Home › Forums › Weekly Numbers › Scavenger Life Episode 460: 2020 Plan
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Jay.
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04/26/2020 at 2:16 pm #76693
Join the conversation in the forum>> Our Store Week April 19-25, 2020 Total Items in Store: 8103 Items Sold: 53 Gross Sales: $1,778.94 Cost of
[See the full post at: Scavenger Life Episode 460: 2020 Plan] -
04/26/2020 at 3:43 pm #76699
04/19/20 – 04/25/20
Total Items In Store: 3441
Items Sold: 25
Cost of Items Sold: $ 850
Total Sales: $ 884.54
Highest Price Sold: $ 72 (DVD\VCR Combo)
Average Price Sold: $ 35.38
Money Spent on New Inventory: $ 0
Number of items listed: 130Gut Sales Report for the week: Again, it felt like the busy season. I was still selling a lot of Inline skates (4 this week) but other things as well.
Challenge of the week: Still trying to take pictures of about 10 items everyday Mon-Sat.
Scavenge of the week: Nothing.
Trends of the week:
1. This is probably the most items listed in a week for my store.
2. I am going to Fedex a lot more. They lowered their prices for larger heavier items and that
helps a lot. In some cases I make more sales. In other cases (the buyer doesn’t select
Fedex), I make more money on the shipping.3. Golf clubs are starting to sell.
4 Stereo equipment, DVD’s, VCR’s are starting to sell.
Mark S
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04/26/2020 at 3:45 pm #76700
Update: Cost of Items Sold should be $ 85.
Mark
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04/26/2020 at 5:17 pm #76701
My eBay Sales (No Store) Week April 19-25, 2020
Total Items For Sale (No Store): 31
Items Sold: 2
Gross Sales: $24.55
Cost of Items Sold: $0
Highest Price Sold: $14.95 (Shoe Insoles)
Average Price Sold: $12.28
Returns: 1
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number Of Items Listed This Week: 7 -
04/26/2020 at 5:44 pm #76702
Total Items in Store: 321 Ebay, 60 Mercari
Items Sold: 20 Ebay, 3 Mercari
Gross Sales: $501 Ebay, $24 Mercari
Cost of Items Sold: $101 + a few items ours
Highest Price Sold: $79 (One yard of French fabric, paid $5 at garage sale)
Average Price Sold: $25 Ebay, $11 Mercari
Returns: 1 – Sold a damaged item (as described), allowed buyer to keep instead of return ($14)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $35 online RA
Number of items listed this week: 27I listened to the podcast while cleaning the house today. Not as much fun as sitting by the fire. I liked the discussion about how an item has to have a hook even if it’s not your taste. There does still certainly seem to be a lot of uncertainty about what to expect through the end of the year. Not sure what my younger teen will do during summer. She’s thinking about helping me photograph for Ebay but wants a lot of $. If she’s bored enough she might come around.
It was a busy week for me on Ebay while Mercari was quiet. I sold a lot of fabric. There is a big box of vintage fabric in my garage that I need to dig up. I’m hoping to get more listed this coming week from the piles.
This week for fun I’ve been working on making a what sold video to share with you trash elves on Steve’s Wednesday forum post. My first time on IMovie, so bear with me friends.
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04/26/2020 at 5:55 pm #76703
I think that is why they are doing that now, not showing names. I do remember blocking people who lowballed me before and now I cannot. Why do I block them, because usually your lowballers are the ones who will either try to scam or give a bad feedback. Not always but it does happen to me.
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04/26/2020 at 6:29 pm #76705
That’s an interesting hypothesis. eBay used to be much more transparent. You could see a user’s buying history and what they paid for things. I guess we’ve moved into a world where privacy is key.
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04/26/2020 at 7:50 pm #76707
Sun – Sat, April 19 – 25
Total Items in Stores: 319
Items Sold: 13
Gross Sales: $234.10
Cost of Items Sold: $88.00 (not including family castoffs)
Highest Price Sold: $50.00 (military challenge coin on consignment)
Average Price Sold: $18.00
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 57COGS relative to gross was uncharacteristically high for me due to one item I took a loss on. I had paid close to $70 for it on an eBay auction snipe in a listing with bad pictures. I thought it was good for an easy sale at $120 but it was in much worse condition than could be discerned in the fuzzy pictures. I should have just made a fuss and returned it but the listing was no returns, condition “used” with no further explanation so I really felt it was just my fault for paying too much. It sold for $40 plus shipping with full disclosure of condition.
Lots of family castoffs are getting dumped on me as the kids are cleaning out their rooms between online classes and we continue to purge for the upcoming move. Many are low dollar items – I’m going through a box of about 150 DVDs, for example. I hate to just donate that stuff so I’ll list it but it does cut into the average price sold. Although I don’t include the family items in item costs above I do take the original cost into account for tax purposes, but never for more than net selling price.
I’ve already sold 5 items today so knock on wood it will be a decent week for me.
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04/26/2020 at 8:00 pm #76708
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04/26/2020 at 8:28 pm #76711
We have and you did post that link but it is a great article on them, though it only talks about one legend of how they started. I talked about my experience with them before here:
And here:
It’s still a very active collecting field. Personally I have zero interest in them other than the ones I earned during my initial voluntary servitude in the ‘80s but happy to help my friend sell off his large collection and they’re so easy to list and ship. It doesn’t hurt to have a military background to maximize returns with key words and descriptions and also for pricing.
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04/26/2020 at 8:37 pm #76713
That’s right! Like anything collectible, that’s where the money is.
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04/26/2020 at 9:52 pm #76718
04/19/20 – 04/25/20
Total Items In Store: 14,959
Total # of orders – 150
Total # of items sold – 165
Cost of Items Sold: ~$42
Total Sales: $ 3,310.22
Highest Price Sold: Potbelly Antique Chestnut Coal Stove – $225 – $50 partial refund = $175
Money Spent on New Inventory: $ 0Busy week again, not a day under $300 gross sales, which is great. I had an issue with the customer who bought the cast iron stove. He claimed the “back” damper was missing, the damper on that item is on the top, not the back, so he was either fishing for a partial refund or didn’t know what he was talking about. At the end of the day, I just provided him a $50 credit an he kept the item. It would of cost me nearly $60 to send it back, so it was the most sensible option. I paid $30 for it 2 years ago and it was a pain to pack, so I’m just glad it’s gone and I made a profit.
Best of luck with the 2020 plan you guys have started!
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04/26/2020 at 11:00 pm #76719
Listening to the podcast: Just wanted to say, if you have Concierge Support, that is operating now….the agents are working from home. The guy I spoke with the other night had his 7 year old dropping in while he was helping me LOL
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04/27/2020 at 6:38 am #76723
We never have had an option to join Concierge Support. I think it was offered only to people who showed up to eBay Open one year. Am I wrong?
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04/27/2020 at 10:38 am #76739
Hi Jay,
I think for the last few years, anyone who showed up at ebay Open was auto enrolled into the Concierge service. But I thought anchor stores got it as part of their subscription:
“Anchor Store subscribers receive
Access to white-glove customer support by phone and email—wherever, whenever.”
So, I think you guys should have it, don’t you have an anchor store?
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04/27/2020 at 4:17 pm #76769
We have an Anchor Store. No access to concierge service. We have access to an Anchor Store phone number. Doesn’t feel like the white glove service that you;re describing.
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04/27/2020 at 4:33 pm #76773
This is on the “Customer Service” page when I open it, about midway down the page:
Hi my-cottage-books-and-antiques,
As an eBay Concierge member, you have instant access to premium service.
Have us call you
Monday to Sunday 5:00 am to 10:00 pm (PT)You don’t have anything like that?
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04/26/2020 at 11:01 pm #76720
The new mailer is basically what is usually called a photo mailer….it’s a stiff cardboard that is thin but very stiff…
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04/27/2020 at 2:52 am #76721
Just a short note on block buyers sending emails. On the eBay “Buyer Requirements” page: https://offer.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?BuyerBlockPreferences&BuyerBlockPreferences= near the bottom there is a check box to “Don’t allow blocked buyers to contact me.” So if you have a blocked buyer but haven’t check the box they may still be able to contact you.
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04/27/2020 at 6:38 am #76724
That’s a cool tip. Thanks for the direct link.
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04/27/2020 at 7:48 am #76727
weird that that checkbox is on a totally different page. i had that checked, but i’ve still received messages from blocked buyers.
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04/27/2020 at 10:42 am #76740
Ryanne,
I’m pretty sure if you block someone during a transaction, they can continue to contact you regarding that transaction. They should not be able to contact you (through ebay) about other stuff. However, it can take a while,before the block actually goes into effect. That may be why they were still able to contact you.
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04/27/2020 at 8:07 am #76729
Items in Store 1578
Items Sold 61
Total Sales $2,625.00
COGS $193.00
Total Profit $2,432.00
Average profit $39.87
Average sales price $43.03
New Listings 95Wow what a week! I had several big ticket sales that boosted my numbers. If only every week could be like this week…that would be awesome. I’m gonna keep riding this wave as long as it lasts. I slowed down a bit this weekend because I got hit with whopper of an allergy attack. I’ve been freaking out thinking I have the coronavirus. Not fun at all.
A quick tip – Paypal currently has no fees on instant transfers. Take advantage of that while you can! It’s nice to instantly have new money in my checking account instantly.
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04/27/2020 at 9:02 am #76735
Hello all, chugging along at around 2%-5% better sales week to week than this time last year.
A WWII Supply SGT’s scrap/photo book finally sold for $231.50. I paid a lot for it at $100 but could not resist the possibility of finding a Holy Grail document or photo in it, not so, but a good book regardless. I enjoyed owning it for awhile and almost gifted it to my Father.
My wife and I have decided to move again forward with the selling of our home. Planning for anything right now is at the very least a good antidote to sitting around paralyzed with uncertainty. I like the taking action option better.04/19 – 04/25/20 (no cross listing is done between platforms)
eBay store: totommyto
Total store items: 787
Number of items sold: 8
Total eBay sales (not counting s/h): $397.50
Cost of items sold: $117 (Way more than my usual this week!)
Highest price sold: $231.50 WWII scrap/photo book, paid $100 knowing I could at least double that.
Average price sold: $50
Returns: 0
Money spent on new inventory: 0
Number of new items listed this week: 14
Sell through rate for the week: 1.0
Number International sales: 0Etsy store oldfleatoymarket
Total store items: 634
Number of items sold: 6
Total Etsy sales (not counting s/h): $119.50
Cost of items sold: $5
Highest price sold: $27.50 Shabby old lot of fishing net rope strands and an old buoy, paid $3.
Average price sold: $20
Returns: 0
Money spent on new inventory: 0
Number of new items listed this week: 9
Sell through rate for the week: 1.0
Number International sales: 0 -
04/27/2020 at 11:03 am #76744
I have a question about the coupon for shipping supplies you mentioned. I’ve had a store for a couple of months now and haven’t seen the coupon. It’s just a starter store, though, so maybe it’s not eligible. Do you need a higher level store? Or is the coupon somewhere I’m just not seeing?
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04/27/2020 at 11:30 am #76746
No shipping supplies coupons with a Starter store. Upgrading to a Basic store will get you a coupon for $25 a quarter, plus some other seller tools and analyticals such as Seller Hub and Sales Reports and a free monthly Terapeak subscription (they charge $19 a month then automatically refund each month).
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04/27/2020 at 11:30 am #76747
You need to have a basic store or higher to get the shipping supplies coupon. You can see the benefit seven rows down on this discount table:
https://pages.ebay.com/seller-center/run-your-store/subscriptions-and-fees.html#m22_tb_a2__2
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04/27/2020 at 12:07 pm #76749
Hey Jay & Ryanne –
Just an idea on the mugs for your coffee shop. As scavengers, you come across mugs all the time for very little money. Some thrift stores give them away because no one will buy them. Why don’t you just collect & wash them, and then just highlight that as part of your store’s “sustainability initiative”. People can leave them, or take them, and you can have a sign asking for more donations. Just a suggestion.
For offer history, I am just as confused about that page, but I have noticed that they moved the most recent offer down to the bottom. So, first they list all the expired offers, then the ones still open on the bottom. Really stupid way to organize the page, but that is the way it is.
For the caller (Patty) asking about how to select shipping when sending an invoice. So, sometimes you strike a deal that includes shipping, and you want to make sure that it is the cheapest available. What you do is delete all the other options and only leave one. Keep in mind that the fist option cannot be deleted, so you have to change it to what you want. If you have Priority first and FedEx second, you have to delete FedEx and then change the main one from Priority to FedEx. Then the buyer cannot select a premium shipping service. Perhaps this answers her question?
Week of April 19 – 25
* Total Items in Store: 1403 eBay, 34 Etsy
* Items Sold: 29 eBay
* Cost of Items Sold: $36.96 + $83.96 Commission
* Total Sales: $579.97 eBay
* Highest Price Sold: $40 Vintage 1970s Miller High Life lighted bar sign
* Returns: 1 (not shipped yet)
* Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
* Number of items listed this week: 5Still having very robust sales, but many are inexpensive items under $10. I sometimes take photos before researching, so I end up with cheap stuff that I list because I already did the work. Still quite happy with the results. I sold eight items on commission, so that number is high.
I started this new week with a $124 sale, so we’re off to a good start.
I’ve noticed many more counteroffers lately after sending offers to buyers. Buyers seem to be smart about it because they make a reasonable offer just below what I was interested in giving, but then I want the sale so I accept 🙂
One last thing – I just noticed this morning an extra heading on Seller Hub called Payments. I clicked it, it is about managed payments. Since I’m not there yet, it is just informational, but, in the future, I guess it will probably have information on the money available for disbursement and other such things.
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04/30/2020 at 6:40 pm #76875
Sharyn, I love the coffee mug idea. My local coffee shop does that too. They basically have a wall of mugs. You can bring your own and leave it.
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04/27/2020 at 12:21 pm #76750
Total Items For Sale: 203
Items Sold: 14
Gross Sales: $357.21
Cost of Items Sold: $30?
Highest Price Sold: $58.00 a lot of vintage t-shirts, also a pair of Matsuda Sunglasses
Average Price Sold: $25.21
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number Of Items Listed This Week: 6Put a junk drawer lot up for auction, sold for $3.25. Realized a day before auction ended that I spelled titled “Jumk Drawer lot.” No sure if misspelling affected search results.
Sold a Nike Jordan T-Shirt for $60 but havent been paid yet, not sure if I will so didnt count that in total.
Also a few of my sales were some albums I have taken out of my small personal collection as well as a cast iron skillet that I havent used in a couple years.
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04/27/2020 at 12:39 pm #76751
Hi Ryanne & Jay,
Thanks for the podcast.Here are my numbers for the week:
Total Items in Store: 3858
Items Sold: 81
Total Sales: $1599.39
Cost of Items Sold: $152
Average Price Sold: $19.75
Average Cost of Item: $1.88
Highest Price Item Sold: $125 Parker Vacumatic Golden Brown Fountain Pen & Pen Dual Tone Nib 1930s
Number of items listed this week: 104 worth approx. $1814
YTD Sales: $17960
YTD sales compared to this time last year: +20%
Average age of items in store (in days since listing): 456
Average number of days between listing and selling this week: 287
Median age of sales (in days, between listing and selling): 179
Sell-through rate (for the week): 2.1%
Hats sold this week: 59 (72% of sales) worth $968 (60% of sales $)I had a great week. In fact I had the best week I’ve ever had (in the last 5 years). I’ve never had more orders in a week and my $ sold was also the highest ever. In addition I had 2 days where I sold more in a single day than ever before. (I sold 22 items on two different days). I also sold something that had been listed for 1389 days which is the oldest listing I’ve ever sold.
In regard to offer history, I mentioned in the forum that you can always use this link to see offer history. (eBay only provides the link when there is an open offer): replace the 99999999999999 bit at the end with the item number of your listing https://ofr.ebay.com/offerapp/bo/showOffers/99999999999999
I’ve been using this link a bit because people have been letting offers expire and then contact me to ask if I’ll resend it. Even though the username is scrambled the feedback number is correct for the user so I can match that up.My 1000 hats / $1000 purchase seems to be coming to a satisfactory conclusion. The seller is sending another 150 hats and gave me a refund of some of my purchase cost to make up for grossly underestimating the number of hats.
Hope everyone has a great week this week. Stay healthy, sell trash!
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04/27/2020 at 4:13 pm #76767
In regard to offer history, I mentioned in the forum that you can always use this link to see offer history. (eBay only provides the link when there is an open offer): replace the 99999999999999 bit at the end with the item number of your listing https://ofr.ebay.com/offerapp/bo/showOffers/99999999999999
I’ve been using this link a bit because people have been letting offers expire and then contact me to ask if I’ll resend it. Even though the username is scrambled the feedback number is correct for the user so I can match that up.This is a cool hack, but its unclear why eBay doesnt make this page a normal feature.
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04/27/2020 at 1:27 pm #76753
Hi all, I just used eBay Chat to resolve two returns in about 8 minutes. So much better than calling! I took photos of the page where the rep said “no defects” when I asked the question at the end of our session; I am supposed to get a transcript emailed as well. I saw the option on eBay’s “contacting customer service” page.
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04/27/2020 at 1:30 pm #76754
do you have a link to the page where you found the chat?
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04/27/2020 at 2:09 pm #76756
https://www.ebay.com/help/account/default/contacting-ebay-customer-service?id=4379
Scroll all the way to the bottom and look for dark blue print “other options” with a click down arrow; that is where I found “chat with us”
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04/27/2020 at 2:55 pm #76761
I don’t see the chat option. I can only see
– Call us
– Email us
– Start a return
– Report an item that hasn’t arrivedMaybe chat is a program they are still rolling out. Or perhaps it depends on the type of seller you are. (I have a anchor store).
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04/29/2020 at 9:45 am #76830
Chat is available to me. I have premium store as well.
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04/27/2020 at 4:05 pm #76765
Shipped out 187 orders last week. With multi-quantity orders, I think it was roughly 195 items to go out? 53 orders going out today. I estimate we’re at 20-30 so far for tomorrow. Mainly selling the usual items, but I did sell a Christmas ornament on my 2nd Ebay store. Christmas ephemera has also been selling on my main Ebay store – I think people are finding the idea of a future Christmas to be comforting, so they’re stocking up on related items to be as cheerful and optimistic as possible. Disney related item sales have also picked up. I would recommend listing both types of items if they’re the sort of items in your backlog and you’re wondering what to list next?
I ventured out of the house today for the first time in nearly a month. Very bleak. 90% of people outside had face masks and looked miserable. I walked in the street multiple times to avoid people. With the gray skies and drizzle, it just felt wrong outside. When things start to “get back to normal” here, I honestly don’t know how it’s going to work. It barely worked today with only essential businesses open and few people walking or driving. I don’t know how an increase in people will work with the small footprint the stores in NYC have – as it is now, you can sometimes be the only person in a store for up to 5 minutes. When more people are encouraged to walk around and go shopping, our stores won’t be able to handle it. With more cars on the streets, it will be difficult to walk in the road when it’s full of cars again. The sidewalks won’t magically get larger to accommodate the 6 ft social distancing mandates. This goes for all the major cities in the US with tiny stores. It’s not going to work. At least in rural or suburban areas with large stores, most people can keep to themselves in their cars or in their Super Walmart sized stores or even thrift stores. We don’t have that option here. Our corner stores are tiny. Our thrift stores are tiny.
This was going to be the first year I completely cut out online sourcing for the majority of the year and just focused on buying locally. Oh well. I’ve gone back to buying a lot online and continue to work through the backlog. I feel that to an extent things may go “back to normal,” i.e. the “new normal” for the majority of the country, but not for where I am. Just gotta get used to it. During Cuomo’s press briefing today, he said the shutdown will be extended for downstate NY and just had a bunch of ? question marks ? about when we would even begin to reopen.
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04/27/2020 at 4:15 pm #76768
Until there’s a vaccine, it’s going to be difficult to get back to normal.
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04/27/2020 at 4:09 pm #76766
I’m seeing it in both my Starter store and my Basic store.
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04/27/2020 at 4:22 pm #76771
Thanks for another great podcast, Jay and Ryanne. I like your attitude of gratitude in these cray days. Like being thankful for being able to walk outside. Hard to realize there are many who can’t even enjoy that simple pleasure.
April 19 – 25
Total Items in Store: 534
Items Sold: 18
Total Gross Sales includes s/h: $578
Highest Price: $104 (Saris Bones 2 Bike Rack)
Lowest Price: $11.99 (Toshiba TV/VCR Remote)
Average Price: $32
Returns: 0
Cost of Goods Sold: $15
Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $0
Number of New Items Listed this Week: 1Gut reaction: Another solid solid week of sales. Stuff that I’d even forgotten about after months of sitting on the shelf are flying out the door. My death pile is gone though, so active listings are falling fast.
Scavenge of the week: Started scouring FB the other night and hit paydirt fast: 220 TV/DVD/CD remotes for $40. The only catch is I have to drive 3 hours to pick them up. The seller was willing to ship but that’s almost 60 pounds of remotes. I’m a little queasy about the length of the trip, but I will only stop for gas (with hand cleaning etc. after touching gas pump), pick up from porch and then back home. I’m hopeful I can eat off this buy for weeks.
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04/27/2020 at 5:30 pm #76777
Hi guys, good to hear from you as usual.
Another good sales week on ebay… unfortunately still dismal scavenging.
Sales c/w shipping: CAD$3,449, 21 sales, COGS: $257, Fees: ~$481, Postage: $735, –> Gross profit: $1,975
Expenditures: $195 –> Cashflow: $2,233
Biggest sale was the last 11 of my medical wall panel things… had a good run with them, I think I originally bought like 50 of them for $5 each and over 1.5 years, sold them all for around $70 average.Built a square foot garden on the south side of our garage (16’x2’x20″) this weekend.
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04/27/2020 at 5:42 pm #76778
4/18/20-4/24/20
Total Items In Store: 2103
Items Sold: 53
Gross Sales: $1570
Highest Price Sold: $200 (Electric Water Feeder Pump)
Average Price Sold: $29.63
Returns: 0 $0
Money Spent on New Inventory: $0
Number of items listed: 0• Another great week in gross sales.
• Still working on projects around the house to stay busy.
• Our governor extended the lockdown until the end of May and our city cancelled this year’s town wide garage sale days. Sourcing new items to list has been an issue and local online auctions prices are running very high.
• Once restrictions are lifted, I would imagine there will be some great buying opportunities with the market getting flooded with inventory that people have not been able to get rid of. -
04/28/2020 at 11:10 am #76788
April 19 – 25
Total Items in Store: 3,948
Items Sold: 32
Total Sales : $788
* Below yearly average of $983
Highest Price: $60 (Glass Ceiling Lamp Globe Shade with Brass Finial)
Average Price: $25
Returns: 0
Cost of Goods Sold: $71
Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $0
Number of New Items Listed this Week: 48Things kinda slowed down for me this week. Not terrible, but not amazing either. Still made plenty to keep me comfortable though. I kinda struggled with listing again. Some days I just didn’t have it in me to get started. But that’s not to say I wasn’t productive. I Got some yard and house work done instead.
I started making bread too! I looked up a no-knead recipe on your recommendation and gave it a try. It turned out wonderful! So good in fact that I ended up making a second loaf the following day. I threw in some garlic and onion powder in the second batch and it’s so good.
Regarding the shift of people working remotely, I really hope it starts to happen. I love living in our rural area but the only drawback is the lack of little businesses and people our age. If more people from the Pittsburgh area could start spreading out to little towns an hour away from the city, it would help the little communities around us so much.
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04/28/2020 at 1:09 pm #76793
Ryanne makes that bread every three days now (how long it takes for us to eat it). We throw everything in the dough: seeds, nuts, anything you have laying around. Fresh garlic sounds good.
I think moving from an urban area to a rural area has a psychological barrier. Anything two hours outside an urban area is “the middle of nowhere”. We’ve had friends ask if Amazon delivers to our house 🙂
But once other pioneers start moving to rural areas, the word will get out. Its all the benefits and few of the downsides. No traffic, able to know people, able to get involved in local government, affordable real estate, spots to open businesses for little money.
One reason why we’re investing in a coffee shop on our main street is to help spur other small businesses to open. We’re putting our money where our mouth is. Invest where you live.
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This reply was modified 5 years, 11 months ago by
Jay.
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This reply was modified 5 years, 11 months ago by
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04/28/2020 at 7:00 pm #76806
Another nice podcast, it’s nice to have some semi scheduled things to listen to every week for a bit of normalcy!
Sold 2 costume jewelry items on ebay, stuff listed long and and forgotten about $100
A few sales in the past few days on mercadolibre, air rifle pellets for $30 and a silly cars kids inflatable punching bag for $25, and a shot winch cable for $35 bucks.
Still listing stuff from a big lot we bought, doing 10 listings a day to keep busy and also leave ourselves something to do everyday to get some routine going in our lives.
Jay/Ryanne, when the coffee roaster gets up and going will it be the supply for the coffee shop only or also for online sales? Any issues getting the health certs for the product?
I really like your plan with the building. I’ve got a few similar ones to get going here, real estate buy and holds with a moneymaker to keep it going for the hold period.
Best of luck and happy hunting to everyone!-
This reply was modified 5 years, 11 months ago by
scott2.
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04/28/2020 at 7:33 pm #76810
The roaster will supply beans for the two cafes, plus wholesale to other cafes, plus retail customers (like those of you who purchased 🙂
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04/28/2020 at 9:03 pm #76818
ah, two cafes? Is there a second cafe you aren’t telling us about, or will you be roasting for your friends over in Harrisonburg?
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04/28/2020 at 9:31 pm #76820
Its a longer story that we’ll tell when it all becomes real. We’re partnering with Broad Porch who already have a cafe. So we’ll have two cafes and a larger coffee roaster once we get it up and running. Lots of things to do between now and then.
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04/29/2020 at 7:38 am #76825
14lbs doesn’t sound like a alot, but coffee is light I suppose. Just how much volume is 14lbs of beans? Can you give more details on the roaster? I’m quite curious about it. Just how big is it?
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04/29/2020 at 7:58 am #76826
It’s 15KG. So it can roast 33lbs at a time. It’s a large size fora smaller businesses. A large business would have a 120kg roaster.
This isnt the brand we bought, but it looks like this: https://is.gd/uqMaRN
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04/29/2020 at 9:53 am #76831
Can I just say, good call on putting the roaster in a separate space. My local coffee shop has their roaster in the middle of the cafe. Between the roaster running fairly often and college students ordering obscene amounts of frappuccinos requiring almost constant use of a blender, it’s so loud in there that I rarely go anymore.
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04/29/2020 at 12:17 pm #76835
Agreed. I think some folks see coffee roasting as a “cool” piece of architecture, but its basically food processing. Loud, hot, and messy.
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04/29/2020 at 5:06 pm #76838
Thanks for the podcast. Coffee roasting sounds fun. I really love coffee and I think it would be fascinating to learn how to create your own personal roast. Looking forward to tasting the Scavenger blend.
Bouncing up and down from week to week. Back up above our average sales rate this week. Quarantine boredom seems to be the driving force with lots of collectors and hobbyists as our main buyers. I checked my three month sales this morning and we’re running 87% higher this year than last.
Best sale of the week was a vintage Rolleiflex camera for $499.95. After turning down lots of offers over the last few months someone finally bought it for full price. My COGS are up this week as I paid more for this camera than I normally would. I misidentified it as a more expensive model at the estate sale I purchased it from. I bought the camera and a lot of accessories for $400. All the accessories should bring about as much as the camera itself. Already sold some of the accessories, so this sale finally pulls me firmly into profit. One of the reasons Estate Sales aren’t my favorite venue, I frequently feel the need to make a quick decision on a purchase before fully researching. As this turned out to be short tail, only 2 months in inventory, I guess it’s not so bad.
Week Ending 04/25/2020
Total Items in Store: 1146
Items Sold: 18
Gross Sales: $1,308.38
Gross wo Shipping $1,135.49
Cost of Items Sold: $241.98
COGS Percent 21.31%
Highest Price Sold: $499.95 Rolleiflex Camera
Average Price Sold: $63.08
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory: $0.00
Sold via promoted listings: 11
Promoted Percentage: 61.11%
Average Days Listed: 196.17
Longest Listed: 832
New items listed: 31 -
04/29/2020 at 5:25 pm #76840
I can see the chat option, and I don’t have a store subscription. Thanks for that link.
I recently went back to selling on ebay. I only have 50 items listed but am averaging 2-3 sales a day. Small potatoes to the rest of you but I am relieved to see that ebaying still works.
I like how Jay and Ryanne figured out how much they have to sell to cover their expenses. My expenses are lower, and I figured I need to sell at least 5 items a day to pay the bills. So I am aiming for that.
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04/30/2020 at 11:45 am #76864
Honestly my state (FL) hasn’t really locked down like other states. The roads are still packed, you can get takeout anywhere, most stores seem to be open. Some people are still having yard and estate sales on the weekends which I’d think is against the rules but Florida is gonna be Florida I guess. We are staying in because we’d prefer to have a vetted therapeutic available at least before we start venturing out. I have plenty of Ebay deathpiles to keep me busy lol. Sales have been surprisingly good for me in the past month but I wonder if that will hold.
I think my state may be opening up hotels and vacation rentals to outside tourists soon, so maybe yours will too? It will be interesting to see how the Georgia experiment pans out in a few weeks. Maybe if it’s not a terrible uptick in numbers other states will start loosening up.
One thing that I’ve found interesting in all of this is that we don’t hate homeschooling. My oldest will start high school in the fall and as long as it’s done safely (ie everyone wearing masks at all times) I think she’ll be good to go. My grade schooler is doing just fine homeschooling and I think I’m going to homeschool her next year using our state’s virtual school curriculum. Not going to lie here…I’m rather enjoying not dashing back and forth to drop offs and pickups and lessons all day long. I also don’t trust that littler kids can be made to wear masks and social distance all day long. Until this thing is over, I think I’m an accidental homeschooler…and I don’t hate it.
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This reply was modified 5 years, 11 months ago by
ChristineK.
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04/30/2020 at 12:51 pm #76866
I have an online friend who lives in Florida and she says the same thing. Meanwhile in my state, everything is shut down except for essential businesses and we have people gathering in protests. I have always homeschooled so that was easy. The hardest part is worrying about transportation (I don’t dare ride the bus right now).
I enjoyed your what sold video.
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04/30/2020 at 1:13 pm #76867
People in my area are still complaining, don’t get me wrong. Our town had to close down beach parking because we were being overrun by people coming from the counties (and other states) that had closed down. We were afraid of them seeding our area with infection. You can still go to the beach, but you can’t park there. Obviously this makes it a less-attractive prospect for most and we have not had our beaches slammed since the spring break fiasco.
There is a vocal group that wants everything including beach parking opened back up immediately. I feel like our lockdown is pretty minor in comparison to other states but yet there will always be complainers and protesters. I’m sure when they kids start back to school in August there will be complainers about the kids having to wear masks. I’m just thinking of avoiding it wholesale and homeschooling for the next school year too. Seems like the logical choice. Homeschooling isn’t that bad…I though it would be more difficult than it has been. Mine have always gone to the neighborhood schools so this is new for us.
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04/30/2020 at 3:00 pm #76869
Homechooling on lockdown SUCKS.
Normal homeschooling where we are free to go whereever we want whenever we want is AWESOME.While I think it is cool that people are getting a taste of homeschooling, I fear that many think this is what homeschooling really is – being stuck at the house all day every day. We have so many activities we do that have all been ended since the stay at home order started.
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04/30/2020 at 3:18 pm #76870
Yeah, one of the advantages of homeschooling is you can go to musuems and outings whenever you want. I only have my youngest at home now and he’s a teenager.
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04/30/2020 at 3:38 pm #76872
Oh no for sure I’d take my grade schooler out to activities during the week if we homeschooled after there was a vaccine. Homeschooling is pretty common in our area and we have plenty of friends who are homeschoolers by choice so we’d have a good community to join if we decided to continue. We live right by the beach so we do get out there with friends right now at least, but it’s nothing like activities and going to the museum whenever you want unfortunately. Right now our homeschool activities are boogie boarding and bike riding lol.
Homeschooling at least for next year makes the most sense in my mind even if we’re stuck at home. We lost I can’t even remember how much school to Hurricane Dorian last fall, and then by March we were out for the year. I don’t really want to deal with this on-and-off stuff next year due to the virus (and possibly to storms too, although I hope not!). My youngest child has had a weird elementary school experience with near-annual storm evacuations and also having her teacher quit mid-year last year. I need to make sure that she has a decent foundation before she is done with elementary school, and homeschooling for a year might be the right thing to do. Without the pandemic I wouldn’t have considered it.
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04/30/2020 at 3:22 pm #76871
Thankfully no one in my town is protesting, but we hear about it in the large cities in my state. I live in the “thumb” area of Michigan. Small communities, and no protestors. Mainly people are worried about their jobs.
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04/30/2020 at 6:39 pm #76874
Sun – Sat, April 19 – 25
Total Items in Stores: 807
Items Sold: 9
Gross Sales: $320.02
Cost of Items Sold: $8.00
Highest Price Sold: $67 (Rosenthal sculpture – bust of the composer Wagner)
Average Price Sold: $35.56
Returns: 0, but a tiki mug broke in transit. USPS already approved my claim
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $22
Number of items listed this week: 24Scavenge of the week: I got 3 band tour shirts (Radiohead and Styx and REO Speedwagon) for $16 total shipped via my new fun place to source – Facebook live auctions. I’ve scored a few great deals and it’s pretty entertaining to see what people have and what people will pay for things (often higher than eBay prices). I keep it on the background while working or cooking and if something piques my interest, I bid. The two groups I like are: Richmond Online Auctions, LLC (they are local to me but also ship) and Bid to Win Live (there’s an auction almost every hour of the day). Richmond Online Auctions is even going into local antique stores and doing buy it now sales to help the shop owners during these crazy times. I’m considering trying out my own auction soon. We’ll see!
I’m also participating in a Richmond local maker/vendor virtual sale the next three days on Instagram (@rvamakersmarket, I am @heygoodeye). I don’t have details on how they’ll do the event yet but it should be fun to get my stuff out there.
Oh! And I got the Southern Split coffee from Broad Porch. YUM! It was strong too. Got me through the day.
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04/30/2020 at 6:42 pm #76876
That REO Speedwagon one might do really well if you can somehow reference Season 3 of Ozark. I don’t want to put in any spoilers here, but that band shows up.
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04/30/2020 at 7:57 pm #76880
I think this is the period where all learn how to source online. I wonder if a lot of the local auction houses will go back to in person.
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