[Jay]

There’s a growing awareness that algorithms are increasingly controlling many aspects of our lives. Dating apps, Facebook posts, news sites, online ad
[See the full post at: ]

[Retro Treasures WV]

Items in Store: 3181
Items Sold: 50
Total Sales: $2,132.00
COGS: $274.00
Total Profit: $1,858.00
Average profit: $37.16
Average sales price: $42.64
New Listings: 87
Items scavenged: 9
2024 weekly new listings Avg: 40
2024 avg gross weekly sales $1,605.11
2024 Avg weekly Items Sold 34
2024 ASP $47.45
2024 projected total sales $83,465.94

Shipping was ANNOYING this week! 50 items is a lot for sure. I stayed on top of things and even went ahead and packed/shipped items on Saturday/Sunday and I STILL have 20 things to ship today.

Historically, I’ve only hit 50 sales in a week 10 times – 5 of those times were the first 5 weeks of Covid lockdown so they don’t count. I have a feeling I have plenty more 50 sale weeks in my future this year.

Low dollar sales are still dragging down my ASP as I had 12 sales at $12 or less. Gotta get rid of these items somehow and $116 in my pocket off of these sales is better than $0 if I pulled and donated them!

Yard sales I think are dead in my neck of the woods. I may not even make the effort to go out anymore. It’s not like I need the stuff. I just picked up a few items this week – not really worth my time.

I spent some time organizing in my garage/office. My goal was to reclaim the disaster death pile in the corner where my weight lifting platform is. I bought a bunch of tubs from Menards along with another foldable 2×4 table. I accomplished my goal and prepped 8 bins of commodity clothing for my oldest children to 100% list. There is A LOT more of this stuff for them to do.

I pay them $2 per item completed. If they start and finish a complete bin (20-25 items per bin typically) within 2 days I will pay them a 10% commission on the ESTIMATED total profit from the bin (Sales price minus COGS, fees, and 15% average reduction due to offers.) This way they won’t have to wait on the items to sell and it encourages them to be quicker with their work. They tried a bin this weekend and…well… those legos, phone games, and xbox just aren’t gonna play themselves! They missed out on their 10% commission this time.

These bins will stay in the garage in an organized manner in labeled bins so I don’t have to move anything to inventory – it is just 100% done and all I have to do is ship solds which is quick and easy in a poly mailer. If shipping gets super annoying I will teach them how to ship these items and pay them for that work too. If this little project results in an extra 50 listings and 10 or so sales a week it will be a huge success! I clearly will have to hound them relentlessly to keep them on track though.

 

I also got a bit frustrated with my son and his photos. When he did the photos of the coat/jacket wardrobe the photos weren’t great. He is using my old iphone 7. I used that phone for several years and THOUSANDS of items and it did a fine job as a 12MP camera. Then the photos this week were even worse to the point I couldn’t use them. I did a bunch of research into why the camera was sucking so badly. I was even looking into buying an iphone 11 to replace it (since the ebay app no longer supports iphone 7). Nothing was making sense…until I looked at the camera lens. I asked my son “Remember when I told you that you needed to clean the lens EVERY time you go to take photos – are you doing that?” “Oh yeah…I forgot”. I cleaned the CLEARLY greasy lens and went out to reshoot one of his items – perfect photos. GRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!! Ah the joys of trying to teach/employ teenagers.

Premium Hoarder update:

Sold 9 items for $736.

Nothing major – just a good mix of clothes and a few pair of shoes. I’m close to 500 active hoarder listings and I’m about to cross 500 sales. It’s CRAZY that I’ve already listed/sold near 1000 items from this haul and I’m nowhere near done!

[Jay]

You have a lot of patience with your teenagers. We struggle dealing with kids in their 20’s who seem to never have learned how to be detailed oriented and self-motivated. Those skills are so valuable.

[Retro Treasures WV]

Looks like something is wrong with the post and there is no title to click in the forum.

[ThriftShift]

August 24-31

Items sold:  17 items

COGs:  $38.50

Net profit after fees and COGs:  $626.16

 

Breakdowns:

Ebay Items in store:  464

Ebay Items Sold: 5

Ebay Gross Sales: $198.07

Ebay net minus fees and shipping:  $118.16

COGs: $1.50

 

FBM items:  over 60; there is not a “storefront” to count items easily.

FBM Items sold locally:  12

FBM Sales:  $545

FBM COGs: $37

 

I am still “Below Standard” for ebay.   I suppose I am an example that things still sell, if desirable.  My ebay items sold were a Cabbage Patch doll dress, an electric blanket remote controller, a collectible mouse figure, vintage perfume and a mini golf set piece.  This mini golf set is only made in England.  I had picked up 10 plastic pieces off the side of the road last fall.  I just listed them last month (kids not into it).  I’ve sold three for about $60 each with free shipping.

For Facebook, I sold small furniture items.  My best sale was an African-American Santa blowmold for $130.  I drove him on Friday to a hair salon and left him at the reception desk, as requested.  It was three miles away and $130 sale, so I didn’t charge for driving there.  I had bought about 20 vintage blowmold items at a yard sale in April for $321.  I made my money back with the sale of three angels, and everything since then has been profit.

Here is what I sold last week that was FREE to me: remote blanket controller, side chair, three side tables, a Pottery Barn mirror, six plastic bin containers, two Target bar stools, and an outside side table.

The FBM algorithms are annoying.  Last fall I could sort by furniture and then “newest”.  Now I am being shown only items I click on, and that the phone sees or hears me talking about.  It takes several steps to find my free or cheap items to flip.  And I still think I am missing out. I know there must be a ton of yard sales in Charleston, but they are so hard to find online.

I had some negative Nellies this week on FBM.   I don’t hold items past a day unless a downpayment is made, generally I ask $5-10 nonrefundable. I just delete, block, and move on to the next.  I can report a buyer but I don’t know if it goes anywhere.  I listed more “smalls” on FBM this past week too.  I had local pickup for two green Pyrex mixing bowls for $35 which is about what I would get on ebay, without shipping it.

[Retro Treasures WV]

I agree that the algorithm has DESTROYED FBMP even from a buyers perspective.  keywords, sorting, location based – all of those tools are WORTHLESS! I dial a search in and get…whatever and wherever.

[Jay]

Sounds like you’re in a very active Facebook Marketplace area. We find and sell maybe two or three things a month locally. Hearing your stories is inspirational.

[Sharyn]

I was out of town last week with my store on Time Away, so I only sold seven items. I did sell a few higher priced items, so my ASP wasn’t too bad.

Right before I left on my trip, I found that I had never adjusted my Etsy handling time from my last vacation that ended in the beginning of June. I might have made an extra sale or two over the summer if I had remembered to fix it. I fixed it on Friday.

My daughter (with my husband’s backing) has asked me to give back some of the basement so that we can have a workout area downstairs. It might not be a bad idea for me to reduce my store and get rid of inventory that hasn’t moved over a few years. Plus, we can free up some workout equipment that’s buried in the mist of all my junk. I told them that I will probably need until the beginning of next year to set up a Maxsold online auction.

Week of Aug 25 – 31
Total Items in Store: 1763 eBay, 37 Etsy
Items Sold: 7 eBay, 0 Etsy
Cost of Items Sold: $11 + $18 Commission
Total Sales: $212.11 eBay
Highest Price Sold: eBay $75.65 for 1961 Websters New International Dictionary
Average price: $30.30
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 10

[Jay]

Sometimes it’s good to reorganize. Creating a workout space is also a nice bonus.

[BethGreen]

Items in Store: 626
Items Sold: 23
Total Gross Sales: $798
COGS: $51
Average sales price: $34.73
New Listings: 41

I couldn’t disagree with you more on the theory of the necessity for Promoted Listings. I’ve maintained my growth on the site without it. I have performed many experiments and here is what I belive based on the results:
(Side Note: I have taken a “bad buy” item and promoted it 100%…still didn’t sell. PL won’t make non-desirable or mis-priced items sell).
When you *first* start promoting, eBay gives you an immediate reward with priority placement that results in a flush of sales. This is where it’s easy to draw the conclusion that PL works. However, over time, those sales even back out to somewhere close to what you used to have prior to promotion. So then we try “turning them off” but sales take a dive and don’t recover. The conclusion made is we need to promote to get those sales. Oh, and 1% used to be enough, but now its 2% minimum…and you are forced to re-consider your rate with every lull, and the suggested/trending rates are now often in double digits.
Here’s what I believe happens: You first start promoting, eBay gives you that immediate boost with the increased Impressions Data to show how PL is really working. Your items are being shown to many more buyers…and the items that would have sold without promotion sell even more quickly. Problem is those impressions are being shown and counted even when you’re not really a direct keyword match to their search. Ebay gets “credit” for giving increased impressions, but eventually the other metrics take a hit…click through and sales conversion rates decline. I have done a bunch of experiments on this and can confidently say that PL will make your ORGANIC search placement tank. Take a look at your “Top Search Slot Impressions” percentage (in the Traffic Section). I sit at 20% with no PL. I have yet to find a pro-Promoted Listing seller who has a percentage anywhere close to half of that. I’ve done plenty of experiments on this…consistently, after starting a PL campaign my percentage dropped to single digits within days. After a few months of PL, sales taper down to relative normal, as long as we’re paying that increased fee percentage. When you try to “shut it off”, you can’t recover because of the damage that’s been done to your Organic Placement. You’re sales don’t come back. Remembering that eBay Promoted items are “tagged” to pay the extra fee a full 30 days after you turn them off, if a buyer previously looked at the Promoted Listing, and taking into account the damage done to Organic Placement, it’s going to take months to recover. Sellers don’t wait that long and feel trapped into Promotions at that point.

[Retro Treasures WV]

oh there is definite merit to what you are saying. That’s why I don’t promote items for at least 90 days, preferably 120 days.
I think immediately doing PL is a bad idea for one- off items.

I want to make the sale at a couple target points – the initial new item bump, the bump when google picks up my items, and then finally, the PL bump. Eventually I’ll have the next bump of ending/sell similar at 6 months.

I currently have 210 items not on PL since I last added items. I’m typically at 400-600 items once I will do another addition to PL.

I’ve also done experiments with old items. I’ve done 50% off sales on old items with ZERO sales.
In PL, I bumped my oldest items from 3% to 5% and have TRIPLED the sales that come from those old items. I’ve sold almost 50 items from my oldest items PL campaign in the last 3 weeks. That’s an incredible improvement consider I sold less than 20 from the same group in the previous month

 

[BethGreen]

That’s a great idea to cycle them through algorithym bumps.  How do you stay organized with your method?  One big perpetual Promotion Campaign and just keep adding the older items to it?

I might try this out.  I’m hesitant to make changes heading into 4th quarter so I might wait till the new year but I’m curious to try.

[Retro Treasures WV]

In the past I’ve just added them wherever they fit in an existing campaign. When a campaign was full I would start another one. This last time I purposefully split off the new stuff to do some rate comparisons.

Next time I will probably create another new campaign to do some more testing.

[Jay]

Thanks for sharing your experience. It really is an example of being a slave to the algorithm.

[craig rex]

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I’m happy with how my store is trending as summer winds down. I worked hard the first half of this year to get my entire reselling business (both eBay and my card consignment sales) much more organized. I’ve always struggled with death piles and letting things get too cluttered. But something clicked for me this year. It’s still a daily battle, but it feels like one I’m winning. I’m excited to see how this pays off in Q4 and beyond.

8/25/2024 to 8/31/2024

Total listings: 357 (up from 347 last week)

New listings this week: 45

Items sold: 31 — 16 via best offer, 8 via seller initiated offer, 23 via advertising

Gross sales: $1642.26 (down 9% from one year ago)

Net sales: $1006.72 (down 13% from one year ago)

Average sales price: $52.98 (up 9% from one year ago)

Highest price sold (net): $109.38— Justin Herbert rookie card /49 2020 Panini Dynagon green RC PSA 9 Chargers

Lowest price sold (net): $10.35 — Dre Greenlaw auto rookie card 2019 Panini Contenders college ticket RC 49ers

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[Jay]

After building up this successful business and creating a steady stream of good income, do you have any goals you’re working towards? I think I remember at one point you wanted to buy a home or property?

[Author]

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