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You are! At least compared to the folks that think eBay is turning the spigot off on our stores, or that think they can fool Cassini search algorithms, etc. 🙂
For the past two days I was wandering the great abyss, unsure of my next move, which direction to go. But then I picked up my phone to head off to work and saw the best sight – a Scavenger Life podcast was waiting for me! As I rode the subway into the city, the dulcet tones of R&J’s voice eased my mind, centered me, and got me focused. Welcome back!
Week August 18-24, 2019
Total Items in Store: 1015
Items Sold: 22
Cost of Items Sold: $129 (18.6% of sales)
Total Sales: $693.55
Highest Price Sold: $65 (1973 Lynyrd Skynyrd first press)
Average Price Sold: $31.53
Returns: 0 (1 NPB though)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 0
Promoted listings test: 8 sales, $231.62 (33.4% of total sales), $10.83 fees (4.7% of sales)Nice solid week in overall sales volume & totals. The box lot of randoms continues to pay off – sold 11 items for $260 out of the box (reminder that the whole box cost $50). It’s reflected in both my COGS dropping down below 20% to balance my higher dollar items and also my avg price selling coming down to lower than normal levels… gotta keep the balance working in this direction. Some interesting sales from that box include: pipe rest made in India, 1921 Gillette razor, and some unused flints for a Dunhill lighter. Also a reminder that the holidays are approaching and people are starting to buy decorations like these vintage elves on a shelf.
Nothing really listed but I did end & relist some things to freshen them up. Already sold two things that were sitting around for years. This coming weekend I’ll probably not list anything either as we’re driving to Pittsburgh to visit my brother & niece.
Congrats on finishing another rental! Are you going to continue t renovate the other floors while you have guests? Is that going to cause noise problems?
Week August 11-17, 2019
Total Items in Store: 1034
Items Sold: 13
Cost of Items Sold: $166.99 (22.3% of sales)
Total Sales: $748.95
Highest Price Sold: $155 (1996 Soundgarden Down on the Upside)
Average Price Sold: $57.61
Returns: 0 (2 NPB though)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $138
Number of items listed this week: 39
Promoted listings test: 7 sales, $420.97 (56.2% of total sales), $19.35 fees (4.6% of sales)Decent week, would love that volume to increase, but the high average sale price is working out. Last week I mentioned picking up a big box of smalls/bread & butter stuff that will sell for $20-$30 each – I’ve listed 30 items out of the box and so far have already sold 4 items for $90, so already turning a profit and the rest of the box is gravy.
Outside of the high dollar record I sold, this was another good sale: 300+ early world stamps, paid $10 and wanted $150-$200 but took a $100 offer after a year.
Week August 4-10, 2019
Total Items in Store: 1015
Items Sold: 9
Cost of Items Sold: $174 (31.6% of sales)
Total Sales: $550.48
Highest Price Sold: $170 (1950 New York Yankees Sketchbook/Yearbook)
Average Price Sold: $61.16
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $213
Number of items listed this week: 13
Promoted listings test: 8 sales, $231.93 (37% of total sales), $11.52 fees (4.9% of sales)Today’s show really hit home. I’ve made a really effort in the past year to stock my store with bigger, better, higher dollar items. As you can see from this week’s sales, that’s working as my average price is quite high and has remained over $40-$50 consistently. However, that comes at a price, especially in these slower summer months – low sales volume & high COGS. This weekend I went to 2 estate sales and focused on bread & butter, lower dollar but high yield items. Even though these items are all going to sell for $20-$30, I’ve also paid less than $1 for each item, pennies even sometimes. They will supplement the store and help bring that average COGS lower and *hopefully* increase volume as well.
One of the estate sales was on the final day and they were allowing great deals on piles/boxes. Grabbed a ton of stuff, anything that looked even remotely interesting, and threw it in a box – pins, medals, ribbons, tobacco pipes & accessories, costume jewelry, playing cards, etc. Paid $50 for the whole box, probably nearly 100 items, smalls mostly that will sell for $20-$30. Gonna take me a bit to list everything, but a few things I’ve been able to research & list already include: Odd Fellows medal, 1904 YMCA medals, 1932 Washington Bicentennial medal, and a neat 1950s foreign coin bracelet (which according to my wife were quite fashionable at the time). Excited to dig through the rest of the box throughout the week!
Week July 28 – August 3, 2019
Total Items in Store: 1010
Items Sold: 13 (1 Amazon)
Cost of Items Sold: $100 (25.1% of sales)
Total Sales: $398.48
Highest Price Sold: $110 (1995 Everclear – Sparkle & Fade)
Average Price Sold: $30.65
Returns: 0 (1 NPB though)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $466
Number of items listed this week: 19
Promoted listings test: 3 sales, $118 (29.6% of total sales), $3.86 fees (3.3% of sales)Another pretty ho-hum week, so I’ve been bulking up my store over the past few weeks – Labor Day is less than 4 weeks away and just after that historically is when things start to pick up leading into holiday season.
Good luck on the big contracting gig!
Week July 21-27, 2019
Total Items in Store: 994
Items Sold: 6
Cost of Items Sold: $73.99 (22.9% of sales)
Total Sales: $322.99
Highest Price Sold: $88 (Beastie Boys License to Ill)
Average Price Sold: $53.83
Returns: 0 (1 NPB though)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $149
Number of items listed this week: 10
Promoted listings test: 1 sales, $78.99 (24.5% of total sales), $3.48 fees (4.4% of sales)Not a great week… it’s been probably a year since I had less than 10 sales in a week. Fortunately, 4 of my 6 sales were over $60, so looking at the bright side.
Whoa, 150 new listings?!?!? Incredible accomplishment!
And yes, ditto on wanting to see your book 🙂
Week July 14-20, 2019
Total Items in Store: 998
Items Sold: 24
Cost of Items Sold: $215 (23.9% of sales)
Total Sales: $900.95
Highest Price Sold: $85 (Highly Suspect – The Boy Who Died Wolf sealed limited edition)
Average Price Sold: $37.54
Returns: 0 (1 NPB though)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $204
Number of items listed this week: 14
Promoted listings test: 7 sales, $344.99 (38.3% of total sales), $16.97 fees (4.9% of sales)Another pretty good week, although it was really only 4 days worth of sales – no sales on the 3 other days (and no sales yet this week). Nothing super high dollar/over $100, but also nothing really low dollar. For anyone into rock music and looking for a good modern band, check out the band that was my high dollar sale, Highly Suspect out of Cape Cod. I believe they have 2 albums out + a handful of EPs and have been nominated for numerous awards including back to back Grammy nods.
Other good sales included the second of two Sterling Silver Torah Pens I picked up at a high end estate sales about a month ago – paid $20 for the two, sold the first for $100 and this one for $75. Also sold this lot of skeleton keys, took a best offer of $75.
Since I haven’t had any sale syet this week (none since last Friday), I’m going to run a few sales and take today to send out as many offers as I can to try to spark something.
Continue being you, Jay. You are awesome and it’s great seeing you taking control and being true to yourself.
Week July 7-13, 2019
Total Items in Store: 1007
Items Sold: 23
Cost of Items Sold: $158 (21.1% of sales)
Total Sales: $747.87
Highest Price Sold: $59.99 (The Cure – Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me)
Average Price Sold: $32.52
Returns: 0 (3 NPBs/cancellations)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 2
Promoted listings test: 7 sales, $151.97 (20.3% of total sales), $6.89 fees (4.5% of sales)Solid week of bread & butter. Nothing high dollar, but also nothing super low dollar – just a steady stream of 3 sales per day.
The biggest issue this week has been people either making offers and then cancelling, or people buying outright and then cancelling immediately. I know it’s been discussed on the show, but it’s just so strange/weird to me how these things happen. I’m not letting it bother me by any means, relisting is easy, just curious.
Another topic that just started affecting me and might affect some of you out there – the new extra fees that come if you have “excessive” INADs. I never thought I hit that mark since I always look at Seller Level/Performance and I’m Top Rated, overall return rate is 1.88%. However, there’s a new section called Service Metrics that shows your returns by category as compared to everyone else in that category. After 3 returns in May, my Music Category return rate is 2.28% (13 of 571 sales) as compared to the average 0.59% return rate in the category. I now get charged an EXTRA 5% on any sales within the music category, which recently has been the majority of my sales.
Working to resolve this and calling eBay to see if some can be excluded, like when a buyer opens a case but never returns the item… while I never had to refund or provide a label, it’s still counted against me.
Another great show. I’m sure whatever place you end up will be just fine once we all get used to it… just like here it took a bit of time for people to adapt, but it happened and the community is larger than ever. There are several people above (and likely callers/emails next week) saying no way they’ll move to Reddit without any explanation/validation – why/why not? I personally don’t go on Reddit much currently, but it’s more because of the trolls & disorganization – but when you weed out those things, Reddit can actually be a useful source of information & community.
Weeks June 23-July 6, 2019 (2 weeks)
Total Items in Store: 1023
Items Sold: 31
Cost of Items Sold: $537 (31% of sales)
Total Sales: $1,730.38
Highest Price Sold: $180 (4) (Alice in Chains – Jar of Flies, Jimi Hendrix – Are Your Experienced, Beatles – Sgt Pepper MFSL, Bush – Sixteen Stone)
Average Price Sold: $55.82
Returns: 0 (1 NPB though)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $800
Number of items listed this week: 24
Promoted listings test: 17 sales, $987.94 (57.1% of total sales), $48.62 fees (4.9% of sales)Really good last week of June, so so start to July. July 3-5 had no sales, and things started to pick up again Saturday. COGS are way higher than I like, however that comes with the territory of going after higher dollar items for sale – 5 sales of $130+. Outside of the high dollar records sold, also had some neat finds that sold including this Certificate of Citizenship folio, a neat beam compass I was able to tie back to a German engineer, and a quick reminder to everyone that the fall/winter holidays will be here sooner than we think after I sold a Halloween blow mold.
Week June 16-22, 2019
Total Items in Store: 1019
Items Sold: 14
Cost of Items Sold: $109.50 (22% of sales)
Total Sales: $498.70
Highest Price Sold: $79 (Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon Master Recording)
Average Price Sold: $35.62
Returns: 1
Number of items listed this week: 27
Promoted listings test: 7 sales, $287.98 (57.7% of total sales), $14.40 fees (5% of sales)Slightly below average week for me, although last posting was so good that I’m still above average for the last 2 weeks. Not a huge dollar sale, but one of those neat sales was a handful of muscle car photos – was at the last day of an estate sale a few months back and they were at the point of “fill up a bag” so only paid pennies for them. Another decent sale were this gold fill Cross pen/pencil set, probably paid $5 for them.
Went to one sale this weekend and really cleaned up on some stuff I priced high because of rarity/not many other listings: 1949 Yankees photo pack, 1950 Yankees yearbook, c1980 ceramic Wayne Gretzky mold (also got Ron Duguay from the Rangers). That painted mold I paid $5 for both Gretzky & Duguay. I looked them up and there are some for $20-$30, but they’re generic without team or player identity. There are some with team jerseys in the $60-$75 range, so I put these players up higher to see what happens – Duguay for $100, Gretzky for $150 – and will happily take offers.
Interesting, after you said it, I looked it up and found this: https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/shoes_at_gettysburg
The article does confirm, however, that the battle was accidental.
