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Sales are slow and steady. Can’t say we’re benefitting from any kind of holiday rush, which may be because we’ve moved so far into “weird, old stuff f
[See the full post at: November 28-December 4, 2021] -
W/E 12/4/21
Total Items In Store: 3,557
Items Sold: 65
Cost of Items Sold: $124.95
Total Sales (Sales + Shipping does [not inc sales tax]) $2,087.69
Ebay / Paypal / Shipping Costs / Fees $598.22
Net Profit $1,489.47
Highest Price Sold: 300.00 <span class=”Apple-converted-space”> Vintage Paramount Pictures Leather Jacket
Average Price Sold: 27.58
Number of items listed: 101
Scavenge of the Week: Snowman Christmas Nightmare Red & Green Scarf Transforming into Snake
Not a high dollar item but I only paid a buck and I think this thing is adorable.
Most Satisfying Sales:
I love it when I list something that is essentially garbage but I just know will be purchased by a Film or TV Production. I had two of those sales this week
Calico Cottage Hallmark Vintage Stationary Set – Open Box
Heavily Rusted Vintage Metal 12 slot 8mm Film Box
@Jay I am feeling the Holiday rush but I have also abandoned many of my sacred cows. I offer free shipping on anything under 2 lbs (I can reasonablely work the price into sales cost) and if something has been in inventory over 2 years and it was truly scavenger (close to free) any profit about $10.00 is considered a win. I hate the concept of “free” shipping but I continue to love money. Love wins.-
I offer free shipping on anything under 2 lbs (I can reasonablely work the price into sales cost) and if something has been in inventory over 2 years and it was truly scavenger (close to free) any profit about $10.00 is considered a win.
Shipping is Ryanne’s realm. I think it’s close to a religious dogma for her that shipping should never be free.
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She’s not wrong.
You guys have the advantage of unlimited storage space. At 3500 items I think I’ve hit my limit. So my “losers” have to go.
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Welp, short report for this week: “We couldn’t find any sales in the selected time period. Try changing the date range or filters.” ouch. No listing again for me but I don’t think I’ve had a week without sales anytime since I’ve been selling. I started a sale today. Hope to list a handful of items at least. Have jury duty on top of it all. Oye.
It looks like the holiday shipping cutoffs are pretty early. I like to shut down right before xmas because Ebay will sell FedEx and then not let me buy a label. Also I just don’t want to deal with the last minute buyers. Then I open again on the 24th. Let me know if the post office is running especially behind this year. Thanks!
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@christiner why turn off your store and walk away from money?
It’s not my problem if things don’t arrive by Christmas. I just get stuff out the door as fast as possible and stop thinking about it.
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11/28/21 – 12/04/21
Total Items In Store: 4237 (was 4209 previously listed)
Items Sold: 26
Total Sales: $ 982.77
Highest Price Sold: $ 100 (Vintage Uniform)
Average Price Sold: $ 37.80
Money Spent on New Inventory: $ 420.97
Number of items listed: 27Gut Sales Report for the week: Good solid week.
Focus for the week : Just trying to keep up with listing and shipping.
Scavenge of the week: Found some good Silver plated Flatware in storage chest for cheap.
Thoughts for the week: Still working on getting my Youtube channel going.
Mark S
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Hello all,
I didn’t realize that people were still posting week numbers until I wandered back into the forum last week. Here are my numbers for this week:
Total Items in Store: 4830
Items Sold: 60
Total Sales: $1427.24
Cost of Items Sold: $313
Highest Price Item Sold: $199.95 Yashica T3 Film Camera Point & Shoot <– purchased for $3 from a church rummage sale yesterday
Number of items listed this week: 77 worth approx. $1836
YTD sales compared to this time last year: +26%
Hats sold this week: 44I made a mistake with my sourcing. I acquired so much stuff a couple of months ago that I slowed down my sourcing and focused on listing. Now yard sales have all but paused for the holidays I’m stuck with almost nothing but hats to list which is boring and not as profitable as yard sale finds. I won’t make this mistake next year.
It looks like I’ll end my year with sales 25% higher than last year. A nice, but not huge, increase over last year considering this was my first full year as a full-time ebay reseller.
I hope everyone’s holiday period is going well. I never see a huge spike but things are reasonably good. By my estimation there’s another 10 days of sales before the Christmas lull will be upon us.
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I didn’t realize that people were still posting week numbers until I wandered back into the forum last week.
We cant quit each other. We’re still selling on eBay so thought it’d be good to still have a place to trade info on how things are evolving.
Yes, we learned a while ago to go into winter with a huge deathpile of stuff to list. Im surprised yard sales stop in California. Isn’t it always pretty nice all year round?
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Glad to see you wandered back to the forum Simon. I’ve enjoyed reading your updates for a while now.
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Weekly sales 11/28 – 12/4
Random Item Store
Total items 1446
Items sold 29
New items listed 70
Gross sales $662.31
Net sales $397.00
New buyers 29
Repeat buyers 1Patch Store
Total items 4361
Items sold 69
New items listed 140
Gross sales $522.87
Net sales $343.46
New buyers 58
Repeat buyers 3Etsy
Orders 24
Gross sales $215.00
Net sales $182.75Gross sales total $1,400.18
Net sales total $923.21Things are not going as expected. I figured that more people on eBay for holiday shopping would mean more sales even if my stuff isn’t quite gift worthy. I at least thought my sales wouldn’t go down any but they have a little. Oh well, I’m still in the process of building my eBay business into what I want it to be and have told myself to just keep at it and see where I’m at by the end of 2022. I’m about to start devoting 5 days a week to it in January so my stores will go up in listings dramatically. My patch store will anyways as that’s what I want to grow the most.
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You seem to be making about as much as us each week: $1000 after fees. In a perfect world, what’s the sum you need each week?
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Yeah, I’m making enough to cover the bills comfortably. I don’t really have a number in mind as long as I make enough to save some each month. I would like to see the numbers keep going up though and I thought I would for the rest of the year at least lol. My goal is to become financially independent, so I’d like as much excess cash as possible to throw in index funds and towards our mortgage. I’m thinking by the end of 2022 my stores are going to be cranking out some serious cash. I plan to double the number of patches I list every day, starting in January.
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Week of Nov 28 – Dec 4
Total Items in Store: 1409 eBay, 30 Etsy
Items Sold: 19 eBay, 3 Etsy
Cost of Items Sold: $5.10 + $30 Commission
Total Sales: $363.58 eBay, $130 Etsy; Includes fees but no shipping
Highest Price Sold: $98 for 1880s antique bourbon jug on Etsy; $50 Lot vintage Snoopy collectables on eBay
Average price: $22.44
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 19I had a 25% off sale on eBay that ended Nov 30. I definitely got a bump up from that as well as some holiday shopping. The surprise was Etsy coming in at three sales for the week! This brings my total for 30 days at five Etsy sales. I think I’ve gone six months to a year with only five or so Etsy sales.
The big change was my new PC. I bought all the parts off Amazon using pcpartpicker.com, and my son put it together. It cost less than $400. He was able to load a valid Windows 10 from a copy he already had. Then someone on the forum mentioned OpenOffice instead of buying Microsoft Office. After some research, I decided on LibreOffice, and, so far, I’m very happy with it. I was able to import my eBay COGS Excel files without any issues.
Mostly, I’m thrilled that I no longer have a very slow 9-year old computer (iMac) any more. Of course, now that most of my windows & tabs are closed, it is working just fine. After I transfer the rest of my files (including years/decades of photos), I’ll be ready to remove it from my desk and reclaim space to do my work!
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That’s exciting. I’ve read how its difficult to find PC parts so glad you could find everything you need.
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Jay – I think that the parts supply issue had more to do with higher end products. When I was doing my research, I noticed one of the higher end gaming systems go from a few thousand to over $20k back down to where it started. So, yeh, definitely a supply chain issue there. I actually bought parts for two PCs, but my son hasn’t started on my husband’s yet. I got first dibs. 🙂
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Items in Store 1558
Items Sold 29
Total Sales $1,011.00
COGS $116.00
Total Profit $895.00
Average profit $30.86
Average sales price $34.86
New Listings 0
Items scavenged 13First week back at day job work was a mixed bag. Waking up to an alarm clock again really stinks. I just didn’t feel like listing. I may not list at all this month. I worked really hard once I got back on my feet in mid-october to build up my listed inventory and well, I think I deserve a break to enjoy the holidays with my family.
Instead of listing I’m hanging out in the hot tub or playing video games with the kids. It is nice.
I still have to ship of course but I’m trying to keep that to a bare minimum thanks to my 2 business day handling. Tonight I have to ship…ughhh. But I won’t have to ship again until Thursday so yay!
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My December sales are off to a great start. Hopefully it continues. It was spurred along by a $220 coat sale (which I paid up for) and a $300 nightgown I bought for $5 and sold in 24 hours.
I’ve been going to more estate sales. I used to be a bit of a snob about it and only hit up the ones that looked good and were run by certain companies. But after some great cheap scores from two estate sales that were privately ran and/or in more run down parts of town, I’ve decided I need to go to all of the local estate sales. That really only means 1 or 2 more a week. I’ve gotten pretty good at seeing the value in items that every other reseller in town seems to pass up so I’m finding stuff at most sales even when I don’t go the first day or 2 of the sale.
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Total Items in Store: 165
Items Listed: 15
Items Sold: 13
Total Sales: $254.25
Highest Price Sold: $65 Peggy Karr glass Gingerbread House serving tray
Slow start to the week, but went bonkers over the weekend! Mostly stuff that sold were new listings, but a few older items as well. Clarification from last week – I wont pull down what Christmas I already have listed, but I wont list new items for a while. I know seasonal stuff sells all year, but best prices are in the months leading up to the holiday so that is when I put in the effort to take pictures, research and list.
For sourcing I prefer nice estate sales, but find good stuff everywhere so I try not to avoid any sales but the ones that last week after week (you know the ones, the sellers usually have spaces at flea markets as well and it seems nothing ever actually sells). I did quite well at one sale that did not advertise like they should have, no pictures and no item descriptions – looked like a dud, but turned out very well. I only hit sales first hour/first day if I see something amazing listed. I just don’t have the patience to throw elbows anymore unless I am really motivated. There is great stuff still there on day 2-3, and prices go way down.
I did decide to take a contract job for a few months starting in January. I don’t want to let my licenses and certifications go just yet from my old career and need work hours to keep them. It is out of area so I will have to pare down eBay selling for a bit, but I think I can still do a bit to keep my listings up in the searches. This is addictive, and I still have lots in the storeroom to go and the antique booth is only so big. I have 3 day handling already, so I will just end a bunch of the larger more fragile listings and try to pre-box new stuff I list.
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11-28-21 to 12-4-21
Total Items in Store: 1793
Items Sold: 4
Gross Sales:$ 72.35
Net Sales:$ 40.91
Cost of Items Sold: $ 1.00
Highest Price Sold: $ 25.00 Pokemon Pin set
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $ 0
Number of items listed this week: 10Very slow week as I was not able to list consistently due to non Ebay life. Will get back on track this week and see what happens.
Did help my Mom clean out a closet (4 contractors bags of clothes donated) and grabbed some gems. Will try to get them listed very soon and see how it goes.
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I have gotten a bit of a wild hair up my butt about organizing and repricing inventory over the last few weeks. I think because end of the year is approaching, but my store has also grown by over 1000 listings in the last year, with many more to be listed and bulk peripheral items (supplies, shipping supplies, etc) taking up even more space. All in all, it’s starting to push the physical limit of one apartment bedroom. I have already put a lot of work in over the last few weeks organizing and consolidating, but there is plenty more to do if I want to follow through with one of my goals for next year which is to expand beyond the trading cards niche.
11/28/2021 – 12/4/2021
Total items in store: 3029 (down from 3543 — mostly due to the inventory consolidation mentioned above)
Items sold: 51 (30 via best offer, 9 via seller initiated offer, 1 repeat buyer)
Gross sales: $3057.86 (up 85% from one year ago)
Net sales: $2244.26 (up 101% from one year ago)
Lowest price sold (net): $6.27 — Luke Ridnour 2003 rookie basketball card numbered to 25
This buyer also bought a $40 listing which is what you always hope for with these low dollar sales. Luke Ridnour was a pretty average player, and that’s reflected in his card prices which rarely eclipse $50 regardless of how fancy the set or how many ornaments the card company decorates the cardboard with.
This was the type of card that I built my store on a few years ago when I started selling cards more — buy a big lot of cards for $50, sell a few of them for $10 to $20 and do it over and over again. Most of these cards go to buyers whose collecting interests are clearly reflected in their purchases, or their user name, or they live in the same state as a favorite team. These buyers focus on particular players and types of cards like autographs or certain serial numbered sets. But they are hard to retain as repeat buyers because they are so laser focused on these very specific wants, which are hard to find consistently. If I buy enough medium to large sized lots, I’ll usually find something worth selling, but will it be the specific Seattle Supersonics players serial numbered cards that this buyer wants? Probably not.
Now my process is a bit different. I buy 10 or 20 or 50 individual cards from the same seller for $1 to $100 each (spreading the shipping cost across multiple cards instead of 1 or 2), focusing on auctions that for whatever reasons don’t reach the level of previous sales. I try to keep my maximum bid at 1/3 of previous sales, but sometimes I’ll go a bit higher if it’s something particularly rare or it’s an especially hot player or team. Then I relist the cards buy it now or best offer and wait for the right buyer to come along or the right time to sell. This has led to a lot more time spent browsing auction listings, but it’s much more sustainable in terms of building a large inventory with more high dollar, popular items, some of which sell very quickly. There are a larger pool of buyers looking for an autograph of their team’s new hot player or a numbered rookie of the superstar who just signed a big free agent contract. Repeat this across all the different sports and teams, and that’s how and why the card industry is still relevant today.
Highest price sold (net): $295.57 — Obi Toppin 1/1 2020 rookie basketball card
An interesting contrast to the low priced sale of the week. It really shows how different card collecting is now. I bought this card in June, during the basketball off-season, for about $50 from an auction listing that didn’t have a very good title and I remember that it also ended at a weird time, like 3:30 on a Tuesday afternoon.
In the era of bid snipers (I highly recommend Gixen, if anyone is curious), auction ending time shouldn’t affect final bid prices much, but my non-scientific theory is that it really does. There are still a lot of eBay users who are very casual, and only browse once in a while for what they want, not every day. And they are not checking eBay on Tuesday afternoons, that’s for sure!
I knew $50 would be a bargain price because 1/1 rookie cards are particularly prized among collectors, since unlike the regular base card (which has thousands printed) or other generic versions, there is only 1 of each particular 1/1 style. Some are often quite neat looking in terms of the aesthetics, and might contain an autograph or unique piece of the jersey like the team’s logo. Granting that every sport has 30 to 50 different sets, and most sets have multiple styles of 1/1s, so players often have dozens if not hundreds of 1/1s. But I digress…
The other reason I bought this card is that Obi Toppin was the first round pick of the New York Knicks last year. So, a top prospect for a popular team. One year into his professional basketball journey, he’s looked like most rookie athletes — some games he’s amazing, others he barely gets the ball and makes mistakes. I’m not surprised this card sold now since a lot of articles are clamoring for Toppin to get a chance in the starting lineup since the Knicks are not living up to expectations.
The buyer of the card had a user ID that was something like “financebro420” (not exactly but you get the idea) and the negotiation was quick and painless. I had the card listed for $400, the buyer offered $350 and I couldn’t hit accept fast enough. I sent the buyer a few other Knicks cards, which I do with almost every purchase under $50 but not usually the high dollar ones. I figure that anyone who spends hundreds on a sports card probably doesn’t care about my silly 50 cent extras. But with the holidays coming, I figured a finance bro might get a fat year end bonus, and maybe they’ll appreciate the freebies and save me as a seller. Plus, I have a few other Toppin cards still listed in my store. Probably time to raise those prices a few bucks just in case…
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Sales Report for: 12/4/21
Total Items in Store: 1189
Items Sold: 26
Gross Sales (Not including shipping and tax): 685.44
Net Sales (After fees): $547.31
Cost of Items Sold: $38.50
COGS Percent 7.03%
Net Profit Margin: 74.23%
Highest Price Sold: $99.95 Antique Mettlach Beer Stein
Average Price Sold: $26.36
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory: $43.70
Sold via promoted listings: 20
Promoted Percentage: 76.92%
Average Days Listed: 365
Longest Listed: 1825
New items listed: 16Had a busy week with a lot of sales, one of the highest for the year, but unfortunately they were mostly lower value items. Total sales came in just this year’s weekly average of $700. On the bright side, I had very little invested in the items, so my profit margin was higher than average.
Best sale was an antique Mettlach beer stein from 1899 at $99.95. This would have sold for much more but was damaged. I had picked this one up for about $11 in an auction lot.
Scavenge of the week was a vintage “The Endless Summer” surf movie poster from a Maxsold auction. It was sold in a lot of posters, most of which were junk and damaged. I initially didn’t think much of the lot, but it was nagging at me so I went back and took another look. Looked it up and saw that originals can sell for a lot of money. Pictures were bad so couldn’t tell if it was original but I put in a bid of $50 and took a chance. Ended up getting the lot for $4 and it turns out the poster is one of the originals. It is not in pristine condition, but should still sell for upwards of $300.
Had one of my longest tail sales this week also. A new baseball cap for the Michigan Spartans that I’d had up for almost exactly 5 years. Interestingly, the cap sold to Israel.
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Cool excel tip: You can use excel for free online if you have a microsoft email account like an old hotmail account or an outlook account. You can save files on the microsoft One drive for free or just save the files to your computer. You do not need to own microsoft office or anything, it is free if you have a microsoft email. https://www.office.com/launch/excel?ui=en-US&rs=US&auth=1
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And for those of you that dont like Microsoft products, I use Google Sheets. Its also free: https://www.google.com/sheets/about/
Very helpful to keep spreadsheets in the cloud, especially when working with other people.
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