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So far I have done limited customizing of the item specifics – mainly for those things I know collectors search for. I listed a few magazines and under topics listed some of the advertisers, for my theme park maps I list popular but no longer present rides under character and so on. If I have a choice of category I will pick one with more item specifics I can use. So far it is working for me, either I sell something that others have listed but not sold or mine sells for more than the competition. Gotta find an ‘edge’ for some items, or at least find a way to get through to an interested buyer among all the other listings.
That was an excellent video, thank you for posting it! As I have time I will be editing old listings to see if it helps, and will use this for my new listings for sure. Seems logical enough. Great presenter as well, too bad I am not interested at all in his area of specialty, he is great at explaining.
Total Items in Store: 163
Items Sold: 9
Total Sales: $211.44
Highest Price Sold: $135 Breyer Vintage Collector Club horse
I echo many commenters – life got busy recently and eBay took a back seat for a while. Luckily I still had a trickle of sales, but I will need to get back in listing mode soon. Storeroom is full, but I did spend time organizing the shipping area so that will be easier to do. I do wish I had room for a dedicated photo setup, but I do what I can with what I have to work with.
One project I am working on is tracking and organizing my estate sale company information. There are some that are firm on prices, some negotiate, some make everything free the last day, some provide receipts. I have created a file to track that information so I can better decide where to spend my sourcing time. Great sales I will always attend, but hopefully I can save some time avoiding the mediocre ones with inflexible or high pricing.
Oh, and one strategy that has been working for me improving my listings is adding every detail I can think of when listing items that have competition. For instance I recently sold a vintage weekly appointment calendar with celebrity pictures. There were others for sale and none sold, so I put every darn celebrity name in the description, and sure enough mine sold. Did the same with a vintage Disneyland map, listing all the attractions that are no longer there, and vintage magazines I list with defunct advertisers (Western Airlines, Pan Am, railroads and the like) named and put in the photographs. So far my selling success is improved and in many cases I got more money than the identical items currently listed by others. It takes a bit more time, but I think it is helping!
Total Items in Store: 171
Items Sold: 11
Total Sales: $166.75
Highest Price Sold: $30 Nancy Ann Storybook Western Miss doll
Nice workmanlike week for me. Had to laugh though, I always check eBay before leaving for the PO or putting stuff out for pickup, but this week every time I arrived at the PO or the carrier picked up I heard a ‘ching’ of a sale. Not a bad problem, it kept me busy for sure. I will be dealing with a lot of pennies soon as I inherited bags of them (so heavy!), and that will make for some interesting research. No purchases as I need to deal with a backlog of stuff.
Keeping organized is an ongoing problem. I hate to break down boxes that are already taped. It is silly but seems wasteful to have to retape – the sheer volume of boxes in the storeroom though is working on persuading me to reconsider. Then I have to deal with work flow and finding a spot for the stuff I pulled from sale before my next yard sale. Luckily the storeroom is cool and in this heat I prefer working there than on the computer. My work habits need to shift to earlier in the morning to take advantage of light and cool temps. So many ways to improve my system, so hard to set them into habits.
Total Items in Store: 171
Items Sold: 8
Total Sales: $155.00
Highest Price Sold: $50 Breyer Special Run Balking Mule
I am working on cleaning out my listings, editing and relisting older stuff, and getting to list some of my recent purchases. Sold 2 ball caps already, paying for what I spent, and more 78 to go! I did notice an increase in sales once I started changing things almost daily on eBay. My only annoyance for the week was one non-paying bidder, of course for a high-dollar item.
Went out Friday intending to be good and only buy if it was a sure thing, but got to an estate sale for someone who collected very nice antiques and had filled the house, garage, outbuildings and rented storage lockers. The sellers were motivated, and although the real good stuff in the house was priced high, items outside were pretty much at bulk pricing. I couldn’t resist, bought more ball caps, records, DVDs, books and piles of random stuff. Passed up a few bargains, so I will have to watch for part 2 of the sale when they get to the off site storage. I do need to up my game, there were police scanners, old radios, TVs and clocks and lots of tools that looked good but I didn’t know enough about to pull the trigger. Had to rearrange the store room again to find somewhere for the haul. I need to get on Facebook and Craigslist more to list bigger items, bulk stuff and all the fun stuff I am pulling from eBay. Add it to the list!
Total Items in Store: 164
Items Sold: 4
Total Sales: $150.49
Highest Price Sold: $95 MCM wall sconce
I have enjoyed being able to take the last few weeks (mostly) off for family stuff and still have things sell. I now have a backlog of stuff to list, so I will need to crack down and get back to work. Got my first neutral for a lot of cassettes I listed as-is, untested – buyer was unhappy some didn’t work. *sigh* I was upset at first, cruised over here to peruse the forums and decided to let it go. Just keep listing and all that.
My other grump recently was for a listing of a Little Golden Book – Little Black Sambo. There are other listings with this book for sale and sold on eBay, but my listing got pulled as being against community standards. Big bummer as it was up to $50 with several interested bidders. Now I have to find an alternate selling venue which likely will bring less money. I don’t mind eBay having policies, but they do need to be more even-handed in enforcing them.
On the bright side I have 80+ snap-back trucker caps to sell, so those should be easy to list and hopefully quick to sell. I do have to get out of the habit of listing with free shipping. Cost keeps going up and I tend to under-estimate weights. Since I am revising old listings each week I will just list with buyer shipping and when I get back to it if it didn’t sell, then add the free shipping. Trying new things seems to bump sales, so I try not to get into a rut and miss on improving my work habits.
Total Items in Store: 164
Items Sold: 8
Total Sales: $454.25
Highest Price Sold: $275 Ford fuel pump
It was a super slow week until I got talking to a buyer and managed to bundle 14 VHS tapes into one sale. I am super happy to move some old stuff and it is so much easier to pack one box than 14! For once my high sale did not come from a model horse but a car part. It took a lot of research, as the number on the part and the number on the box it came in were different, but the price was much higher on the actual part so I am glad I spent the time and noticed there was a difference!
I attended no sales this weekend, but it was neighborhood yard sale season. Mom went to one and remembered what I told her to look for – she got me 80 trucker caps (only one vintage, but mostly new with tag sport teams!) for $20. I will have a ball listing them. I need to work on listing more and buying less for a while, it is hard when the buying is easy but my sales area is full and I do try not to clutter up the house for long while I process stuff.
Total Items in Store: 164
Items Sold: 11
Total Sales: $381.71
Highest Price Sold: $85 Breyer Model Horse Diana
This was 2 weeks of work results – I skipped posting last week as I got my second covid shot and it threw me for a loop. Fever, chills, headache, I had to take Monday off but luckily recovered by Tuesday. Now I can go out and hunt again, yay! Ebay has been quiet for me, I have been redoing old listings and selling some old stock so that is nice. Plenty of low dollar sales to get me through the week.
I went to a Goodwill outlet for the first time, and lucked into a new trolley of media that was just pushed out. Not much competition (I went mid morning on a weekday) and picked up lots of fun stuff for only $2. Already sold 2 VHS tapes for $10. Not sure if I will make it a regular thing, I just like sourcing at estate sales better. I am learning to keep track of the selling company habits, some make stuff free after a certain time, some do big bundle discounts. I will do much better to time my visits and buy accordingly. Gotta keep learning and growing. Luckily this is a fun and enjoyable way to pass time and make some cash.
Nothing concrete to share, just my thoughts from a horse collector/seller. It really looks like pressed wood, and not solid wood. Solid wood tends to have different cuts from the blades required to shape it, pressed has less dimension of form. Could be wood slurry or shells ground and compressed into shape. Modern vintage for sure. From the design it likely isn’t an artist studio piece, the conformation of the horses is poor and the head especially shows its mass produced in the east roots. I do like the trees and the rest of the piece, overall a nice enough composition. When I sell these I look in my stash for an equine themed greeting card to put in the frame, a nice Leaning Tree card by Hilda Goodwine would look very nice. I would say average price, which for me is in the $20 range.
Total Items in Store: 151
Items Sold: 6
Total Sales: $326
Highest Price Sold: $228 Breyer chalky Quarter Horse
Closer to an average week for me. Only grumpiness was a buyer cancellation (said their account was hacked – uh-huh), and a non-paying buyer. One sale was from a listing 2 years ago, I am going in and rearranging photos and changing up titles on older listings, hope it moves some older stuff.
My big entertainment for the week was an estate sale I almost didn’t go to. It was 2 hours away, in the middle of nowhere and I couldn’t go until the last day. Glad I did – got there and everything was free! I found out I am woefully unprepared, it was hot as heck and I didn’t have enough water or food to keep me going for more than about an hour. I hauled out a carload of stuff and when I left there was still (literally) tons of stuff left. The items I saw in the ad that I wanted were still there, so I got 8 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle VHS tapes – those sell well. Plus books, china, and I randomly grabbed some vintage radios, lamps and TV’s! Now I have to figure out if they work, and how to sell. How does one ship an old TV? (they are portables, but still!) Had a ton of fun, and will now be sure to keep a bag of granola bars, trail mix and bottled water in the car.
Total Items in Store: 146
Items Sold: 2
Total Sales: $16.00
Highest Price Sold: VHS Carnosaur
Quiet sales week, but I hadn’t listed anything in 2 weeks so I am not surprised. Only oddity was an auction listing that sold before the auction period was over. I don’t remember putting a buy it now on that one, but I guess I must have. Just weird that it didn’t say bin in the order details. Three items from last week have bids, most have multiple bids so hope to have a better report next week.
Yard sales are picking up around here, I hit 4 last weekend. I do tend to go later to avoid the crazy times but still found nice items to sell. Hope antique shows will start up again soon, I do so enjoy browsing and seeing stuff in person. I also watch buyers to see what they are picking up and talk to other sellers for tips. Congrats on opening the shop – hope to make it out your way some day and visit!
Hey, thanks for the heads up! I just went and tried it though and was not impressed. It seems to pick key words at random, and most of the items I tried to use it on had no sales in the last 90 days and so it just showed me my own active listing. There has to be something more to it than just showing sold listings in the last 90 days with my keywords – I already did that before listing! I will spend more time checking it out, at least it is another tool in the listing arsenal…
Total Items in Store: 139
Items Sold: 7
Total Sales: $170.00
Highest Price Sold: $75 Peter Stone decorator trotting draft horse
Average sales last week, my only blip was a buyer who sent a message that they were unhappy with a purchase. I checked here for advice and followed the professional, quick email format and haven’t heard back. Whew, I get so few it give me the heebie-jeebies that it will turn into something bigger.
I spent last week delisting items, then had a yard sale Fri-Sat. Busy all day Friday, slow as molasses on Saturday. Had lots of rust and old tools from clearing out some sheds, it FLEW out of the garage! None of the bigger furniture sold which was a bummer. Now I have to list individually and deal with questions, viewing, and general hassle. Likely will be a quiet week on eBay as I will spend most of the week working in the neglected antique booth. Sounds like good timing since it is a slow time all around. Just keep swimming!
I get it! When I am listing/picking/taking pictures I am having fun, and even more fun when it sells (still hate the packing though). Had to take a month off listing last year and still sales were happening! I set 3 day handling, but discovered USPS pickup at home and only have to go to the PO when a week of media mail/first class sales only happens. We are all at our own levels, I am happy with my small slice of the scavenging as well. It is addictive I think, even more so when I visit my mom who has the app that makes the ‘ching’ when something sells.
Total Items in Store: 150
Items Sold: 8
Total Sales: $268.00
Highest Price Sold: $115 Breyer Special Run Warmblood Horse Indu
Whew, what a week. I discovered I went over my free listing allotment in March and had tons of listing fees. It was due to all my good until sold items relisting the last day of the month. I haven’t had this much listed ever before so I didn’t know it was a thing. Chose to call eBay support and got a very nice agent who listened to my story and agreed to credit the fees! Only downside was she had to credit each one individually by item number. It took the better part of a half hour, but I was very pleased at their support! It will make me rethink my listings – choosing to bundle more items, not list low dollar stuff and list as fixed price first instead of auction.
We are having our annual clear out yard sale this weekend, and it was time to delist stuff anyway, so I went through and ended items that were older or low dollar. My storeroom is still full after a year and a half of work, so I need to focus on moving stuff any way it goes. If anyone wants to come on Thursday for pre-picking just message me!I was worried as 4 items that sold last week the buyers did not pay immediately, which isn’t a good sign. 3 of them eventually did pay, but one is now in the timeframe to open an unpaid item case. Wondering what others do with these situations? I sent 1-2 invoices, with the little message window just saying thank you to each buyer. Do you ever message the buyer? If so, what do you say? I had one buyer thank me for the reminder and pay like a week late, but it seems by this point they would have paid if they intended to.
