and I found everything so broad as to be non-sensical… for instance many of them were “mens shirt” or something similar. But I finally tried it and can now move on.

Total Items in Store: 837
Items Sold: 24
Gross Sales: $506.24 (including eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Net Sales: $233.04 (minus all eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Cost of Items Sold: $39.03
Highest Price Sold: $32.95 (a pair of jeans with bandana patches which sold immediately)
Average Price Sold: $21.09
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: ~$115
Number of items listed this week: 32

Total Items in Store:  938
Items Sold:  18
Gross Sales: $723.40 (including eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Net Sales: $434.49 (minus eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Cost of Items Sold: $54
Highest Price Sold: $110 (Pumpkin string lights new in box)
Average Price Sold: $40.19
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $70ish
Number of items listed this week:  46

I tried to list at least three of my craft kits each morning with bar codes before my daughter got up.  I suspect the more consistent listing did help with sales.

This week I had a troll buy something and I got the feedback removed.  I’m hoping it’s not from posting here on SL since I haven’t had a beef with anyone.  Weird.

Have a mountain of laundered textiles to photograph and I just need to get down to that.  Saturday I went to a Halloween pop up and an estate sale.  I didn’t do great avoiding hunting last week but I’m pretty caught up on recent hauls except for the craft kits I’m doing over time and fabric that has draft listings.

Week Ending 9/30/23
Gross Sales(w/o shipping $ tax): $493.85  (eBay $344 / Etsy $150)
Net Sales: $412.79     (eBay $280 / $134)
Total Items Sold: 7   (eBay 5 / Etsy 2)
Total Items in eBay Store: 1198 / Etsy Store: 517
Cost of Items Sold: $180.85
Highest Price Sold: $175.00
Average Price Sold: $70.55
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory: $0.00

Average Days Listed: 419
Longest Listed: 1897
New items listed: 18
New Listings Value $1,178.00

Fairly quiet week here as well.  Was expecting things to start picking up already.  Christmas has started selling more though, so it’s in the air.  Had a good September overall, though.  Best in 3 years and up 37% over last year.

My margins were very thin this week.  My big sale of the week was a Porcelain figural group from Dresden, Germany for $175.  Great, except that I paid $168 for it.

I had it up until week before last for $750 and got a query from a potential buyer that said they saw a flaw in it.  I took a closer look and though their flaw was a light artifact, however, I noticed that the item had been previously repaired and I hadn’t seen it.  Ack!  Glad it didn’t sell before I noticed it.  The person who pointed out the “flaw” was still interested in it and offered $125 to which I agreed, then after I created a special listing for them, they decided they didn’t want it.  So, I relisted it again at $175 only to have them send me a note with an offer of $100.  I told them I wasn’t interested.  Then, woke up the next morning to a sale of $175… by the same buyer.  ???  Weird.  They left good feedback already, so at least they are happy.

Fortunately, most of the other sales had small investments and balanced it out some.

Had an average week of listing for me at 19 items.  Most of the listings came from a single “junk drawer lot” I got for $12 at an auction, but also posted some art and a nice pre-war train set.

Started my daughter off on Saturday with taking pictures.  Tried it with my son a while back but it didn’t work out.  First set of pictures were decent so I’m optimistic.  She’s paying off a $500 loan.  Beginning to learn the value of money.

Week of Sept 24 – 30
Total Items in Store: 1727 eBay, 37 Etsy
Items Sold: 13 eBay, 1 Etsy
Cost of Items Sold: $13.50 + $105 Commission
Total Sales: $370.20 eBay, $15 Etsy; includes fees but no shipping
Highest Price Sold: eBay $68.16 for three vintage flat sheets
Average price: $27.50
Returns: 1 (started but not shipped yet)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 19

MaxSold auction results:

Total sales: $8930 total
MaxSold fees about: $2932
Net about $5998
After split 50/50 with neighbor: $2999
Highest Price Sold: $5450 for art including signed & numbered framed Andy Warhol print

I’ve talked all about the MaxSold auction in the sale of the week post, so I won’t repeat it here. I should be getting paid in 2 weeks.

I had a strange thing happen; I think Tuesday evening. I got a call from a buyer on my home line. We have a normal land line, which we keep using less and less, but still want it around in case of an emergency.

A buyer called me up because she bought a set of 4 placemats, but I had six in there. She said she felt bad about it, so she looked me up via my LLC information & address on the label! I told her that I probably mistyped and it was perfectly fine. She seems to be collecting things from Bagshaw, the company from St. Lucia that made them, and I think she just wanted to talk about it. I had done the research about the company, so I knew a little. She said that she only buys from eBay in guest mode, so she can’t message me. She didn’t seem crazy, and she mentioned that she was 80, so I think it was just a nice call. Surprised me though.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/185616997108

Also, got a question if anyone can answer. I sold some vintage labels, which appeared to “go missing” because there was no movement for about a week. I submitted a “missing mail” request via the USPS website, and three days later I received an email saying that the mail could not be found.

Yesterday, I refunded the buyer.

Today, of course, it was delivered.

If they pay me back via PayPal, how do I collect the sales tax? I know am overthinking this for less than a dollar in tax, but I want to at least try to be on the straight and narrow. I don’t want to have to submit a buck for Ohio sales tax for an $11 item. Will PayPal submit the tax for you, and how do I set this up?

https://www.ebay.com/itm/185869629471

<p style=”text-align: left;”>@Sharyn – eBay won’t have anything to do with it any longer once you’ve refunded.  If you feel strongly about collecting the tax you’ll have to submit it yourself.</p>

Items in Store: 2710
Items Sold: 43
Total Sales: $1,565.00
COGS: $227.00
Total Profit: $1,338.00
Average profit: $31.12
Average sales price: $36.40
New Listings: 63
Items scavenged: 80
Listing 2023 weekly Avg: 43

Shipping is definitely becoming cumbersome with the increased sales. I’ve been averaging 40 sales per week which is almost double what I usually average per week. I did the bulk of my listing on the weekend. I just had to put my nose to the grindstone and work. This week I will be more consistent listing every day. I already have a draft bank to keep me a day or two ahead. I’d like to hit 100+ listings again to really get ahead in my fall listing challenge. I’m well on track to meet my goal of 1113 new listings in the last 4 months of the year.

Premium Hoarder update:

It was a slow sales week on the hoarder front. I only sold 3 items for $116.

I bought around another 50 items from the premium hoarder collection for $693 ( I never count them). Mostly all jeans/pants this time. Many of them $100+ pairs. A couple new hard goods. Two of the hard goods will make me back $400-500 of the purchase price so yay! One of them was a Deagan Dinner Chime nice in the original box. The other was an Allen Edmonds Leather messenger bag. I also got a pair of new in box vintage Sears harness boots. So those 3 items will earn back almost the entire purchase price. That’s the best way to scavenge when you can buy a whole bunch and know just a small amount covers the whole purchase. I’ve already drafted 20 items from the latest batch for a list price of $2420.

The tentative plan is that they will keep bringing stuff over to the house in my neighborhood throughout the fall/winter and they’ll call me to come over and do a private pick. While it would have been an interesting experience to do a full buyout, this really is better for me. I don’t have to store and deal with EVERYTHING all at once. I’ll have time to get things listed and recoup funds with sales in between each picking session. I get to cherry pick (always a plus!). The downside is the COGS will be higher this way. COGS really don’t matter though as long as the STR and sales price math works out.

Total COGS: $9341

Total Sales: $10052 ($8720 after fees)

Items sold: 115

ASP: $87.41

This week was a nice reminder how experimenting with your eBay store can pay off. I had a rare week where my sales were higher than they were last year. This should not happen since my eBay store is 1/3 the size of what it was last year. But I started running auctions this year and I’ve started to get the hang of how to sell more than 1 out of every 10. I’ve been running them twice a month lately — basically have them start and end the first and last week of the month.

I sold 38 listings at auction last week (out of 250 auctions total) and then 5 of the unsold listings sold in the first few days after I relisted them as BIN/BO in my store. I like the routine. The last two auction batches I’ve run, every auction was paid for by Wednesday. It was a couple days where shipping was annoying, but I had a nice extra pile of cash and a little more structure to my scavenging life. If I’m selling 40 items on an auction, then I’d better make sure I’ve got 40 quality listings in the pipeline ready to go. I actually have more than that right now, so it will be time to hunker down over the next few days and get photographing and listings.

9/24/2023 to 9/30/2023

Items sold: 60 (38 via auction, 13 via best offer, 5 via seller initiated offer, 13 via promoted listings)

Gross sales: $2368.28 (up 52% from one year ago)

Net sales: $1533.90 (up 42% from one year ago)

Average sales price: $39.47 (down 29% from one year ago)

Highest price sold (net): $176.64 — Quartetto Italiano 37 CD box set

One of many great finds from my Chicago haul. Finishing up a post to close the story of that trip this weekend, including all kinds of numbers. Then it’s time to find a new scavenging travel adventure!

Lowest price sold (net): $-4.20— Let the Doors be Made of Iron (prison documentary) DVD

A $1 thrift store find about the history of the local Eastern State Penitentiary, which is now better known as a haunted house around this time of year. Would have been a $30 sale but the buyer said the DVD didn’t play, so I refunded and moved on with my life.

I heard the European Union (I believe at start of 2024) will be requiring that all listings on ebay have the seller’s name, address, phone number and maybe email on EU ebay websites and is for all selling sites, not just ebay I believe.

I clicked on the preview button and see that address IS prepopulated from what we’ve provided eBay and I don’t see an option for changing that, so you may have to change your business account address to affect that information.

I read a bit through the page @junque-redux linked to. It said that if you don’t want your personal information to be displayed on your listings, you should exclude the UK from places you will ship to. Unless I decide to open a PO Box, that might be an option for me. On the other hand, I was going to get a box at one time and maybe I should just bite the bullet.

I’ve had my name, address, phone number and email on the eBay listings since some time back- I only recently discovered that.

The only spam that comes directly from that is US-based listing services. The emails have my name in the copy.

Apart from that occasional email, nothing. eBay buyers are pretty benign in my experience.

@junque-redux , @Lukastreasuretrove , @Sharyn , @Antique-Frog , that was very helpful information, thanks so much. @AntiqueFrog what you wrote was particularly helpful considering you have already experienced this in Europe and it sounds like it isn’t that big of a deal, I feel better about it and what decisions I make concerning it. Thanks.