Cheapest options

Could be a lot of things, but here are a couple of possible problems:

How many listings do you have? I didn’t start seeing sales ALMOST every day until I was at 200+ listings.

If you are selling a lot of items that are less than 1 lb, set those to calculated shipping as “First Class” and add the weight, which should make a big difference in shipping costs for potential customers.

First Class is anything under 1 lb total weight. Most people use the Priority Mail service. Not everything will fit nicely in a flat rate box and sometimes lighter large items are better off not using flat rate so it can be important to find out what the packaged weight will be.

I am floating around 170 items in my store, but haven’t been able to do much listing in the past few months. I sell 1-5 items a week with it being closer to 1 item a week.

What kind of items are you selling?

Ashana, if you aren’t shy, linking to your store here will let people give you valuable tips. It might not be the shipping. Could be your pricing. Difficult to tell till we see your listings.

If you are selling items that have lots of competition on eBay then the flat rate boxes could be causing your items to be more expensive when you factor in shipping. I personally don’t find very many chances to use the flat rate boxes these days. Most stuff either does not fit in the box or is cheaper to ship another method such as regular Priority Mail or First Class.

How do you research your items? I just picked one out at random – your Speedracer plush car.
First off, your shipping is almost $19. Second, there are no sold listings for that item. It is likely a very long tail item.

If all of your items are super long tail, then your sales will be very sporadic.

You may want to run searches on some of your items and see what your competition is charging to ship.

I have very few items listed with Priority Mail Flat Rate Boxes.

1st Class, Priority Mail Calculated, Priority Mail, Flat Rate Padded Envelope, Fedex Smartpost and USPS Media Mail is generally what I use. Don’t forget, you can also put more than one shipping option on each listing.

Good Luck.

Most of the time for things between 1-6 lbs, Priority mail is cheaper than “economy shipping”/parcel select. so if it’s over 1 lb, first try padded flat rate or legal flat rate envelope.

Priority boxes are FREE on the usps website, so you don’t need to worry about sourcing those.

I source free boxes whenever and wherever I can but I also have purchased boxes on hand also. If you look at Resources at the top of the page, Ryanne gives a list of her shipping and packing options (I think there are links also). You can use her resources to do some comparison shopping. I purchase the majority of my items from Valuemailers on ebay, most of the time their prices are comparable to other sellers.

For clothing over a pound (and if it fits), I use the free mailers from USPS.

When I first started, shipping was a little confusing at first. But as I sold items, it got a lot easier. You’ll be fine!

I’m assuming you have a store subscription with 100+ listings. If so, take advantage of your quarterly coupon and get some of the ebay boxes. I can usually get 50 boxes for $30 which comes down to $5 after the coupon. I started out buying some boxes, but now I get the eBay branded boxes and polymailers and they usually last me the full quarter since I have lower volume of sales. I also have neighbors who give me boxes they get from Amazon shipments and other deliveries. They also save the air bubbles and packing peanuts for me.

Under 1 lb/16 oz, First Class Package is the cheapest. For over 1 lb, you can use FitShipper Listing to find what the cheapest option is for shipping an item to each of the 9 postal zones (since you won’t know where you’re shipping until the item sells). It basically checks the USPS, FedEx and UPS price for all zones at once and sums it up for you like this:

You can use that information to help decide which shipping options to offer in your listing.

Make sure the weight and dimensions you put in are as accurate as possible. Usually I recommend people actually box the item up to make sure they get it right until they get the hang of estimating. Occasionally an ounce here or an inch there can dramatically change the shipping cost.

Yes, the post office will take the extra flat rate boxes back.

You can order FREE Priority mail boxes that are *not* flat rate from the usps website. They come in a variety of sizes. There is a small cube size that comes in handy for a lot of things. I also use the Regional Rate A boxes quite a bit.

So if you have something that is too heavy for First Class, you can send it priority in a non-flat rate box, and charge the buyer based on the actual weight of the item. This is usually cheaper than using flat-rate boxes.

If you need plain brown boxes, talk to any local business to see if you can get them. Grocery stores, drug stores, pet stores, Walmart, etc. If you use Facebook, you can put the word out on local buy-sell-trade groups, or among your friends that you need boxes, (and air pillows, packing peanuts, etc). It never hurts to ask.

I get most of mine from my local post office for free. All the labels, cards, tape, forms, etc. get shipped to the post office in plain, brown boxes. They gladly save them for me, so they don’t have to break them down and toss them. Saves room in their dumpster, which means one less expense for their location.

The other thing that may be working against you is your low feedback. I have seen some other new sellers struggle with asking higher prices.

• This reply was modified 9 years, 4 months ago by Liz.