Another great video from Steve this week. We also have great luck with vintage bank bags!
Scavenger Life Episode 305: The Biggest Transfer of Wealth in Human History
You guys have made clear that we shouldn’t talk about politics here. Makes sense. But can we agree on one thing? The Baby Boomers and their parents sure have a lot of stuff. Where’s the proof? Stop by any auction and see all the piles of possessions being sold each and every day.
After WWII, the US experienced a wave of expansion and productivity like the world has never seen before. While the government made an incredible investment in infrastructure, scientific research, and the university system, the Baby Boomers and their parents built the US into a powerhouse of design and technology. Getting an excellent college education was inexpensive, and even high school graduates could get jobs that delivered an upper middle class lifestyle thanks to advanced factory jobs.
While we can argue why this system has come apart, we can agree that those particular days are gone. Not every member of this age group found riches, but when you go to an auction, you can see evidence of the great accumulation of wealth that the Post War generations enjoyed. So if you’re skipping auctions, then you’re really missing out on a lot of great scavenging. And because younger generations have much different buying habits, we may never see this opportunity again. Some people have multiple houses to store their stuff, or rented storage lockers for the stuff they can’t keep in their houses.
Think of auctions as a mix of an estate sale (selling off a whole house of stuff) and a yard sale (cheap prices!). What’s incredible is that the stuff in auctions is what the families don’t want. Think of what they’re keeping! But even the left overs are super valuable if you have imagination. There’s always a mix of practical, useful items plus kitschy, old-fashioned decor, along with truly valuable antiques.
Going to an auction gets you to the source of where stuff comes from. This is why you’ll mainly be competing with dealers and collectors because they have always known that auctions are where it’s at. Many independent thrift store owners and flea market sellers get their inventory at auctions. So why buy marked up inventory from them when you can go straight to the source?
I know online auctions have become extremely popular in the last couple years. Some of our favorite local auctions have closed down because they’ve gone online. While it’s certainly convenient to bid on your couch, there is nothing like being at a live auction bidding on carloads of stuff for cheap. It’s a carnival atmosphere with the heavy scent of glorious excess capitalism.
Anyway, in this episode we talk about the barriers that some sellers say exist to auctions, and how we strategize as a team. Showing up early, looking through all the boxes, do quick research over a meal, pay attention the whole time, know the prices we’re willing to pay, learn who likes what, dedicating our whole day. We’d love to hear your experiences in the comments.
We also discussed these links in the podcast:
TSATT shared a link to an interview with an eBay employee talking about the coming Guaranteed Shipping Program: http://www.scavengerlife.com/forums/topic/scavenger-life-episode-304-do-a-little-bit-today-then-do-a-little-bit-tomorrow#post-15981
Julie B share a link to the trailer of a new Netflix show. It tells the story of an eBay seller that built a multi-million dollar clothing brand: http://www.scavengerlife.com/forums/topic/ebay-the-netflix-series-sort-of#post-15972
Steve List reminds us that getting negative or neutral feedback isn’t the end of the world. You can always leave a comment on that feedback to let future buyers know it was just a misunderstanding: http://www.scavengerlife.com/forums/topic/scavenger-life-episode-304-do-a-little-bit-today-then-do-a-little-bit-tomorrow/#post-15953
Tare shared the 5 stages of the scavenger’s life. I know we followed these exact steps: http://www.scavengerlife.com/forums/topic/the-5-stages-of-the-scavenger-life
Hope you had a great week!
Join the conversation in the forum>>
Our Store Week April 2-8, 2017
Store #1
Total Items in Store: 5,487
Items Sold: 71
Cost of Items Sold: $166
Total Sales: $2,322.46
Highest Price Sold: $700 (Burberry coat)
Average Price Sold: $32.71
Returns: 1
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $550
Number of items listed this week: 0
———-
Bonanza/Trugether:
Sold 0 items for 0
———-
Store #2
Total Items in Store: 1377
Items Sold: 18
Cost of Items Sold: $250
Total Sales: $677.26
Highest Price Sold: $100 (Apple iSight)
Average Price Sold: $37.62
Returns: 0
Number of items listed this week: 30
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Scavenger Life Episode 304: Do a little bit today, then do a little bit tomorrow
Consistency is the main foundation for our successful eBay business. Since 2008, our secret has been to simply list 20 items a day. If we’re not listing items, we are scavenging for inventory, or photographing items, or working on death piles. We always do something each day that builds our business. We treat our business like it’s our job.
We see the danger some sellers get in when they slack off on listing. They start making less money, so they have to get a job, which means they have less time, so they list even fewer items, making even less money. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.
And truth be told, we now can take off for weeks at a time because we’ve built up a large enough inventory and let out store go on autopilot. I wouldn’t recommend this for new sellers since we know the right balance that works for us. But when we return to our business, we go right back to treating it like our full time job.
Here are the links we discussed in this podcast:
- USPS now scans your mail so you can see what’s coming.
- A pair of genuine 1800’s Levis sold for $80,000.
- A nightmare healthcare scenario.
- A smart seller gave us good advice on what to do when a buyer asks to delay shipping.
- Hollywood Paul corrects bad advice we’ve been giving people for years.
Hope you had a good week!
Join the conversation in the forum>>
Our Store Week March 26-April 1, 2017
Store #1
Total Items in Store: 5,595
Items Sold: 72
Cost of Items Sold: $92
Total Sales: $2,250.44
Highest Price Sold: $200 (Shearling jacket)
Average Price Sold: $32.95
Returns: 2
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $10
Number of items listed this week: 0
———-
Bonanza/Trugether:
Sold 0 items for 0
———-
Store #2
Total Items in Store: 1370
Items Sold: 14
Cost of Items Sold: $27
Total Sales: $697.27
Highest Price Sold: $140 (embroidered Tibetan style coat)
Average Price Sold: $49.80
Returns: 0
Number of items listed this week: 150
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What Sells On eBay: Spectacles, Water Ski, Prince 45, Pattern kits, Photo Enlarger
Love the sale of a 1963 Volkswagon Beetle 1200 owners manual by Steve. We also sold a 1968 VW book this week as well.
Scavenger Life Episode 303: Failure of Imagination
When we hear Amazon sellers talk about their million dollar businesses, it’s pretty impressive. They tell stories of buying tens of thousands of dollars worth of merchandise from a factory in China. Maybe even traveling to China to make a big play on some private label merchandise. Or maybe they are sending employees out to buy retail arbitrage at big box stores all over their region. They have a busy warehouse and multiple employees. We imagine a person sitting in front of several computer screens, pouring over spreadsheets that has everything laid out to the last decimal place. They’re basically mini-CEO’s competing with larger corporations.
This isn’t us. We’re scavengers and have more in common with the guys at the flea market who sell out of their cars. Only difference is that we sell online. We know how much we spend each month and how much we need to make. We are frugal and save extra money to invest in things that will make us more money (like rental property). We have often said that we’re probably don’t have much in common with a Harvard MBA graduate, but we do have imagination. Even though we are not masters of spreadsheets and P/L reports, we do know how to turn trash into cash.
Imagination is our biggest strength because we can walk into any situation (flea market, thrift store, auction, estate sale, yard sale) and see where the money is. We’ve learned that we make money by constantly changing. Instead of going out into the world searching for specific items, we just see what is available and then imagine how we can sell them. Finding these overlooked objects is where our business lies. Some eBay sellers seem to want to find a formula to know exactly what they should buy, how much it’ll sell for, and then never deviate change course. Having imagination when scavenging is what excites us and makes us money. We never know what we’ll find, but we know we’ll always find something. Sitting in front of spreadsheets won’t help us. We have to go out and scavenge!
This is why we love the weekly “What Sold” thread every Wednesday. We love seeing what other scavengers are finding and selling. We see how people’s imagination have sometimes run wild and paid off.
Here are the links we mentioned on this podcast:
–eBay is going to roll out a voluntary program of guaranteed three day shipping.
–An interesting series of short portraits of how different Americans get by.
–Here is that embed code for videos that you can copy and paste (hope it works!)-
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Hope you had a good week!
Join the conversation in the forum>>
Our Store Week March 19-25, 2017
Store #1
Total Items in Store: 5,667
Items Sold: 72
Cost of Items Sold: $110
Total Sales: $2,260.12
Highest Price Sold: $125 (Set of sheets)
Average Price Sold: $31.39
Returns: 1
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $20
Number of items listed this week: 20
———-
Bonanza/Trugether:
Sold 1 items for $?
———-
Store #2
Total Items in Store: 1228
Items Sold: 11
Cost of Items Sold: $25
Total Sales: $544.20
Highest Price Sold: $135 (Leather purse)
Average Price Sold: $51.21
Returns: 0
Number of items listed this week: 40
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Scavenger Life Episode 302: How to Deal with Dreaded eBay Scammers Lurking Everywhere!!
In over 20,000 items we’ve sold on eBay since 2008, we’ve never had an eBay Scammer™. A scammer is someone who buys an item knowing full well they’re going to cheat you. It involves pre-meditation. Maybe they exist and we haven’t run into them? Maybe the Scammers don’t buy the kind of weird, vintage stuff we sell. Maybe the scammers exist for the people who only sell new electronics? We know there are long time eBay sellers who will swear and testify to the numerous times they’ve been scammed, but it hasn’t happened to us.
However we certainly have our share of Grumpy Buyers™. Why is it important to be careful about not labeling a Grumpy Buyer with the label, Scammer? Because Scammer is a loaded word that brings way too much emotion into a business transaction. It assumes that the person is coming after us personally to do us harm. Instead, we get buyers who are just upset and need t be treated professionally.
Grumpy buyers include:
- They just changed their mind ie (Buyer’s Remorse) and don’t want to pay for return shipping.
- They want to keep the item but are fishing for a partial refund. Usually tied to buyers remorse.
- Buyers who are unreasonable and most likely unhappy and angry about their life circumstances. We just happen to be in their line of sight on a bad day.
- Buyers who have untreated mental illness or addiction problems. Yes, these people use the internet and we always hope they seek the help they need.
We never answer any question sent to us outside the eBay system. We are always professional and brief in our conversation. We never accuse or argue or get into long conversations. We always ask for further information where the buyer often ends up admitting there really isn’t a problem. Or we offer choices that the buyer must take action on. We control the conversation following eBay’s rules.
Heres how we handle all returns:
- We turned on Hassle Free Returns with a 30 day return policy for any reason. It’s important that everything happen through eBay’s system so its documented.
- We auto accept any return where the buyer just changed their mind. The buyer pays for all shipping.
- If the buyer says we have done something wrong, they must open a case to allow us to respond.
- If the buyer’s complaint is valid, we take responsibility and give a full refund on the spot. If we disagree, we ask for photos of the issue. This is important because it makes the buyer take an action and provide proof.
- After we get the photos, we then may take responsibility and give a full refund on the spot.
- But if we still disagree, we immediately accept the return to move the process along.
- The buyer has 5 days to print a label and provide tracking. If not, the case can be closed on the phone in our favor.
- Once we get the item, we inspect it. We then may take responsibility give a full refund (including all shipping) on the spot. Having the item abd seeing our mistake helps us learn how to avoid the problem.
- If we still don’t agree, we escalate the issue. Since we’re in eBay’s Returns Program “Beta”, we can refund the buyer for the item but not the shipping. The buyer then has to open a case if they want to further fight it. Usually buyers are just happy to have their item returned and given a refund. Before the beta program, we would call eBay and plead our case. We often won because we offered the buyers choices and had plenty of evidence that the item was not defective.
- Worst case: eBay just disagrees with us. So we refund the cost of the item and shipping. Just a cost of doing business. If the person was a scammer, we are taking away their ability to keep the item so foiled their devious plot.
One thing we NEVER do is ignore the buyer who has a complaint and wants a return. When a seller ignores a buyer, this is the only time we’ve seen eBay take money out of the seller’s account for a refund and let the buyer keep the item. The seller has chosen to ignore the system.
And let’s be clear how rarely returns happen for us. In the past 90 days, we have a return rate of 3.26%. That’s 19 out of 582 items. This is high for us since we just got out of the holiday season when buyers are more prone to returns. (Big retailers can have as high as 20% return rate during the holidays.) Out of those 19 returns, only 2 were grumpy buyers. If you have a much higher return rate and a higher rate of buyers you think are Scammers, I would look at your process and ask why so many buyers seem unhappy. Our experience has shown that a wide majority of buyers order an item and keep it.
Because we have a system in place to handle any and all complaints, we sleep well at night. Some frustration pops up every now and again at a particularly grumpy buyer, but they just get fed into our system and processed to eBay’s satisfaction. The main goal is to treat customers fairly and be seen as a good seller in eBay’s eyes. If we have to pay $30 a month in return shipping fees (which would be very high for us), it’s worth every penny for the peace of mind.
These are the forum conversations we mentioned in this podcast:
–A seller found a hat for $1 and sold for $1000: http://www.scavengerlife.com/forums/topic/turned-1-into-1000-in-1-day-scavenge-of-the-week
–If you want to quit your job and sell full-time, you must budget your expenses: http://www.scavengerlife.com/forums/topic/personal-budgeting-and-financial-planning-planning-for-full-time-ebay
Hope you had a good week!
Join the conversation in the forum>>
Our Store Week March 12-18, 2017
Store #1
Total Items in Store: 5,660
Items Sold: 59
Cost of Items Sold: $150
Total Sales: $2,039.03
Highest Price Sold: $135 (old iPad)
Average Price Sold: $34.55
Returns: 1
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $8
Number of items listed this week: 100
———-
Bonanza/Trugether:
Sold 0 items for $0
———-
Store #2
Total Items in Store: 1231
Items Sold: 14
Cost of Items Sold: $56
Total Sales: $717.02
Highest Price Sold: $150 (Vintage faucet)
Average Price Sold: $51.21
Returns: 0
Number of items listed this week: 10
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Scavenger Life Episode 301: Our Best eBay Week Ever
This week was another example of why we love what we do. Instead of working on eBay, Ryanne’s sister visited us and we spent each day doing fun stuff with her. We hiked in the mountains, cooked big meals, talked about projects we’re working on and ones we want to work on. We also had time to go to our new favorite auction and buy the biggest truckload of stuff we’ve ever bought.
We also had our best week in our eBay store than we’ve had in a long time. Why? Who knows. Unlike other sellers who have theories as to why eBay sales are up and down, we just think it’s pretty random. But we can have these great weeks because we’ve put in all the work up front by listing as many items as we can. The summer slow down is sure to come, so we’re enjoying it while it lasts.
On the forum, a scavenger offered up a very interesting ethical situation. She listed an item that sold immediately for $30. Other people messaged her saying it was really worth $300. If she cancelled the sale, they would by it for the higher price. What would you do? Join the conversation: http://www.scavengerlife.com/forums/topic/sold-it-way-too-low-what-would-you-do
Hope you had a good week!
Join the conversation in the forum>>
Our Store Week March 5-11, 2017
Store #1
Total Items in Store: 5,640
Items Sold: 72
Cost of Items Sold: $205
Total Sales: $2,859.28
Highest Price Sold: $350 (vintage sewing machine)
Average Price Sold: $39.71
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $25
Number of items listed this week: 0
———-
Bonanza/Trugether:
Sold 1 items for $25
———-
Store #2
Total Items in Store: 1130
Items Sold: 9
Cost of Items Sold: $16
Total Sales: $272.04
Highest Price Sold: $65 (Vintage SAS shoes)
Average Price Sold: $30.22
Returns: 0
Number of items listed this week: 0
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Scavenger Life Episode 300: Our 300th Episode!! Now let’s talk taxes…
Congrats to everyone on our 300th episode! We posted our first podcast in March of 2013. Four years ago! We say congrats to you guys because we wouldn’t have kept recording each and every week if you didn’t show up to share with us. I’m glad we’ve found our people, the Trash Elves.
We received our tax bill from the accountant. Double ouch. Good news is that we made more money than expected in 2016. Bad news is we didn’t pay enough over the year so we have a hefty tax bill to pay by April 15. All of our eBay profits in March will go to the upkeep of this great nation. We do our best to stay on top of our numbers, but being self-employed with varying income makes it difficult. Well, if we’re paying a lot of taxes it means business is good.
eBay announced their Spring Seller Update. We talk it about it in length here. Basically it’s higher fees and lower discounts. Not great, but we still make great money on eBay. You can also read how eBay is supposedly going to spend the extra money they get from us.
Sellers won’t be happy, but it’s just business.
Hope you had a good week.
Join the conversation in the forum>>
Our Store Week February 26-March 4, 2017
Store #1
Total Items in Store: 5,714
Items Sold: 71
Cost of Items Sold: $235
Total Sales: $2,074.15
Highest Price Sold: $125 (vintage book)
Average Price Sold: $29.21
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $20
Number of items listed this week: 0
———-
Bonanza/Trugether:
Sold 1 items for $30
———-
Store #2
Total Items in Store: 1113
Items Sold: 16
Cost of Items Sold: $300
Total Sales: $1,453.86
Highest Price Sold: $499 (Vintage painting)
Average Price Sold: $90.86
Returns: 0
Number of items listed this week: 115
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Scavenger Life Episode 299: What Control Do We Have as eBay Sellers?
If you wade into the eBay community forums, you quickly get a sense of overwhelming anger mixed with powerlessness. These buyers choose to rage about problems in their store and feel like the only solution is for a Government investigation of how eBay is purposefully ruining their lives. They are convinced that eBay has a specific employee with a finger on the button that keeps their sales drying up.
As long time eBay sellers, we completely understand where this fear comes from. To this very moment, we experience the grumpy buyers, inconsistent sales from week to week, confused customer service reps, etc. Why can’t we have total control?
But we do have a certain amount of control when running our eBay store that is guaranteed:
- It’s starts with the items we choose to scavenge . Often we use gut instinct, but we still whip out our phone and do a quick search on “sold” items. If we feel our sales are slow or selling for low dollar, we’ll simply choose to buy different items. It’s insanity to keep having problems selling a certain item and think the result will be different. Plus variety is just fun.
- How we take photos of these items is an early important lesson we quickly learned. As eBay customers, we are amazed at the number of sellers that provide only one or two photos that are blurry or unhelpful in their perspective. We have always provided as many photos that are logical (usually at least 8). Our photos are always well lit and clear. We provide plenty of close ups. If we do our job correctly, no potential buyer will see our item and crave a different angle. Whose item will that person buy: the blurry single photo or the ten clear photos?
- How we title an item gives us an enormous amount of control. This is all about research and the experience of having done past research. Proper research gives us the keywords to attract the right buyers. We use every single character to describe an item. Every relevant word is another keyword that google or Cassini will pick up on. It is insanity to see a seller only use three or four generic words to describe an item. Adding all the item specifics is also a bonus.
- And how we price an item is the last power we have (and maybe the most important). Do we need to be very competitive and lowball the price? Or is our item in rare, good shape so we should wait for the higher price? Should we run sales to move items? Or will no one buy this item right now whatever the price is? Am I charging too little for my items to make all the listing worth my time? Or am I being too precious about these items I’ve listed? We think pricing is probably what makes sellers the most crazy because they incorrectly think the lowest price will always win. There is absolutely no single good answer.
If we pull out our view from just focusing on an eBay business, what control does any business actually have? You can’t force people to buy your item or even walk into your store. Some of it is reputation, luck, research, and mostly the seasonal nature of retail. We try to take advantage of all the power we do have, and accept a certain level of helplessness and uncertainty. With this acceptance, comes some amount of peace.
We had an awesome week of eBay sales. They just happened because we had put the time into list list list.
The forum keeps giving us some great conversations. We’re always learning new things from smart sellers. Cebanak posted about Facebook Marketplace now letting people using electronic payments. Is this just one more step closer to Facebook competing with eBay?
Hope you had a good week!
Join the conversation in the forum>>
Our Store Week February 19-25, 2017
Store #1
Total Items in Store: 5,794
Items Sold: 69
Cost of Items Sold: $120
Total Sales: $2,566.74
Highest Price Sold: $299 (vintage art work)
Average Price Sold: $37.19
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 110
———-
Bonanza/Trugether:
Sold 2 items for $60
———-
Store #2
Total Items in Store: 997
Items Sold: 11
Cost of Items Sold: $15
Total Sales: $261.22
Highest Price Sold: $42 (Vintage Dr Scholl’s sandals)
Average Price Sold: $23.74
Returns: 0
Number of items listed this week: 15
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Scavenger Life Episode 298: The Scavengers and The Collectors, A Love Story
We sell all kinds of items, many of which are practical everyday objects: clothes, tools, etc. But we also find and sell many items that are “collectible”. They have no practical value and are mainly ornamental, historical or make people feel nostalgic. Though we’re frugal and love to live a very minimal life, it is interesting that we make a living by scavenging items for people who love to collect. In biology, this is called Mutualism, where both species help each other with their needs.
As Scavengers, we’re out there every week locating these weird, uncommon items in the random waste of the nation, then we come home to post these items online. The Collectors are scouring the internet for the items they need to complete their sets. Our urge is to get everything out of our house. Collectors feel better when they’re surrounded by objects of they deem important. When the Collector dies, their lifetime of collections often get broken up into pieces and sent out into the world for the next generation of Scavengers to find and offer up to the next generation Collector. The natural cycle starts again.
We thank everyone who sent us emails, left phone messages, and forum comments about the Gallery Plus problem and eBay Coupon we spoke about last week. eBay would do it self a favor to have a page that listed “known problems” so we all wouldn’t have to cipher these mysteries.
Our sales slowed from the busy holiday season but have been steady. All we can do is list. Coffee is for listers.
These are the links we discussed in this podcast:
- We found a painting (see above) that should go to the Museum of Bad Art. It reminds us of their first painting that sparked the whole idea.
- On the forum, ShortandStout recommends going to local experts and craftsmen to find out more about items you find.
- And Nancy was nice enough to remind everyone about a great interview with Mark, a tax accountant who now specialized in helping online sellers.
Join the conversion on the forum>>
Our Store Week February 12-18, 2017
Store #1
Total Items in Store: 5722
Items Sold: 48
Cost of Items Sold: $226
Total Sales: $1,351.23
Highest Price Sold: $125 (vintage Air France menus)
Average Price Sold: $28.15
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $16
Number of items listed this week: 120
———-
Bonanza/Trugether:
Sold 0 items for $0
———-
Store #2
Total Items in Store: 997
Items Sold: 5
Cost of Items Sold: $8
Total Sales: $175.80
Highest Price Sold: $85 (vintage spice rack)
Average Price Sold: $35.02
Returns: 0
Number of items listed this week: 15
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