Scavenger Life Episode 458: Help A Fellow Small Business

04/05/20 – 04/11/20

Total Items In Store: 3335
Items Sold: 25
Cost of Items Sold: $ 70
Total Sales: $ 764.60
Highest Price Sold: $ 65 (Rollerblades)
Average Price Sold: $ 30.58
Money Spent on New Inventory: $ 0
Number of items listed: 34

Gut Sales Report for the week: It felt like all I was selling was Inline skates. I
sold 7 pair this week and another person wants to buy 2 pair. Without the skates, it would have
been an ok week.

Challenge of the week: Still trying to take pictures of about 10 items everyday
Mon-Sat.

Scavenge of the week: Nothing.

Mark S

Just last night my husband and I were frustrated that insta cart does not deliver whole beans from our local market. I almost ordered from David Lynch – but since his business if probably gonna be okay – I immediate paused the podcast and ordered from your guys.

Looking forward to my beans!

David

Hello!

Always searching for a good coffee subscription 🙂

https://imgur.com/nJKOo6G

• This reply was modified 6 years ago by Eve Everett.

Total Items in Store: 283 Ebay, About 55 Mercari
Items Sold: 13 Ebay, 6 Mercari
Gross Sales: $699 Ebay, $85 Mercari
Cost of Items Sold: $72 Ebay + $10 Mercari (some items ours)
Highest Price Sold: $153 (Two Norwegian cross stitch kits of cats)
Average Price Sold: $53 Ebay, $14 Mercari
Returns: 1 immediate cancellation $14
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: About $85 online clearance RA
Number of items listed this week: 12 Ebay, 7 Mercari

So grateful that you are still doing the Podcast and keepin’ it real. I’m excited about your new business coming down the pike. Makes total sense for your town and future renters. Smart to have partners.

Finally after a couple of weeks of listing my Ebay store “turned back on”. I’ve been sending offers and listing about every other day. The good sales definitely got me even more interested in listing, though I have my day job work to do as well. In fact, I’d rather be listing on Ebay and getting stocked up again. I’m not being super picky about photography. I’ve been listing vintage fabric, kitchenware, and art work lately from the piles. It feels really good to get some of these boxes out of the garage and tackle them. Easter stuff did not move well but I sold a couple of items.

Mercari seems quite active lately. I was hesitant to put items from the piles on Mercari because they don’t get sucked into my bookkeeping spreadsheet and I have to keep my own records. It’s a bit tedious too because you can’t sort the sales by sale date, etc. and have to drill down into orders. But, some of the lower dollar vintage I’m giving a go on there.

Incidentally, I found out this week that extreme couponers are listing on Mercari in case anyone is looking to buy essentials, especially personal care items. I normally buy some groceries and drug store items on Walmart.com but they are sold out of a lot of items and shipping is slower than before.

Have a great week and happy Easter to those who celebrate.

04/05/20 – 04/11/20
Total Items In Store: 15,014
Gross Sales – $2,117.28
Total Orders – 89
Total Items sold – 112
Cost of goods sold – ~$11
Money Spent on New Inventory: $ 0

Slower week than normal, was under 2k for the week until yesterday. I also applied for the Disaster grant and it was almost comically simple, so I’m very skeptical that I’ll actually get the funds. The SBA is already trying to back out of the law that was passed, which I didn’t know was even possible to openly ignore a law. Last I read they’ve now changed their grants from 10k to 1k per employee. The whole thing is a clusterfuck, really.

Yeah, 90% of the sales were magazines. And I agree, it seems like nothing was learned from the 2008 recession, even though this is much different circumstances. I don’t see why their #1 priority shouldn’t be small business funding, it’s the backbone of our economy. Corporations shouldn’t even receive free money from a slush fund, it would make more sense to give them access to near 0% loans that they can then pay pack.

I’ve been reading that many who applied received an email to reapply. I’ve received nothing, not even a credit pull yet, which means they haven’t got to my application or they just flat out denied it due to have no employees.

Ordered my coffee! Listing my hoard of vintage jewelry. I probably never would have gotten around to it if not for the shut down.

April 5 – 11
Total Items in Store: 3,926
Items Sold: 31
Total Sales : $1,115
* Above yearly average of $972
Highest Price: $170 (Jackson Dynamic Electron Vacuum Tube Tester)
Average Price: $36
Returns: 0
Cost of Goods Sold: $35
Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $6
Number of New Items Listed this Week: 43

This past week was spent very unproductively. I’m lucky to have gotten 40 listings done honestly. Every day was a struggle to get off my butt and work. It must be my cabin fever getting the best of me. Maybe I needed a week of being lazy to reset my brain a little.

That’s so cool that you’re starting your own coffee business. Steph and I have always talked about how fun it would be to do something like that. I wish you the best of luck and I’ll check out your coffee suppliers’ store too.

Items in Store 1574
Items Sold 42
Total Sales $1,284.00
COGS $70.00
Total Profit $1,214.00
Average profit $28.90
Average sales price $30.57
New Listings 99

Another excellent week. Man if I would have know I was at 99 new listings I would have done one more to hit an even hundred. Lol!
Ebay really should capitalize with some advertisement right now to bring in more sellers. Amazon is really screwed up right now and their shipping quote times are laughably bad. Ebay is pretty much the only place in the world right now where you can get what you want and have it shipped quick. #ebayisopen #ebayhaswhatyouneed

Hello all, I logged into Broad Porch Coffee Co, after a simple goggle search, easy ordered a ground bag of the ‘Southern Split’, which sounds like a fantastic dark roast, my preference. Paying with Paypal was also a plus.
Thank you, thank you for the Podcast! “Keep talking, Let them hear you talk!”

04/05 – 04/11/20 (no cross listing is done between platforms)

eBay store: totommyto

Total store items: 780
Number of items sold: 11
Total eBay sales (not counting s/h): $416
Cost of items sold: $34
Highest price sold: $182.50 – lot of 7 vintage jet plane desk models, paid $20
Average price sold: $37.82
Returns: 0
Money spent on new inventory: 0
Number of new items listed this week: 11
Sell through rate for the week: 1.4
Number International sales: 0

Etsy store oldfleatoymarket

Total store items: 624
Number of items sold: 5
Total Etsy sales (not counting s/h): $174.50
Cost of items sold: $11
Highest price sold: $65.50 – set of 7 vintage Shakespeare books, paid $5
Average price sold: $34.90
Returns: 0
Money spent on new inventory: 0
Number of new items listed this week: 12
Sell through rate for the week: 0.8
Number International sales: 0

Good to hear from you guys, cool that you’re thinking of opening up a cafe. So you will be sort of silent partners in this venture? Or do you intend for this other coffee co to rent your space?

I continue to be exceedingly lucky, I am selling just fine in this crisis.

Sales c/w shipping: CAD$3083, 31 sales, COGS: $389, Fees: ~$428, Postage: $656 –> Gross profit: $1610
Expenditures: $698 –> Cashflow: $1957

Still not really sourcing to any significant extent though. New job is taking up most of my spare time & brain cycles.

I coincidentally happened to have purchased lots of coffee right before the lockdown. But, Scavenger Life is such a big part of my week, I went and purchased the Southern Split. We also enjoy a dark roast. I forgot to write a note about Scavenger Life, but I’m sure they’ll be seeing all these purchases from all over the country and wonder what the hell is going on.

The two big auction houses that I normally go to have started to do online auctions temporarily. I hope that they don’t enjoy it too much because I don’t need more online auction companies. The first one had mostly the more expensive stuff and I didn’t bother bidding. The second company just put their stuff online, and I think that their starting prices are too high in some cases. I saw a few things here and there I might bid on, but I’m going to be careful. IRL, they would start combining lots if it didn’t sell right away. They can’t do that online, so I wonder how they are going to handle it if some items don’t get any bids.

Week of April 5 – 11
* Total Items in Store: 1442 eBay, 37 Etsy
* Items Sold: 28 eBay
* Cost of Items Sold: $25.05 + $197.09 Commission
* Total Sales: $894.13 eBay
* Highest Price Sold: $250 for 14K ring with a gemstone and small diamonds (on commission), 2nd place $126 for Azerbaijan glassware pitcher (also on commission), 3rd place $99 for ruby color iMac from 2000
* Average Price Sold: $31.93
* Returns: 0 (but 1 immediate cancel)
* Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
* Number of items listed this week: 8

My week was tremendous, but mostly due several items on commission, so my COGS are quite high. I did have a $99 sale of my own, and I had many sales overall, so just a good week.

The $99 sale was an older iMac in partially working condition. I messaged him to make sure he knew it didn’t work as I don’t want a return from Texas (although the listing is no returns). He said that he has free time because of the current situation, and he likes to fix computers and get them in working condition. So, this lockdown has not been bad for my sales at all.

Hi R&J – Thanks for the podcast this week. Since I don’t have a commute at the moment (week 5 of working from home), I listened while I listed yesterday. I paused and ordered a bag of coffee. (I didn’t see a place in the checkout to mention that R&J sent me. )

Good luck with your new business I’ll be really interested to hear how that goes. Is there a new podcast in your future perhaps?….

Here are my numbers for the week:
Total Items in Store: 3815
Items Sold: 67
Total Sales: $1484.27
Cost of Items Sold: $170
Average Price Sold: $22.15
Average Cost of Item: $2.54
Highest Price Item Sold: $94.95 Sony Handycam Digital MiniDV DCR-TRV30
Number of items listed this week: 71
YTD Sales: $14964
YTD sales compared to this time last year: +15%
Average age of items in store (in days since listing): 445
Average number of days between listing and selling this week: 352
Median age of sales (in days, between listing and selling): 287
Sell-through rate (for the week): 1.76%
Hats sold this week: 40 (59% of sales) worth $630.19 (42% of sales $)

I had a great week. I was just $12 short of beating my best week for the whole of 2019. I’ve been doing lots of listing while stuck at home. That has helped a bit but it seems like people are continuing to buy lowish-value items like hats which is surprising to me.

I made my biggest sourcing purchase ever this week 1000 preowned hats for $1000 ($700 plus $300 shipping). Fingers-crossed that they actually arrive. The seller has some challenges – no car and no printer. It wouldn’t surprise me if he finds it will cost well over $500 to ship that many hats. If the hats do show up I’m going to have a serious challenge finding a place to put them. I might have to get a storage unit so that my wife doesn’t leave me. 🙂

I hope everyone has a healthy (and profitable) week.

I’m one of the few who never guessed Coffee Shop. What a great idea for that area! I’m so excited for you. The locally owned coffee shop, Swift and Finch where I live has been closed due to the virus but in the meantime they’ve been staying afloat by driving to different neighborhoods each morning in their converted French 1971 Citroen van. It’s the coolest most unique little van. They take it to farmers markets and to different events around town like weddings and whatnot which pay them to come out in order to provide a whimsical coffee experience on site.

Sales have been down for me but I’m continually surprised at every sale I get. I can’t believe anyone is buying anything right now. If nothing else, I feel good shipping items out because it’s helping the currently beleaguered post office.

I ordered a couple lbs of expresso from Broad Porch since I drink two large mugs of it daily. I didn’t see anywhere to let them know you’d sent me either but with the number of random out of towners ordering this week they should figure it out. I hope their “shipping department” is up to it. 🙂

I did open a second store last year for low value items including patches and postcards and the like that would not have tracking. I also sell any clothing I come across in that store and don’t offer returns. I am able to easily maintain TRS status in my main store and with my low volume, all it takes is a couple postcards with no tracking to kill my TRS. Administratively it’s easy to maintain the second store because I use EasyAuctionsTracker that pulls the numbers for both stores and I keep the stores open on different browsers. But after a flurry of initial sales it has not been worth the subscription cost so I am rethinking it. I know you all don’t care about TRS but it’s tough to let go if you’ve been used to it.

I concur that sellers who specialize in collector niches can develop strong followings. Some whom I follow put everything on auction and almost never leave any money on the table – they get vigorous bidding and great prices. I think it would discourage interested collectors from subscribing to a seller if their new item emails contained too much random stuff. But I do think you guys probably get more repeat buyers than you realize, even with your kitchen sink approach. You’ve mentioned it before but eBay really should give sellers that information somehow.

I think you’re right about this time being different, as far as a recession is concerned. This one was not triggered by financial factors, and I think there’s much more of a “we’ll get through this together” sentiment. For example the banks back then generally had absolutely no qualms about foreclosing on houses (and of course financial institutions were failing in alarming numbers). Now, it seems they are really trying not to put people out on the street. That could change, of course….

It’s great to see how decent everyone’s numbers are, considering the circumstances! Mine are not, but eBay isn’t my main income so I’ll be fine.

On today’s podcast Ryanne was talking about FB Marketplace taking down items. I sell a lot on Marketplace and other local apps. When I listed something like a picture of a horse or a bunny garden ornament FB thought I was selling animals. So now I’m real careful about the wording. I just say garden ornamen because they can see it’s a bunny. It isn’t ebay– I don’t spend much time with descriptions unless it’s measurements. When FB takes items down you can appeal it. I’ve been successful with that, for ex. saying this is not an actual horse it’s a picture of one.
I’m happy to help with any other questions re: FB Marketplace or other local app selling. Stay well, everyone!

My numbers for the week of 4/5/20:
Total Items in Store: 224
Items Sold: 18
Cost of Items Sold: $86
Total Sales: $772 + shipping
Highest Price Sold: $185 (Bible Commentary)
Average Price Sold: $42.89
Returns: 0

Exciting to hear of your new coffee shop plans!
I don’t post my numbers too regularly, but the podcast mentioned sellers like me. Small inventory, no death pile, quicker moving product. I actually usually do have bins of unlisted inventory in my basement, but it is only to carry me through the winter months (I’m in Northeast Ohio). Buying season for me is early spring through early fall, where I fill up those bins. I time it really close so that it’s just enough to carry me through to March…which usually works great. Except for during a pandemic/shut down all my normal sources of inventory situation! So if I was listing at my pre-epidemic pace now, I would have only about 2-3 weeks of inventory left to list. What I have done is slow waaay down in my listing. Couple things a day. Just enough to keep my account active. Actually, I didn’t list a thing since last Tuesday. (A tornado hit our area on late Tuesday/early Wednesday am. My family of 5 was huddled under our pool table in the basement. Major tree damage and a huge fir tree snapped in half and hit the corner of our house. Damage to the roof but all external, thank the Lord. Power and internet was out for a day. Lots of cleanup and an insurance claim. No eBay happening.) Despite the lack of working on eBay, my sales have remained pretty consistent to pre-pandemic levels. I had one pathetic week about 2 weeks ago, and that was it. Everything went back to usual levels. Nothing I am selling is essential. I’ve recently sold some of the oldest items I had listed! I think I have enough to keep this going at my slower pace for a couple more months. By then I am hoping things will be opening back up so I can start sourcing new inventory. I’m a little concerned that garage sale season will be short and sparse this year. Not sure if people will be comfortable enough to open up their garages and have strangers touching everything. Will they just not have them this year? Will it still be risky to go out and be in contact with people and their stuff through the summer? It’s my main venue for sourcing. I might have to adjust. I have not gotten into estate sales but that would be where I would turn to fill in the need to source new items.
I hate to even say this, but with the percentage of people passing with the virus, there are bound to be an unprecedented abundance of estate sales in the near future.

4/4/20-4/10/20
Total Items In Store: 2161
Items Sold: 39
Total Sales: $ 1051.70
Highest Price Sold: $ 90 (Perfume)
Average Price Sold: $ 26.97
Returns: 1 $30
Money Spent on New Inventory: $0
Number of items listed: 0 (Out of Inventory to list)

• Sales are good…continue to hit goal of $1000/week.
• No auctions or yard sales due to shutdown making it hard to find items to list. I anticipate this will eventually start impacting sales.
• I am getting a lot of projects done in the absence of listings, so at least staying productive.
• Since quitting my career job last March, store has been increased from 800 items to almost 2200 items and sales have increased from $250/week avg to $1000/week avg.
• I also applied for the small business loan/grant. Didn’t even get a confirmation e-mail, so I am very skeptical that this will amount to anything.

We had a pretty good week, selling mostly puzzles and DVD recorders. We are currently working on re-listing our entire store. It is a long story but we had our store shut off for 5 months and all our 1900 items got deleted. It was an error of my own. Regardless we are doing our best to put as much up as we can. We are trying to decide what to work on, hard goods or clothing. Is anyone selling clothing?
Ryanne, the 4×4 box is nice but it is really annoying that a lot of mugs won’t even fit in there, even without bubble wrap.

My son had his $1200 stimulus money by Monday! We heard that those with the least income in 2019 are the first to get the $
Like many of you, buyers disappeared for a while, but this week they came back. Lots of lower stuff, but I don’t mind being in business again.
Crazy times. My relations in Michigan are under anti-gardening laws. A Walmart, Meijers, or Lowes has to block off the seeds, plants, shovels, compost and everything else that you would need to grow your own food. I’m not joking, “According to the order, stores that occupy more than 50,000 square feet and offer essential items can remain open, but will be forced to close off access to certain parts of the store, where items like gardening supplies, plant nurseries, house paint, flooring, and furniture are sold.” Governor’s executive order as of April 9.
And you know where all those hungry Michigan gardeners are going to turn? Ebay

Sharyn,
I’m guessing its not about growing the food, its about buying the products to grow food in a B&M store.

Congrats on the new venture and good luck! We’ve been wanting to get over to Luray and rent your Air B&B spot, now just one more reason to go. Chalk up another order for the Southern Split. Placed the order yesterday after listening to the podcast. Looking forward to trying something new. Normally go for the large bag or Pete’s from Costco.

We had an amazing week on eBay with $2120 in sales. Three large sales Friday and Saturday that really put us over the top. Sold an antique lantern for $499, an old clock for $350 and two vintage Ansel Adams posters for $482. Frankly, I’m still in shock. I think that is probably our most for a single week ever. We’ve had that clock up for some time. Originally asked $895, but finally took an offer this week.

Week Ending 04/11/2020
Total Items in Store: 1148
Items Sold: 22
Gross Sales: $2,122.49
Gross wo Shipping $1,908.41
Cost of Items Sold: $139.43
COGS Percent 7.31%
Highest Price Sold: $499.95 Antique Lantern
Average Price Sold: $88.17
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory: $0.00
Sold via promoted listings: 7
Promoted Percentage: 31.82%
Average Days Listed: 463
Longest Listed: 1389
New items listed: 29

My bag of Guatemalan Broad Porch Coffee arrived today and I’m enjoying my first cup now!

Thanks for continuing doing the podcasts. It does give us a little normal, to this mess we are all in. There is a BACK Porch Coffee in the Northwest, hope it doesn’t affect you guys in VA. 21 of the 90 Goodwills here in AZ just opened on Monday. Its a start. We really do appreciate everything you share with us.

My eBay Sales (No Store) Week April 5-11, 2020

Total Items in Store: 26
Items Sold: 2
Gross Sales: $39.65
Cost of Items Sold: $0
Highest Price Sold: $21.64 (XBox One Game)
Average Price Sold: $19.83
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number Of Items Listed This Week: 7

My wife and I plan on purchasing at least one pound of coffee from your partners this week. If my wife likes the coffee, we may be able to do a subscription. 🙂

• This reply was modified 6 years ago by old_man_marty.

Our biggest local thrift chain started taking donations again drive through. Interesting because we will probably be late to reopen in our state and the locals will wait for the state even though we don’t have a lot of cases.

• This reply was modified 6 years ago by ChristineR.

First poster….long time listener. Congratulations on the coffee venture! Just ordered the ethiopian. So happy for you all.