Home › Forums › Podcast Comments › Scavenger Life Episode 392: No Alarm Clocks – We chat with Troy aka T-Satt about the eBay Lifestyle
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olddenmark.
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12/30/2018 at 9:04 am #54129
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[See the full post at: Scavenger Life Episode 392: No Alarm Clocks – We chat with Troy aka T-Satt about the eBay Lifestyle] -
12/30/2018 at 10:34 am #54137
2018-12-23 – 2018-12-29
Total Items In Store: 2599
Items Sold: 11
Cost of Items Sold: $40
Total Sales: $420
Highest Price Sold: $93.50 (Allen Edmond Shoes)
Average Price Sold: $38.13
# Items Listed: 13
Money Spent on New Inventory: $0Gut Sales Report for the week: Slow sales, but still steady. Hope things pick up in January.
Challenge of the week: Trying to get those custom labels all done before the new year!
Scavenge of the week: Nothing
Mark S
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12/30/2018 at 12:19 pm #54144
Week of 12/23-12/29
Total Items in Store: 2,674 (Up 63% YOY)
Number of Items Listed: 40
Number of Items Sold: 64 (Up 10% YOY)
(Includes 1 Etsy, 0 Bonanza, 1 TrueGether, 0 Poshmark)
Weekly STR: 10% (Down 5% YOY)Total Product Sales: $1,702 (Up 13% YOY)
Cost of Items Sold: $304
Cost of Labor: $149
Highest Item Sold: $88 – Wolverine 1000 Mile Brown Leather Canvas Wingtip Brogue Oxfords
Competition: Highest Priced Sale: Veronica wins the week and Veronica wins for the year 30-22. So, she has won both years we do this competition. 2019 is a new year for me! Clothing
# Listed: 1,671
# Sold: 42
STR: 11%
ASP: $25.28Shoes
# Listed: 456
# Sold: 11
STR: 10%
ASP: $31.59Hard Goods
# Listed: 547
# Sold: 10
STR: 8%
ASP: $26.61Etsy
# Listed: 153
# Sold: 1
STR: 3%
ASP: $59.88Poshmark
# Listed: 115
# Sold: 0
STR: 0%
ASP: $0Funny listening to the podcast when we get to talking about knowing your numbers, both in your business and in your life. As my older son is at the house for Christmas break, we are going over this more and more for his own situation. So important to teach our kids how numbers work, so that they don’t get into debt for dumb things, or pay fees that they don’t need to, etc. Financial education is so lacking right now…
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12/30/2018 at 1:16 pm #54152
For young people, I wish sometime had really explained to me the Rule of 72:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_of_72Compounding interest is the most powerful force in the universe 🙂
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12/30/2018 at 2:50 pm #54157
Amen Jay!
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12/30/2018 at 12:20 pm #54146
PS – Thanks again for the time on the podcast Jay. I love talking with you on how we do stuff!
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12/30/2018 at 12:59 pm #54151
It’s fun to talk about goals and then be able to see how they turn out. There quite a few experiments that people have been discussing here:
–crossposting to different platforms. How much more income can be generated on top of eBay?
–buying more expensive items that sell for more. Can high dollar items be found consistently, and how long will it take for the to sell?
–How much of an eBay store can be done by workers without quality control going down, or profits eaten up by hourly wage?-
12/30/2018 at 2:55 pm #54158
Yep…and all three are on our agenda for 2019. Gonna see how we can grow this thing out. I will keep the numbers split out for everyone to see: eBay/Etsy/Poshmark/Mercari. Truegether and Bonanza are too low to really have their own subset, and we don’t do any work on them since they sync up with eBay.
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12/30/2018 at 5:46 pm #54182
I noticed that you only sold one item on Etsy and nothing on Poshmark this week. Does that worry you? What amount of listings on each platform do you expect to get consistent sales? Or do you have some sales goal to make cross-posting worth your time?
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12/31/2018 at 8:20 am #54203
No, not worried about the lack of sales.
For Etsy, we know that the STR is lower, but we really haven’t given it the due respect (meaning enough listings) that we should have. We did a bit of a shift on Veronica’s side this year with her doing more shoes and jeans, since we were having trouble consistently finding vintage hard goods, so we didn’t really crosslist there enough. We hovered between 150-180 listings on Etsy all year. We want to shift that this year, with me dropping some lower end clothing and taking up the jeans and shoes, freeing her up for more hard goods, and we think we have some new sourcing options to keep her full on that side. I’m really interesting in how Mike does on Etsy, as he already has 2-3 times the listings there that we do.
For Poshmark, again, not worried. I’m listing mostly the high end stuff now, so naturally a slower STR. Plus, a lot of my listings there are men’s clothing, and Poshmark is still more women centered, so again, a slower STR. I do have some sales, and I’m finding more men’s sellers/buyers on there, so I just have to stay the course. I still am only at 120+ listings right now, so again, too small to really tell.
Like you say, we really need to get to 500 listings on a platform to see consistent sales. So that will be the true test. 500 is a SWAG, but a good goal to aim for before we really analyze.
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12/30/2018 at 2:28 pm #54153
Listened to half the cast so far, good to hear you guys talk!
I had another really good week.
Sales: CAD$1382, 7 items
COGS: $523 –> Item profit: $617
Expenditures: $144 (mostly refund on defective item)
–> After-tax cashflow: $835
Hours: 5, $168/hr
Listed: $0 (Ouch! Only eating the seed corn this week.)
Notable sales: Mosquito trap $211–> $750.
No scavenging! Boy, I got the itch though! -
12/30/2018 at 2:30 pm #54155
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12/30/2018 at 3:04 pm #54160
I have been toying with the idea of restarting Amazon this year. Counterpoint: when I sold a shower base on Amazon they gave me $50 to ship it when the real shipping cost is $250. I had to cancel.
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12/30/2018 at 3:08 pm #54162
Would you sell brand new items (whole or retail arbitrage)? Or would you try to sell scavenged items that are “like new”?
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12/30/2018 at 3:22 pm #54165
I get quite a bit of new boxed stuff from auctions. Often the boxes are utilitarian so if there’s a few scuffs it’s no big deal.
I am starting to sour on the idea of sending these in to amazon. When I cross post to Amazon MF 80% of my sales still come from ebay best offers anyway.
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12/30/2018 at 10:02 pm #54189
I will occasionally scan things with the Amazon seller ap but I’m restricted from selling pretty much everything. I’ve only ever sold textbooks and I never sent in the business info they wanted when I signed up for a seller account so maybe that’s the problem.
Selling on Amazon isn’t really something I’m super excited to do so I haven’t bothered to investigate it further.
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12/30/2018 at 3:06 pm #54161
Yeah, let’s do that.
On Jan 1 I will post our full year numbers. So that we can see some comparisons across stores, let’s have everyone post as much of the following as they can.
1. Yearly Sales in $
2. Number of items sold in the year
3. Number of listings on Jan 1 2018
4. Number of listings on Dec 31 2018
5. Number of new listings made in 2018I can calculate the monthly average STR and the ASP from the top 4 items.
Anything else that people want to look at?
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12/30/2018 at 3:17 pm #54163
I reckon Expenditures are worth reporting too. Sounds good!
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12/30/2018 at 3:37 pm #54168
Ok, for Expenses, let’s do the following:
COGS
Labor-
12/30/2018 at 9:24 pm #54188
Expenses…. boxes, mileage to source and ship… do you guys think it is worth tracking / sharing these kinds of things? I feel traditionally the forum have collectively looked at these things sort of like a standard costs that we kind of don’t talk about… but i know my mileage to source, for example, may be more significant than i have traditionally been fully aware. Same hold true for boxes — its great to get the ones from Ebay – but sometimes i have to spend real money to ship a large item and it turns out to be a significant percentage of the profit from that sale.
I also know the idea has always been not to go too far as to make it too much work sharing… but i do think if you are tracking expenses these are real and maybe worth more emphasis at least for how i do my business.
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12/30/2018 at 11:37 pm #54192
Geoff, I’m not primarily thinking of eg shipping supplies, but rather our main costs e.g. COGS and COGUS (cost of goods unsold). For folks with employees or major storage expenses (I know a guy pays $600/mo for storage) that would be relevant too.
Personally I think COGS as a bare minimum is critical. I could make a million dollars this year but if my COGS is a million too, I’m not getting far. (Seems like some amazon sellers work on this model.)
Another way would be to report net profit. One way or another you gotta get to net to compare apples to apples.
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12/31/2018 at 12:57 am #54195
yea that makes sense. Though i suppose the ‘main cost’ will vary between the businesses some — certainly larger operations versus smaller. Your friends 600 dollar storage expense does not apply to me, unless of course, i count my basement and the portion of the mortgage that the basement represents.
Looking at my ‘books’ for December – cog is 301. My “mileage expenses”, which is not actually cash coming out of my business now, but by my accounting, is 91 dollars. I do not track boxes in a way that lets me see Decembers box usage on a cost basis, but i bet adding in to the 91 dollars for me personally my millage expense and shipping supplies may be almost as high as COG. If I look at the percentage of the mortgage (or a 600 dollar storage space) those definitely are more significant than 90 dollars or whatever the boxes would be.
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12/31/2018 at 8:04 am #54201
Geoff, my apologies, I read your original comment too fast & misread it as being primarily about this new years thread. Regarding whether to track shipping supply expenses and mileage, my answer would be yes, absolutely – mainly because they’re tax deductions! 🙂
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12/31/2018 at 8:26 am #54205
Geoff: I completely agree with Simplico. Any cost you have to your business you should track, document, and take as a tax deduction.
From a Management Accounting perspective, you should ALSO track and maintain these costs. You want to see the main drivers in your business and see what you can do to lessen them. If you are spending hard dollars to drive to pick up items, try to time your trips to be efficient, or see if they can be shipped to you. Or can you find a reliable source of boxes you get for free (recycle) so you don’t have to pay for boxes.
We haven’t paid for any boxes in many years. Check with some of your local malls, check craigslist (great for packing paper, bubble wrap, and moving boxes) for free stuff. You can even us IFTTT to send you messages when listings on Craigslist match your criteria. I got up at 5 am and got to Boulder last week for two huge boxes of free packing paper. And we still have packing paper we got for free last year (about 8 large garbage bags full).
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12/31/2018 at 9:56 am #54214
That is awesome. I spend so much money on boxes.
Simplico — I actually was missing the point of the New Years thing.
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12/30/2018 at 5:49 pm #54183
And let’s just make a new thread with this list of data points when the time comes so we have it all in one place.
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12/30/2018 at 3:25 pm #54166
Good Afternoon all, the numbers and then to listen. I will not have compiled my first real yearly numbers until the second week of March, 2020. So for now, numbers for last week. A better week.
eBay store totommyto
Total store items: 650
Number of items sold: 11 (0 international)
Total eBay sales (not counting s/h): $419
Cost of items sold: $29.50
Consignment payouts $13
Highest price sold: $90 – Rusty antique iron cross bar with chain & hook
Average price sold: $38
Returns: 0
Money spent on new inventory: $0
Number of items listed this week: 20
Sell through rate for the week: 1.7Etsy store oldfleatoymarket
Total store items: 627
Number of items sold: 5 (0 international)
Total Etsy sales ( not counting s/h): $76.50
Cost of items sold: $4
Consignment payouts: $2
Highest price sold: $22.50 – Seattle WA vintage leather key pouch
Average price sold: $15.30
Returns: One return for $0
Money spent on new inventory: $0
Number of items listed this week: 4
Sell through rate for the week: 0.7-
This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by
totommyto. Reason: Initially I said, March 2019 - DUH!
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This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by
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12/30/2018 at 3:37 pm #54167
Here are my weekly numbers – a quiet week overall, not running any promotions or sales, or listing, so I cannot complain…
My Store Week Dec 23-29, 2018
Total Items in Store: 1077
Items Sold: 10 (1 International)
Gross Sales: $288.91
Cost of Items Sold: $23.06
Highest Price Sold: $47.49 (Vintage Fisher Price Toy)
ASP: $28.89
STR: 4.0%
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $47
Number of items listed this week: 0Happy New Year and Thank you for your podcast – will come back and post yearly numbers after the correct thread gets going…
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12/30/2018 at 3:39 pm #54169
With the holidays, I just listened to last week’s podcast yesterday and am listening to this week’s right now. Being the end of the year, I have spent time reflecting on last year’s sales and my store and where I would like them to be in 2019. I think 2018 was a transitional year for my store. My sales were not where I wanted them to be, but I was also spending lots of time tweaking my inventory to higher quality items. I also didn’t have an entire estate sale dumped into my lap (moving my dad) like I did in 2017. I know that I have become more discriminating as a scavenger, I didn’t buy as much junk this year, just because I needed things to list. I discovered my sweet spot as far as the size of store I can handle on my own, plus the type of things I am comfortable selling, storing and shipping. I also realized that because my monthly health insurance cost went up dramatically last year, I was much more dependent on my eBay income for living expenses and not just for fun money.
With all those things in mind, my store resolutions for 2019 are continuations of what I started in 2018. I am going to continue to upgrade my inventory. I would like to get my store up to about 1,500 good quality items. Last year, I could never build up a cushion in my account for emergencies because it seemed like there was always an emergency. So my goal is to increase my sales enough to be able to build in a savings cushion of at least $500. Lastly, I am going to get some totes and reorganize my office so it looks less like an episode of hoarders.Since I missed last week, here are my numbers for the last two weeks.
eBay Dec 16-22
Total sales. $263.83
# sold. 24
Avg. sale. $10.99
# listed. 10
# in store. 1103
Returns. 0
COGS. $10.15
$ spent on new. $25.02
Highest sale. $100 vintage hand sewn quilt pieceseBay 23-29
Total sales. $119.93 (1Bonanza sale)
# sold. 12
Avg. sale. $9.99
# listed. 8
# in store. 1096
Returns. 0
COGS. $5.47
$ spent on new. 0
Highest sale. $29.99 Aitkens Pewter Handled spreaders (3) -
12/30/2018 at 4:29 pm #54174
Troy: Good point about the “networking” mentality. The only dumb question is the one you don’t ask. So ask your partner and if they don’t have the skills sets to dig into the question, then reach out to someone else.
Susan just couldn’t throw back detailed answers on the relational database issues, so when I heard you mention something way back on the forum, then Bingo.. A light bulb went off and I told myself and her, that this is a guy I need to talk to, especially with you and I having the same manufacturing backgrounds.
It was the conversation with you that pulled my focus away from WonderLister, especially with their current hold-ups-roadblocks about Etsy and aimed me toward SixBit. Then after I informed you of what WL did for the Shopify interface, you said for me to inquire with SixBit, let them know about some solutions I found by working with WL and dig into those issues. Which 2019 is the time that is going to happen.But the point is having someone, or this forum or even our helpers to build that sounding board of brains around yourself and it will make things so much easier.
mike at MDC Galleries and Fine Art
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12/31/2018 at 8:09 am #54202
Mike: Amen brother! That is why I love this forum, I have learned a TON from all the good folks in this community.
If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go FAR, go together.
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12/31/2018 at 12:57 pm #54228
Herman Cain used to have a saying either at the beginning or end of his radio show, “Those that are going our way, then jump on our wagon, those that ain’t, then get out of the way!”. 🙂
mdc at mdcgfa
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12/31/2018 at 3:17 pm #54249
For me…
“You can get on the bus or get off the sidewalk…but I’m drivin’!!!”
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12/30/2018 at 7:15 pm #54187
Happy New Year, everyone.
Will listen to the podcast tomorrow. Looking forward!
12/23/18 – 12/29/18
Total Items In Store: 950
Items Sold: 24
Sales (Total Sales – Selling Costs): $653.70
Highest Price Sold: $75 Vintage Carrom tabletop/board game
Average Price Sold: $27.24
Cost of Items Sold: $31.56
Returns/Refunds: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of Items listed this week: unsure – I was out of town some, I’ve listed some, have created dozens of drafts, and have also purged a lot of low dollar items that have been in inventory for years that I don’t care to store any longer. -
12/30/2018 at 11:57 pm #54193
Listening to the show as I crank through listings. My day job office has been closed since 12/22 and I go back on 1/2. After a few days with family, been listing what I could each day. Also got a bin of stuff from my mom that I agreed to list for her as my parents continue downsizing headed into retirement. I don’t love listing things for others without taking a commission, but I’m in the holiday spirit in helping her out.
Week December 16-29, 2018 (2 weeks)
Total Items in Store: 995
Items Sold: 35 (2 Amazon) (2 Consignment)
Cost of Items Sold: $235.95 (18.4% of sales)
Total Sales: $1,281.15 ($90 consignment)
Highest Price Sold: $125 (Chinese Opera Masks display https://www.ebay.com/itm/192744542984)
Average Price Sold: $36.60
Returns: 1
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $590
Number of items listed this week: 65 for me, 28 consignment
Promoted listings test: 18 sales, $668.99 (52.2% of total sales), $30.58 fees (4.6% of sales) -
12/31/2018 at 12:49 am #54194
12/23/18 – 12/29/18
Total items in store (beginning of week): 484
Items sold: 17
30 day sell through (rate): 15.70%
Gross Sales: $644.32
Cost Paid for Items sold: $119.09
Shipping Cost: $215.48
Ebay Fee’s: $ $45.49
Paypal Fees: $25.70
Total Costs: $405.76
Net Profit: $ $238.56Profit % Rev: 37%
ROI: 200% -
12/31/2018 at 7:23 am #54198
Troy I can TOTALLY relate to the on call 24/7 story.
I have taken a call while refereeing a youth soccer game.
I have woken up at 1 in the morning to take a call and go get on the computer to work for 2 hours.
I have spent an entire visit to a science museum with the family…on a conference call with work on a holiday weekend. Some people wear those kind of experiences as a badge of honor – “Look at me! I’m soooo important!”. Me…I thought they were humiliating.The only reason I’m halfway sane at my current day job is because when I leave at quitting time I am able to “leave it at work”. I established at the beginning I wouldn’t be on call and that I would get my work done in my standard 40. They offered me a corporate iphone in my first year. I told them absolutely NOT. They never asked again.
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12/31/2018 at 8:42 am #54206
Retro: Yep, so true.
Here’s the thing…I work hard. It’s just who I am. I have two speeds: Mach 5 and Stop. And I spend a lot of time at Mach 5.
I take my work seriously, and I think about it a lot. I look for risks, try to mitigate them. I look for new opportunities. I think about processes. I spend a lot of time on this eBay thing and how to make it better.
So even now, I am “on the clock” just about all the time.
Difference is, I the one choosing to do this…not that I am MADE to do this. When I do decide to go into STOP mode, I can. Then I can pick it back up when I choose to.
Having this type of mindset is great when YOU are the one running your show…but when a manufacturing plant that runs 24/7/365 is setting your schedule…that mindset is going to burn out quick.
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12/31/2018 at 12:22 pm #54225
I STILL have a dream Thursday nights about a weekly sales forecast call i would have to give every Friday AM… at the time i had that gig i don’t think i realized how much it took out of me. I stopped working at that job 2 years ago…
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12/31/2018 at 7:31 am #54199
Items in Store 1039
Items Sold 14
Total Sales $439.00
COGS $34.00
Total Profit $405.00
Average profit $28.93
Average sales price $31.36
New Listings 14Well sales took a nosedive this week, which wasn’t too surprising. I cancelled my Bonanza store last week. I sold an item on Bonanza that I hadn’t had for some time. I looked at my store, and there were TONS of items listed for sale that were long gone already. Sorry Bonanza, but 1 sale a month is not worth the headache an issue like that causes.
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12/31/2018 at 10:41 am #54215
Total store items: 373 Ebay, About 45 Mercari
Number of items sold: 9 Ebay, 5 Mercari
Total sales: $758 Ebay, $77 Mercari
Cost of items sold: $411 Ebay, $18 Mercari, $14 shipping included, + a few items ours
Highest price sold: Ebay, new bedding set $355 Ebay (paid $135 spring clearance)
Average price sold: $39 Ebay, $15 Mercari
Returns: 1 (the bedding set above, free returns, immediately sold again thank goodness)
Money spent on new inventory: $0
Number of items listed this week: 0Numbers are unusually skewed as I bought some bedding new for my daughter a while back that she did not prefer and I just sold it on Ebay at cost to get my money back. Had it listed higher because I thought maybe an international buyer would spring on it, but no. Now they discontinued the color, so it sold probably because of that. I also was nice and let some guy return a gift after 30 days and then it resold the day after I relisted so happy about that except the free shipping and returns stung a bit. In the past I have not gotten returns on that type of new item.
Enjoyed the podcast despite there being almost zero chance I will go full time Ebay unless one of our dads goes downhill and moves in. I had a couple of days off work recently and did some serious listing. That would be pretty hard to get used to I think doing full time day in and day out and would get kind of lonely. I do enjoy working part-time out of the house while the kids are at school since I am more focused at the office and it is California casual. Both jobs are too much sitting at the computer.
Lots of thoughts about my reselling journey and path forward. A lot of this coming year will be focused on killing the rest of the piles. A serious newb mistake on my part. When I started Ebay was making a lot of changes and glitchy so I would get frustrated with listing plus I was looking to get top dollar and being too precious with my listings. Now I have concluded that it’s mostly about great items at great prices. I find it more satisfying to move items more quickly. Also, I have usually great sourcing here and limited competition so I have learned much about what is not worth picking up.
I was initially fearful about shipping so many coffee mugs are left but there is a variety. I will use Mercari to help plow through those lower dollar items more quickly. There is cool stuff like paintings in the piles too – for Ebay. Those items are much slower to research so I need to get in the mood. They are grouped by type and I also made a seasonal worksheet for myself to tackle the items when it makes sense. My current sales reflect some marked down Christmas stuff that is being liquidated around $10.
Happy New Year trash elves!
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12/31/2018 at 11:31 am #54220
Christine: You do really well with sales on Mercari.
Do you think the Promotions to Likers is a big part of that?
Do you think the lower items go faster there?I haven’t had a sale there yet, but like Poshmark, starting with the high end stuff first. I haven’t done many offers to likers (first time was on Saturday on three items, no sales). When doing that, do you wait until there is a certain number of likers first?
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12/31/2018 at 2:00 pm #54239
Hi Troy, yes I am for sure using the promotion tool. I typically use the max 10 each day and mark it down by the minimum allowed. I have promoted to everyone even if it only has one liker. I can understand why you decided to cross post your higher priced stuff first, but I would keep in mind that Mercari is engineered to create quicker sales. Google likes Mercari but I would say that people are generally looking for a good deal on Mercari. You will definitely get more than a yard sale but less than Ebay and Posh. I recommend pricing a bit higher and using the promo tool. There is no relisting functionality yet, but I know some sellers do remove and relist after a certain point. I remove free shipping when it gets down in price. I also buy on Mercari and have searches out. I get notified of offers on my phone, which is always with me.
Unfortunately so far I would say there is not a lot of chatter about what people are doing well with on Mercari. Here’s what I have heard: skews younger, better brand driven, kids’ stuff, men’s clothing, shoes, books, Rae Dunn dishes, farmhouse, Starbucks, Disney / pop culture, and Pyrex. I’m going to try out more vintage items this coming year and see how that goes.
The nice part is that there is less competition so far. For example, I have a Disney doll up for sale. There are many on Ebay from sellers who are asking less but I suspect I will get a good price on Mercari. It’s on the only one on Mercari and has 20 likers.
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12/31/2018 at 3:58 pm #54252
Ok, so it seems like the “offers to likers” process on Mercari (and I believe Poshmark is the same way), is that you have to go down at least 10% for them to send the deal. If you send a deal the second time, you have to go down ANOTHER 10% or it won’t send. Is that correct?
If so, then I would guess that starting high is a must for that reason.
Have you had to “walk down the ladder” with that process?
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12/31/2018 at 4:23 pm #54255
Yes, you have to go down more on offers to likers than you do to promote to all users. I often will just promote to all because I’m only dropping by a buck. 10% minimum sounds about right for likers but I’m not certain what the rule is since they just recently added this feature with the last app update I loaded. Before, you just dropped the price for all users and they notified watchers so they probably copied Posh with the new feature.
So far I’ve listed a lot of our family stuff and Christmas items on Mercari and I’m really looking to unload it. I’m ok with working the price down on those items until they sell and I haven’t really been paying a lot of attention to how many watchers there are. Going forward with vintage, I might be a bit more patient if I think it’s a good item.
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01/01/2019 at 10:50 am #54294
Christine: So do you mainly Promote to Likers on Mercari, or drop the price publicly? Any difference in your success on either?
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01/01/2019 at 9:35 pm #54345
I just recently loaded the update with promote to likers. Most of the time even since then I am using lower the price to everyone because it requires a smaller incremental price drop. I’ll let you know later if I have luck with promote to likers. Please do the same.
If I like something, it usually means I would but it if it was offered at a lower price, so it makes sense to use that functionality if you’ve got the spread.
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01/01/2019 at 9:47 pm #54346
Will do.
It is the age old question of velocity vs higher price. Always a balancing act…
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12/31/2018 at 10:43 am #54216
30 minutes into the podcast. Thanks for the shout-out, T-Satt!
Already a lot to think about in terms of numbers. This has inspired me to look at some of my data for the year so far. Sales are simultaneously up & down across all venues. It looks like it has overall either evened out or actually gone up, unexpectedly.
Of course, this is the first year in a long time I have taken a significant chunk of time off from my main venue, started to focus away from just 100% books and ephemera and the odd weird item of interest, and started ventures outside of reselling entirely.
I believe there comes a point when you can juggle multiple hats simultaneously somewhat well, but you have to have a good foundation and know implicitly the main focus of what you do. Then, there comes time for an offshoot. Once you have mastered that offshoot, another offshoot. And then, again. You can’t just do it all at once. You have to master each offshoot before moving onto the next one, or get to a level that you are comfortable enough with an offshoot before moving on. It’s comforting to know that it’s there for you to fall back on if something else unexpectedly fails, or does not do as well as you had hoped.
Time to bring the mail in!
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12/31/2018 at 11:33 am #54221
almasty: Anytime on the shout out.
Your last paragraph has a TON of wisdom. Know what you are doing in one vein before you start another. I like to think FOCUS
FOCUS = Follow One Course Until Successful
THEN it is easy to maintain course #1 while you learn and start course #2.
Trying to do it all at once…very low chance of success.
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12/31/2018 at 11:02 am #54218
Troy and Jay, thanks for the great episode. I really appreciate the emphasis on “knowing your numbers” for folks that are considering becoming full time sellers. I think you guys also make the case for knowing your personal expenses for people in all walks of life and I think that is really important too.
I am not a numbers guy. (In my 20s I got a studio art degree and spent a few years in my own personal Boheme before going back to school to pursue a practical career.) Conversations about numbers always are going to rub up against my personal weakness. So as not a numbers person, here is what I do to stay on top of our numbers:
(1) We make more money than we spend and we put the difference in savings.
(2) We pay off credit cards every month.
(3) When we buy something big (vacation, car) it is planned, and we pay cash. (It helps that I really think of big expenses as being anything more then about $5 and Jen is similar but sets her threshold at about $30).
(4) I stay on top of the savings at least quarterly and we set savings goals annually.
(5) We invest savings in index funds with Vanguard and do not worry about markets.I am not a full time eBay seller and my eBay business is a new challenge for me. I make money, but I have not drilled down to determine exactly how much money I have made. I have kept records and will be tallying up the total expenses for 2018 in preparation for doing my taxes.
Bottom line: if you do not make more money then you spend, you have to really pay close attention to the numbers. I have not had to do that until this eBay business took off. Now I have to pay closer attention to my eBay numbers in order to be able to optimize my taxes.
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12/31/2018 at 11:42 am #54222
aperture: Still though, there is a ton of wisdom and discipline in your numbers process, and I have seen others fail at doing just the basics of what you are doing.
If you aren’t full time, then yeah, a lot of the numbers and meaning isn’t needed. Only shop when you have extra cash, list everything you have purchased, make sure you are getting solid returns on what you buy (for us, that is a minimum of $10 net profit after COGS/Fees/Labor for $5 and under purchases and 3X or better on higher dollar purchases). Do that and you will be successful.
The reason that I do numbers to the depth that I do is that this is now our life, and I can speak the language of numbers and forecasting to see what type of business we need to achieve the goals that we have. And with the much higher burn rate that we have vs Jay and Ryanne (living in a higher cost location with 2 kids and a mortgage), I have to make sure the return is there.
STR tells a story and provides information. STR over time tells even more of a story. STR with ASP over time expands it further. For me, that is the story I need to know.
They are like the stars in the sky, and I’m the Captain of the ship in the 1800s, with a sextant and clock, navigating the high seas of eCommerce…
Boy…that was cheesy… 🙂
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12/31/2018 at 12:07 pm #54224
The no re seller policy at target … wow. Look for people buying a lot of your stuff and stop it from happening. If that is really reflective of the state of where Target is as a business i do not know if they will be around in ten years.
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12/31/2018 at 12:52 pm #54227
Geoff: I would think that serious resellers would just set up some kind of rotating buying line. Have 3 or 4 people going in every hour and buying a small quantity, then rotating people until a large quantity is purchased.
Seems to me that determined, clever buyers will figure out some type of simple work around to get thei buying done. And seems like a cost to Target to patrol the check out lines.
Hhhmmm..mike at MDC Galleries and Fine Art
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12/31/2018 at 3:14 pm #54248
Yep…
Scavengers always find a way…
🙂
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12/31/2018 at 1:18 pm #54229
Geoff – and on top of that, Target donates all their unsold clearance items to Goodwill.
I have heard that Nordstrom Rack has a similar policy – they flag people who buy “too much stuff” using their Nordstrom credit card. I believe their reasoning is that the resellers come in and buy up all the really low priced clearance items but do not look at the rest of the store. They think it discourages the “regular buyer” from coming in and checking things out. The “regular buyer” might come in, check out the clearance rack and then check out the rest of the store, possibly buying other items at full price. If it becomes known that the clearance rack never has anything good, those folks won’t bother coming in at all.
I don’t know if this is true or not but that’s the chatter among the Poshmark folks on Instagram.
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12/31/2018 at 1:21 pm #54231
They aren’t donated – Goodwill purchases the new goods they sell around here. They STILL have a bunch of new Star Wars Last Jedi Merch from that barnfire of a movie.
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12/31/2018 at 1:54 pm #54238
I didn’t realize they were purchased. I assumed they were donated and then Target took a tax write-off. No wonder the prices for the new Target stuff is so high at Goodwill. Sometimes they leave the old clearance stickers on and you can see that the Goodwill price is higher than the clearance price.
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12/31/2018 at 2:13 pm #54241
Yep. Purchased from Target. That’s also why (at least in my area), they are tagged with white tags which never go 1/2 price and are excluded from any other kind of discount. Pretty sure they have an agreement with Target that they have to put a minimum price on each item and can’t sell it for less, at least in the retail stores. Never been to the bins, so not sure if the Target stuff ends up there eventually, or not.
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12/31/2018 at 2:24 pm #54243
I see Target stuff with the white tags at the bins. In fact, I picked up some funny Halloween bubbles yesterday – still in package – that I’ll either resell next fall or give out to trick or treaters.
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12/31/2018 at 3:55 pm #54251
I just LOVE seeing that…when the Thrift Store price is higher than the Retail Store price.
If you are going to do that, remove the original stickers!
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12/31/2018 at 1:28 pm #54235
You know, thinking out of the current topic but still related, if you are the owner of a smaller store or restaurant, just try to refuse to sell to or provide services to anyone and see how fast that gets you in trouble. It is a wonder the “potential buyer” for whatever reason, doesn’t come back legally with some type of claim, about why they are being refused or not allowed to buy at the store??? HHHhhmmmmm.
mike a MDCGFA
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12/31/2018 at 3:25 pm #54250
Oh, there is a can of worms… 🙂
Good point though. I wonder if all states have the same laws to protect the business on this one. I know that this is their policy, but could it be challenged in court?
Dunno on that, but it is interesting…
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12/31/2018 at 1:47 pm #54237
Target should, instead of kicking the re seller out, hire one of them!
Without a doubt they need to fire some people. The share holders should throw them all out.
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12/31/2018 at 5:09 pm #54257
I guess the theory here is that clearance items are those legendary “loss leaders”, and resellers hurt Target by making them incur the loss without any hope of its leading to other sales? Well, OK, I guess that’s not *impossible*. I’m not a marketing guy, maybe it’s a super important strategy and Target would go belly up without it.
On the other hand, I believe that brick and mortar retail is basically, ruthlessly, about dollars per day per square foot. Under those constraints, sometimes clearance is just gonna be clearance – because those widgets aren’t moving and you need the space. God knows I have stuff I’d looooove to unload on another reseller. Seems unwise to exile them just to maintain your loss leader strategem.
Now, I don’t really know how these pros and cons net out. But I wonder if Target really knows either? Life lesson: start looking under rocks and you’ll find no shortage of garden variety incompetence.
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12/31/2018 at 1:24 pm #54233
Thanks for the shout-out last week; I just got to listen to last week’s podcast yesterday. I hope no one thought I was dissing parents taking kids to school. I have a 4 year old and 17 year old, so one wakes up too early and the other has to be drug out of bed. But at least I and the 4 year old don’t have to leave the house running. I opened my PreK homeschool box yesterday while listening to the show, so that will be our regularly scheduled event each day now to make our “Plan of the Day” around, but I am so thankful we can take off still and teach her on the road.
12/23-12/29
Ebay items in store: 721; sold 12.
Sales: $651
COGs: $19
I sold a vintage GE mixer for $200 for an elderly friend, I don’t plan to take a consignment from that sale. It’s called the “Handy Annie” and was hard to research but finally found it on Worthpoint.
I also sold a 1980s denim acid-washed coat for $180. It is by Nike and was called the “Challenge” coat, apparently Agassi was their model for it in the 80s. That was only $5 at SA.Poshmark: 251 items, sold 3 items for $49, COGs were $11.
Mercari: 592 items, sold 2 items for $40, COGs were $2.
I’m working on a pile of “smalls” items like more military medals, belt buckles, ink cartridges, that I picked up in mid-December and need to get listed. Tomorrow we travel to New Bern, NC from SC. We are going to do renovation work on our metal building/mechanic shop that was flooded from Florence for 3 full days. Epoxy the floor, repaint walls, trim work, install doors, security system, etc. It is going to be my ebay office and storage, our engineering business office, and a “crash den” when we don’t want to spend the night on our sailboat. I would so rather paint walls than have to figure out the numbers that T-Satt loves. Thank God my partner is an engineer and can do it. I space out when numbers talk starts.
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12/31/2018 at 1:29 pm #54236
Dec 23-29
Total Items in Store: 1986
Items Sold: 26
Total Sales : $648
* below yearly average of $896
* below 2017 total week sales of $778
Highest Price: $80 (Pair of Kastar American Flag Patriotic Motor License Plate Reflector Bolts)
Average Price: $25
Returns: 1
Cost of Goods Sold: $88
Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $5
Number of New Items Listed this Week: 17Great interview once again! There were so many great topics discussed. I’ll have to point my friend who is just getting into selling as a hobby to this one.
Well it’s been sort of a so-so week, but that was to be expected. The holidays are always great for sales until right up to and right after Christmas. But it’ll bounce back once everyone resumes their scheduled lives.
I’ve been seeing a huge (to me anyways) influx of returns lately. While a couple were because of size or change of mind, I’ve been taking a bunch due to mistakes on my part. A big one, and my biggest in my ebay career so far, was for that stereoscope library I sold a couple weeks ago. That one hurt. Apparently I didn’t inform the buyer well enough that it wasn’t a complete set. $650 + shipping return. And a ring box that I sold last week got returned because it didn’t close properly. That one I didn’t include in my numbers, but it was a $60 sale. I’m not gonna beat myself up about it, but I’m going to start improving my listings and start REALLY highlighting the flaws instead of casually mentioning them in the description.
I kind of got a taste of what it will be like full time on eBay this last week. Working at a Catholic university, we were given the whole week off of work. Unfortunately I made the mistake of letting my friends and family know. So I spent a lot of time running around, helping, planning and visiting everyone. I sure didn’t get a whole lot of listing done, that’s for sure. But starting yesterday, I’ve got no plans until I go back to work on Wednesday so I’m hitting the ground running!
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12/31/2018 at 2:45 pm #54245
Just finished listening to the podcast. Lots of interesting points brought up throughout, definitely worth listening to again or three times for anyone considering going f/t from p/t.
While it is easy to do this p/t, the scaling to a f/t level is a whole other story. What works today will really not necessarily work even 3 months from now, let alone a year or two. You can never get a break – you have to be constantly shining a light on what will sell now, what may sell in the future, even a year from now, all simultaneously. Living expenses have to play a key part. Sourcing expenses are high on the list. Do you not spend for a month and list down what you have, or do you continue to spend when good stuff is out there?
Since I am at the very early stages of poshmark, I sorted through a few bags of clothes I have sitting around the house to list and realized they have gone up even more in price over the past few years. I am glad I just waited. I’ve found 2 shirts alone that even a few years ago would have sold for $30-50 apiece. Since I waited on them, I can now ask $100-200 per shirt OBO on both poshmark and ebay (yay, guess I’m going to have to cross-post to both). Expanding is good. Being niche is good. They are both good. I will not expect these shirts to pay my bills, but they are a nice “bonus” that I wasn’t expecting.
A lot of this really depends on what you like to do. Selling p/t for fun is “fun.” When it becomes a f/t job, it can be just like another f/t job. It depends on how much of a self-directed person you are in general. If you do not have even that basic trait, this is probably not a good choice. If you cannot spend the day just packing orders, or just sourcing items, or doing whatever you need to do at that very moment to keep the business going, it will not go well.
What is “fun” can lead to f/t, as it has for many of us. There just needs to be so much more to stand on than just that. Ebay was my “fun” apart from Amazon. Now, it is another income stream in addition to Amazon. I turned fun into work. My 2nd ebay store, my etsy store, and my poshmark are now my “fun.” If they turn into another legit income stream, cool, great. If not, they will just be there for when I find good items for them. It’s all fun. It’s all work.
Happy New Year, everyone!
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12/31/2018 at 4:08 pm #54253
Almasty: Preach it!
I think the hard part is to not let it get to a grind when you go F/T. And I think the best recipe for that is the Jay and Ryanne approach: Have a low personal burn rate so that you aren’t chasing your tail all the time.
For Veronica and I, we are about as low as we want to go, but I know that is higher than J&R. We like our house now, we like the area (close to both boys and reasonable to our parents), etc. The main goal now on the personal side is paying off the house. 8+ years left and this sucker is ours and much less of a monthly burden.
But this is our choice too. We can go lower and make this easier, but not the life we want. So we make it fun, look for new areas (Poshmark and Mercari are “fun” for me too) and we level up each day!
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12/31/2018 at 5:19 pm #54258
> Have a low personal burn rate so that you aren’t chasing your tail all the time.
That’s exactly what I did. Paid off everything, including the mortgage, and then banked all that money for 6 months until I realized I had been handed an impossible task at work. When I quit my savings, plus the 2+ months of vacation I was paid, propelled me through the rest of this first year of reselling.
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01/01/2019 at 3:01 am #54273
Totals for the MONTH of DECEMBER 2018. I am mainly a mens clothes seller, free shipping, free returns, 1% promoted listings, no best offer, good till cancelled.
Listings/items at end of month = 3712 / 4208 Total listed value $88,126
Items sold = 334 up 42% YOY
$ sold = $9257.33 up 46% YOY
ASP = $27.72 up 3% YOY
Expenses
Postage = $1789.56 (19.3% of gross)
Ebay fees = $1,039 (11.3% of gross) (includes Promoted listing fees of 94 sales totaling $2557(25.55-8.33 credit = $17.22) 28.1% of items sold/ 27.6% of $ sold)
COGS = $741 (8% of gross)
Returns = $543.81 (5.9% of gross)
PP Fees = $376 (4.0% of gross)
Total operating expenses = $4,489.37 (48.5% of gross)
Total operating profit (my name for it – does not include expenses such as mileage, shipping supplies, depreciation, etc …) $4767.96
Notable sales:
NASCAR 1988 Yearbook, cost 75 cents (bag sales), sold for $299.99
CC Filson Jacket jacket, $3.75, sold for $154.32
Double RL vest, bought for $3.15, sold $99.99
Sales breakdown by price range:
$100+ = 2
80-100 = 3
60-80 = 2
40-60 = 22
30-40 = 30
20-30 = 105
10-20 = 1702018 total sales = 86,104
2017 Total sales = 43,534
2016 total Sales = 19,800
2015 Total sales = 13,655-
01/01/2019 at 10:56 am #54298
Kelly: A lot of your numbers line up similar to ours, including gross profit %.
Where do you do most of your sourcing for men’s clothes?
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01/01/2019 at 5:07 pm #54335
I have a ‘route’ I go on in western Maryland between Hagerstown and Oakland weekly as we have a slow rehab project farm house in the Deep Creek lake area. There are 9 Goodwills and 8 other Thrift shops on that route. That is where almost all the clothes I sell come from. I used to go to live and online auctions but that is on hold till the planned storage building gets built and the whole inventory moved to the retirement house (building is planned for this year but the moving is scheduled for 2022).
I am happy with the sourcing system I have now as I do not want to expand past what I can do myself along with all my other projects. I am loving planning out by new ebay operation with an organized station based workflow and onsite storage. The rule for the new house is “no ebay in the house!” My house now is overflowing and not organized in any rational way (for instance my main clothing storage is in my attic and my shipping area is in the basement, down 3 flights of stairs)
LDK
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This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by
Kelly1mm.
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This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by
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01/01/2019 at 9:41 am #54280
December 23-29 2018
Total Listings in Store: 3629
Items Sold: 85 orders for a total of 89 items.
Gross Sales: $5833.73
Cost of Items Sold: $750
Highest Price Sold: $465.99 (Gucci Leather Jacket)
Average Price Sold: $65.55
Returns: 3
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 25What I love about this business is the flexibility at the Holidays. We traveled to see family for 2 days, we hosted 2 large dinners, and had the nieces and nephew over to spend the night (please note: they are 7, 8 and 9 years old and we have no TV or video games, so we had a blast teaching them the original way to have fun by using their imaginations and doing things together). Very minimal time spent on ebay this week, other than shipping and polishing up a few lingering listings I had started. The highest sales day of the week was Christmas day, with just under $1200… and $600 before I even got out of bed in the morning.
December Totals
Ebay
437 Items Sold for $24,839.53
Off-ebay
1 Shirt Lot sold for $475I was so close to breaking a $25000 month, fortunately that shirt lot I sold to a fellow re-seller puts me over in total.
Here’s what Q4 looked like.
Q4 GOAL
Q4 Goal – $60,000
Daily Goal – $652.17
October Goal (31 Days) $20217.39
November Goal (30 Days) $19565.10
December Goal (31 Days) $20217.39Q4 ACTIVITY
2913 Active Listings (Oct 1)
1882 New Listings created (Q4)
1235 Items Sold
3560 Active Listings (Jan 1)Q4 RESULT
October Sales – 391 items for $22,939.32
November Sales – 407 items for $21,145.34
December Sales – 437 items for $24,839.53Q4 Total Sales – 1235 items $68924.19
Q4 Daily Average – 13.42 Items for $749.18
Q4 ASP – $55.81-
01/01/2019 at 11:00 am #54299
Seam Store: Again, just some incredible numbers.
You averaged listing 145 items a week (our goal for 2019) with an ASP of over $50.
Amazing! I would love to know where you are finding that volume of items at that ASP. Just incredible.
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01/01/2019 at 12:41 pm #54315
The_SEAM_Store wrote:
Seam Store: Again, just some incredible numbers.
You averaged listing 145 items a week (our goal for 2019) with an ASP of over $50.
Amazing! I would love to know where you are finding that volume of items at that ASP. Just incredible.
Thanks! A lot of hard work, but it paid off. This is the first year I really pushed hard through December. I normally take at least 2 weeks off, but we spent some of our cushion on unexpected medical expenses and recovery time, so I wanted to get that back in place before the next emergency arises.
I source though a variety of channels.
-I thrift, of course. It’s a hike to anywhere decent, but we are centrally located so I can be in one of 5 or 6 decent areas in about an hour or two drive. If I can’t get out, I e-thrift items from multiple online platforms to flip. About 45% of my listed inventory is from thrifting/e-thrifting.
-Networking. Through word of mouth or via online forums I have been given opportunities to buy full closets of menswear, or pick up inventory from other re-sellers who are changing directions or quitting. About 15% of my listed inventory is from networking buyouts.
-I also have a handful of decent consignors in various areas (Toronto, Phoenix, Seattle, Long Island, D.C.) who send me occasional boxes of inventory. Roughly 16% of my inventory is consigned.
-Online Wholesale/Liquidation. I bought a few decent lots this year. Not a huge profit to be made really, but was nice to fill the store with New items for Q4. Roughly 3% of my listed inventory is liquidation.
-Direct Liquidation. Through my network of contacts, this November I was able to hook up directly with a supplier who was liquidating older inventory from their warehouse. I was able to pick up roughly 2900 units, and made a new contact for possible future opportunities. Roughly 21% of my listed inventory is from this purchase with many more items still left to list.
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01/01/2019 at 12:48 pm #54316
That was weird. It just disappeared. Thanks Jay
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01/01/2019 at 12:55 pm #54317
Its a quirk in our forum software that we cant figure out. If you write a long post and then try to edit it soon after, it’ll disappear. So copy long posts in your clipboard before you try to edit.
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01/01/2019 at 1:02 pm #54318
Ah, good to know. I noticed it the other day too. I had actually copied it to my clipboard, but had already accidentally Command+C’d something else in between. I just figured I would re-type it later.
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01/01/2019 at 10:54 am #54297
just wanted to add this here, i made a buying/selling/trading post forum if people want to post things they are looking to buy/sell/trade to fellow scavengers (i’ll be posting some stuff there soon)–
https://www.scavengerlife.com/forums/forum/buying-and-selling/buying-selling-trading-post/
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01/01/2019 at 10:54 pm #54347
GReat episode this week with T-statt! Lots of quality knowledge dropped. Cheers to 2019!
I enjoyed the holidays but also wanted to ‘get back to work.” B/c when you LIKE your work, that happens.I have decided that eBay and I are in an open relationship. Wherein I will be aggressively cross-posting to etsy, Mercari, Depop, Poshmark, and Facebook Market. I am keeping my eye on Instagram selling as well. ebay is my main squeeze, but I have needs. LIKE MONEY.
I will do my annual numbers and post over there when complete.
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01/01/2019 at 11:34 pm #54348
Jay, T-Satt and everyone else with a number comprehending brain, could you do a favor for those of us that are more word based? Could whoever mentions a term first, give the words? Just one time each week? Some of it is sinking in. I know that COGs is Cost of Goods. I diligently look up terms, but Google can be a quagmire instead of a help. According to Google STR is Smith Travel Research. Or Stand to Reason. Or Scuderia Toro Rosso.
I love learning a little every week. Will the real STR please step forward-
01/01/2019 at 11:52 pm #54349
Hey Marie. I hear ya – not a big fan of acronyms myself but in my job they’re used everywhere, even when the referent is less syllables. It’s painful sometimes.
COGS is Cost of Goods SOLD to be precise (important term for doing taxes). I also sometimes refer to COGUS (Cost of Goods Unsold) because I think it’s an important number to monitor.
STR is Sell Through Rate. Basically, what percentage of your inventory sells per month (or per any other time period).
For example if you had 1000 items on Dec 1 and on Dec 31 you had sold 100, your monthly STR = 10%.
It’s also possible to calculate it in dollar terms, which will give you a (perhaps interestingly) different number.-
01/04/2019 at 2:38 pm #54510
simplicio: “Cost of Goods Unsold” – you have used this term a few times – for tax purposes, do you (or maybe Troy) know if this is a relevant term for tax purposes other than if you toss an item? My understanding is you can report an inventory cost in 2 circumstances: 1) you sell it or 2) you declare it a loss and throw it away.
I agree for tracking purposes it makes a lot of sense to track this but your post made me second guess my understanding for tax purposes.
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01/04/2019 at 3:44 pm #54519
Hey Geoff, you’re not confused about COGUS. It’s not tax deductible or anything, you just have to clearly distinguish it from COGS so you don’t claim the cost of unsold inventory as a deduction. I do occasionally run into resellers who think they can deduct all their inventory costs every year.
Setting aside taxes, I mainly look at COGUS from a cashflow perspective because it eats into the profits you actually take home.
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01/05/2019 at 7:01 am #54568
That’s what i thought — thanks for the clarification
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01/05/2019 at 8:29 am #54573
Geoff: 100% correct. For tax purposes, they will have you calculate your COGS
Beginning Inventory + Inventory Purchases – Ending Inventory = COGS
So COGUS (unsold) would be in inventory (or written off and by default of the above, part of COGS).
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01/02/2019 at 12:12 am #54350
STR = Sell Through Rate = For a particular time period, the percentage of items in your store that you sold. So if you have a store with 500 items and you sold 10 items last week, your sell through rate (STR) for last week is 10/500 = 2%.
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01/02/2019 at 7:39 am #54354
Marie: Very good point, and it is mostly lazy writing on my part by just using acronyms.
And everyone had the definition right. It is a measure of the velocity of your store, how fast it turns inventory back into cash.
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01/02/2019 at 8:42 am #54355
Thanks Everybody. So one Ebay goal is to know my Sell Through Rate. I know full well that my book keeping is my weak point. Nothing like the beginning of the year to change it around.
Total Listings in Store: 429
(We were on 10 day shipping)
Items sold:2
Total sales $44
Purchases $10 for 2 items Lovely leather Birki Vintage Shoes
STR for the week .0047 Hope I did that right -
01/02/2019 at 8:48 am #54356
Marie: Your is STR is right for the week. Now for me, I like to see everything in Monthly terms. To see your STR for the week in monthly terms:
2 sales / 7 Days in the week * 30 days in a month = 9
So, at the rate you had this week, you would have sold 9 items for the month.
9 / 429 = 2.1% STR
So this would tell you that you are currently selling 2.1% of your inventory each month. At an Average Selling Price (ASP) of $22 this week, then your store would be generating $198 in Revenue each month.
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01/02/2019 at 12:11 pm #54373
I have to laugh because I am running so late this week maybe I need an alarm clock, LOL
Dec 23 -Dec 29, 2018Total Items in Store: 3509
Items Sold: 64
Gross Sales: $900.21
Consignor Commission (COGS): $276.16 (30.6%)
Highest Price Sold: $42.67 (Antique Dresser Jar)
Average Price Sold: $14.06
Returns: 2
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 60LOW sales this week.
We had 3 buyers request delayed shipment. Ebay assured us this
would be okay if we called and had defect removed as long as we had
a message from buyer.
We had a buyer intentionally return the wrong item, we opened a case
and ebay sided with the buyer. If we hadn’t opened a case we could
have done a partial refund. Once case is opened we no longer have that
option. Frustrating. -
01/02/2019 at 3:16 pm #54397
Week of 12/23-12/29
Total Items in Store: eBay 275 (low because of cleaning out inventory), Poshmark 132 (all crosslisted from eBay)
Number of Items Listed: eBay 0 (end of year clear out, no listing), Poshmark 20+ crossposted from eBay
Number of Items Sold: 22 (eBay 16, Poshmark 6, etsy 0)
Total Sales: $310.69 (eBay $193.69 / Poshmark $117)
Average Sold Price: eBay $12.11, Poshmark $19.50
Cost of Items Sold: approx. $22
Cost of Labor: $30 (paid stepdaughter to crosspost to Poshmark)
Highest Item Sold: $40 (Raquel Allegra top, but… wah wah, it’s getting returned, but they haven’t sent it back yet, maybe they won’t).
Most interesting item sold: a collection of about 20 post its I found at the bins, love notes/reminders from one partner to the other. Most of the notes were about food left in the fridge for them, usually it was eggs, but always also saying they loved them. Someone offered $5 for them, I just took the offer, there’d been no interest in these notes & I was just tickled that someone else thought they were interesting.Took this last week to go through inventory, donated a bunch, caught up on putting inventory away, investigated a kid’s consignment store to get rid of some inventory (kinda depressing), but then looked into a twice yearly childrens consignment event that I may try, that seemed more interesting. I reexamined our household budget in order to make better work goals & plans for the new year.
Happy New Year!
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01/02/2019 at 3:28 pm #54398
Enjoyed the podcast this week – it was very re-assuring that the path I’m taking isn’t unique, and that those who are where I want to go used the same philosophies and steps to get there. It was very comforting for me!
When T-Satt talked about his old corporate job, it gave me shivers. It’s the life I lived. Long days, and even out of the office people were constantly calling me all night and through family events/weekends/vacations for help. I can always go back to that world, but I’m much healthier mentally and physically getting out of it…Also enjoyed the part about looking for others who are doing the same thing and finding a community/partner to work with. I find that very important as I move forward to a full-time seller from part-time.
Good job guys, and great conversation!
Looking forward to 2019.
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01/02/2019 at 3:34 pm #54400
Glad you enjoyed it Inglewood!
That is also why I love this forum…a virtual water cooler of people doing the same work, plus a great group to ask for advice!
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01/02/2019 at 9:36 pm #54423
I’ve been away visiting family in Pittsburgh returning yesterday, so I’m pretty late in posting my numbers. I finally was able to listen to the podcast this morning.
The podcast mentioned Paula Pant. I know about her because she interviewed Jay & Ryanne about a year or two ago. Her podcast is called Afford Anything (going along with her byline mentioned by Jay “You can afford anything but not everything”). She’s got a great voice and is very interesting to listen to (just below Scavenger Life).
https://affordanything.com/Week of Dec 23 – 29
* Total Items in Store: 1275 eBay, 10 Mercari
* Items Sold: 12 eBay
* Cost of Items Sold: $13.87 + $50 Commission
* Total Sales: $275.55
* Highest Price Sold: $79 Vintage 1980s Civilization game
* Average Price Sold: $22.96
* Returns: 0
* Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0 (But my parents brought me more stuff from their friends)
* Number of items listed this week: 1My highest sale was a commission for a friend, and I’ve decided to give her $50 from it.
I have some paintings by an artist named Norma Smith listed on eBay. Her granddaughter contacted me saying that she might buy them some day. I actually owe her a response, but she said that she set up a Facebook page. I did find it and contacted her through the page. Her message wasn’t flagged because she didn’t send a link, but I think that she bypassed eBay’s rules doing that. I wouldn’t sell it outside of eBay anyway. I think that she is just researching her grandma and posting about it. Kinda neat.
I’m currently catching up with eBay and life, but in a week or two I’m going to start working on my “things to do” list that I came up with when someone created a 2019 goals topic. I’ll report on my progress each week.
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01/03/2019 at 1:51 am #54428
Year ended on a high note with most gross and net sales ever!
December Monthly Numbers
66 sales
$ sold (minus shipping): $1888 (new record!)
Per sale average: $28.611 (goal over $25, second best month of the year)
cost per item average: $5.33 (high due to bigger purchases)
Biggest Sale: Air Force Dental Laboratory Technicians Manual from 1959. Got it in an auction lot with some military memorabilia ($25 total for lot). Priced it higher than others of that area that had sold so I was very happy! https://www.ebay.com/itm/1959-Department-Of-The-Air-Force-Dental-Laboratory-Technicians-Manual-AFM-160-29/192726719510Items in store peak for month: ~840
Returns/Refunds : 0. But, I did lose a priority mail insurance case from last month when they sent a letter asking for more photos of package damage itself (or to bring package in to post office for inspection, uhhh I don’t have the item). I received only one photo from the buyer that had the item broken still partially inside the the bubble wrap but didn’t show the box. Next time I’ll ask for the additional photo.
Customer issues: One purchase was made and then immediately cancelled, they didn’t notice it was a used item and it was a gift.
Sourcing: Very little with the holidays but did get a few items here and there. I have plenty to list anyway.
Will do a year in review post another time along with goals for 2019. Happy New Year everyone!
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01/04/2019 at 3:47 am #54491
2018-12-24 – 2018-12-30
Total Items In Store: 9551
Items Sold: 32
Cost of Items Sold: approx $150
Total Sales: $830
Highest Price Sold: $149.99 (Danish Neolithic Stone Axe)
Average Price Sold: $25.93
# Items Listed: 25
Money Spent on New Inventory: $100Sales slowed down as Christmas arrived, just as expected. December has been much better than last year.
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01/07/2019 at 6:03 am #54662
OldDenmark Nice Stone Ax sale. Where did you find that? Not your normal thrift store find.
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01/07/2019 at 9:58 am #54685
I bought a huge collection of ancient stone axes of a guy on a Craigslist similar site here in Denmark. Slow sellers but great profit margins.
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