10K on the Bay

[Retro Treasures WV]

So I thought this was an interesting tidbit in last weeks podcast, so I listened to the associated podcast. You can check it out here:

chrislinning on ecommercemomentum (EDIT: Jay removed direct link because their site prompted warnings from Google about being compromised. Just google if interested in the interview)

I figured this was worth a break out conversation because there were some interesting tidbits sprinkled throughout the show.

As for my thoughts:
– The host of that podcast is very positive and upbeat – moreso than Jay! I could tell that the host knew the 10K guy was in over his head in multiple places but he helped him work through it.
– Chris is about to hit “the wall” for sure. He has some good ideas and I think he’ll figure it out, but he really has no true idea how to manage the volume he is taking on. It is easy to box up and catalogue purchased inventory. That is the easy part.
– My favorite part of the podcast were his discussions of his buying methods. The discussion of the process of buying an entire yard sale was very interesting. I personally couldn’t do that since 80% of yard sale stuff is junk. If he makes it work though with his helpers and still turns a profit, then that is quite the process. His profit margin will be much lower but the work is all done!

I’m going to keep an eye on his experiment. I wish him all the best in it. My general assessment is that he really doesn’t have a true process yet though – he just has 3000-4000 junk items filling his garage. If he keeps improving and gets a real process going with multiple employees, I’d love to hear him be interviewed here at Scavengerlife in September or so.

• This topic was modified 9 years, 1 month ago by Jay.

[michael d]

I would like to find his store to see how he is currently doing with his 4000 listed items. He has several videos up that explain how he wants his process to work. Right now he has everything in a two car garage and its stacked to the ceiling with a small place to process shipment. If that’s 4k items that pretty impressive, but I am use to dealing with bigger items.

Very positive and likeable guy.

I did find a seller with a similar model, 10k clothing items 85% male tops. His feedback is 688 for last month. Mostly best offer so hard to gauge pricing. So I may end up biting my tongue, the model has some merit.

Not sure on etiquette so didn’t post the sellers store name.

[Retro Treasures WV]

In the podcast he only had 1500 actual listings, but had 4k items in bins and on a COGS spreadsheet.

[Jay]

I’ve heard other guys talk about just buying out a yard sale for one price. I agree that it seems like a dumb move. You;re just paying someone to throw away a lot of trash. Why not just spend a little time and cherry pick the best stuff for cheap?

[davidbloop]

I watched a fair few of his vids today… he has a solid model but it honestly just sounds like a chore to me. He doesn’t go scavenging, he buys pallets of bulk preowned clothing and then focuses everything on efficiency and faster turnover, like he wanted at least a 1/3 sell through rate. Saying he wanted to get his shipping to 100 items shipped per hour and stuff like that. Great business thinking…. but not my cuppa tea. I do really appreciate all the videos he has up where he goes into detail about how ebay operates and also tax and cogs and all that, even down to how he was approaching graphic designers and all of that stuff. It’s nice to see someone so open and transparent with all of that. Sounds like a great way to become a millionaire, don’t get me wrong, it just also sounds like no fun. I also heard in one of his interviews that his goal is mainly to create a commercial business that he can then sell. He was talking about his struggles trying to move to a commercial space because noone wants to buy a business that’s run from home. Not sure if that’s still his goal though.

So ye, I think he’s worth checking out, he seems smart enough and has a model that works. It just doesn’t gel with what I want from my own business and life I suppose though.

[Jay]

The new way of “getting rich” is to build a quick business that shows profit and then sell it. I’ve read about the guys who start websites that sell products or courses and then flip them. I guess its a smart idea. Just different than what we do.

[Author]

Posts