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I’ve never seen those clocks in the wild. I’ve started following some pickers on Instagram and some estate sales in the heartland look great.
“Glowy glass” is a big Youtube trend. I’m wondering how long it will last. Silly to me because it only glows if you put it under a black light in a granny display cabinet. It’s interesting to see what catches on. I hope brass doesn’t go out soon because I have some to unload.
Total
ItemsListings in Store: 934
Items Sold: 16
Gross Sales: $583 (including eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Net Sales: $365 (minus eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Cost of Items Sold: $89 (plus two items ours)
Highest Price Sold: $78 (pair of new pillow shams)
Average Price Sold: $36
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $260 (some business supplies included)
Number of items listed this week: 4Life is settling down finally this week and working on listing again. Ebay did respond with some sales this time. I’ve been gathering up inexpensive display items for my live booth and I need to start sorting and putting prices on. I’m also networking on Instagram. Finally, I’m selling some larger household items and throw pillows off on Facebook because they take up so much room and there is too much stuff everywhere. They are actually doing pretty well and I can buy standard square feather inserts at one thrift store for $5.
I did a minimal amount of RA purchasing and found a number of things the few times I went sourcing last week. I found and tried an online estate sale auction and it was super fun. We normally don’t have those here.
For fun, I’m trying to figure out what Gen Z is looking for now in clothing. I started following some college student locals on Instagram who sell and model vintage clothes (usually 90s and Y2K). I will only have a small clothing rack in my booth but I thought it might help bring younger people in to look at my hard goods. Normally I only buy clothing for resale if it’s truly exceptional vintage and I happen to run into it. It doesn’t light my fire but I can scan through the racks pretty quickly. Since I’m not super confident on clothing picks, I should look at garage sales and places with lower prices. Also Gen Z is showing up in force at the thrifts lately. It’s fun to hear them chatter about it.
There used to be a nice Scandinavian lady on YouTube who posted about this subject. I can’t find her channel any longer. If you are lucky it might still have a sticker or be marked. I ignored it all for a long time but just started looking again. Basically I look for anything that looks like ice, nature, or midcentury starbursts. The Italian glasses stood out for their heft. It’s much better now with Google lens because my attention span for clear glass is short. I’m picking up small dishes to sell live as trinket trays in the booth ($1-3). They will look better in the sunlight.
I’ve seen mostly O. Stone online and mine has a longer signature but it seems to fit.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/335252635190 This is my pick because I’ve been venturing recently into the clear glass isle. I just take a quick glance and once in a while I pick things up. Barware seems to sell pretty well these days but I rarely find any colored or super cool ones.
This week I picked up a set of 4 of these. https://www.ebay.com/itm/314803095639?itmmeta=01HVHSRRJSW6T0N3QY8FFMJQBS&hash=item494bba0857:g:aycAAOSwCJVk7zK3&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAA0KQKoVroTCZvFMphnk1YRImhIPuERutc9TMHS7DACt%2FlzFcERQuCRAgqZH8WRdqbYsTe4IYa22i%2BFMXgwiMU2x5ZjLlHvsJOCyKWKaKFWyJvpSLZ1V2GBHvTlPNP027R%2Bxp6TfSDlX7SadfGWwmeNi64NlqWif2tLNSnLWxUHMZoUZR3hRepJ%2BZdmJItOKBg%2BbX%2B0YLsi567fCYAaWVRsskYUaUq%2Fmqa8MF8Ws2HLgUA6QUFIe%2BcASa4a%2FxJPvO%2FKQzUD7dSBkAazsYDZhvUpmU%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR76J47ncYw They are super heavy and kind of interesting.
It was pouring this weekend and nothing was going on BUT there was an online estate sale (not common here). I had so much fun joining in and bought about $100 worth of items. One nice Mid Century artwork, some folding shelves and tables for my live booth, a large lucite craft drawer kit, and an awesome Orla Kiely carry on suitcase. I got two nice small rolling travel bags, vintage ash trays, and some art books I don’t need that I’m hoping will pay for some or most of this spend. That could be addicting! The artwork does have some browning, so it’s a little hard bidding online, but I’m still glad I bought it. It is a signed and number piece by this guy I’m pretty sure https://www.invaluable.com/artist/foss-oliver-kxe2lnxlfp/sold-at-auction-prices/
I’m still an art novice, so I have to figure out how to describe it. Not a painting, not a lithograph. Serigraph maybe? https://imgur.com/gallery/55f5mEQ
Welp, only 4 listings and some drafts. I’m delighted the fundraiser is over and it was better than last year. Need to get Ebay into gear again. I have a lot of recently purchased items to list, so sadly no death pile progress. The annual realtor neighborhood garage sale is coming up and I have to decide if there is another layer I should shed and if I will ever get our better used clothing listed online. I have to sort some things for the live selling after, so might have a small sale.
@Jay thanks! I’m super excited about it. I hope it’s worth the effort in the end. Will post photos in May or June when I get there. Either way, it’s fun finding my local vintage peeps. Delayed covid reentry.
Total Active Listings: 937
Items Sold: 6
Gross Sales: $208 (including eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Net Sales: $99 (minus eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Cost of Items Sold: $28
Highest Price Sold: $47 (2 new shams, Mercari bundle flip)
Average Price Sold: $35
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $100
Number of items listed this week: 14Whew after a few weeks of not listing much my Ebay store is on life support. I’m definitely feeling the sandwich generation pulls as both of our dads have been having health problems and my daughter is struggling with some things. This week took a lot of time with the fundraiser, but I just have one more day of that and I feel good about stepping up. I do have a couple of weekend trips coming up but generally speaking life should calm down during the weekdays. Knock wood. We continue to have a lot of unusual expenses cropping up but the last car will be paid off in July. I need to get Ebay cranking again.
I also flipped some things this week on Facebook that are non-vintage – some Pottery Barn pillows and bulky items we have in our living space. Some ours and some I bought for Ebay. FB marketplace could be great but I just don’t want to have people coming by the house for resale items and I don’t have the patience for meet ups. About half of those items sold right away.
I haven’t had much time for sourcing but over the past couple of months I have tried out a few estate sales. It’s a very wide variety of pricing and quality of stuff available. I like the idea of hitting up Friday sales and occasionally going back to the bins when it’s less crowded on weekdays. It would be good to get things at lower price points than thrifts, but I also love my thrifts for certain things they don’t care about pricing up. Estate sales are kind of nice for buying practical things. I joked with my husband that I finally scored some tin foil at the last one.
Finally, it’s a ton of work but I’m really driven to sell live at the pop up market. It wouldn’t be worth it until tourist season begins because the space is not super cheap. Despite the work I am connecting with other dealers and vintage lovers, even on Instagram. I’m trying to get some idea of the desired Gen Z clothing items to add just a small rack of clothing to the mix. Hopefully they will see decor items they like as well. I need to start on price tags and sorting and sign up for square. I have been able to score quite a bit of inexpensive metal display racks but will need to add trunks, baskets or some other things for the ground space.
When I tried I couldn’t get anywhere with a real agent on chat, it was just a bot. Maybe it was due to the topic.
Good luck Joe. It does suck that Ebay took away the call me function. I had a chargeback a little while ago and it was puzzling because the buyer had left really good feedback too. I messaged her and she said the description of the charge from Ebay looked like a subscription fee that she worried would reoccur. Later on, it got resolved in my favor without me doing anything. Hopefully it’s just something like that. If Ebay is no longer handling things for us that would be disappointing. More fees for less service is no bueno.
I made 14 new listings. Mainly this was my RA from the Target Magnolia winter-spring transition line that is now sold out. Did list a few things from my recently acquired items sitting around the desk. It felt good to get back to listing and Ebay decided I could have a few sales. I hope to find a few pockets of time during this week. Next week should be much better.
@VL yes I will price everything and thanks for your input. I ordered some tags with my info but I think you are right that it would be easier to remove them. If it’s a better dollar item I might leave it on and write it down. Then I have heard that $5 baskets do really well for sellers at these events. I bought a few clip on signs for those and the fabric / woven shopper bag racks. The middle stuff I intend to type up sticker labels with a description to put on the paper tags. That way I could adjust prices by either reprinting or marking them down with a pen. I’m a very fast typist and printable white labels are always easy to pick up at the thrift store.
I’m glad I have a lot of time to prepare. I’m picking up metal display racks pretty easily and inexpensively. I think I might use some heavy cardboard produce boxes to keep things off the ground and haul. There are trunks listed for $35 on FB marketplace so if it goes well I’ll pick up a couple of those probably. Looking for some inexpensive wooden crates. Having fun watching videos of set ups and not finding much about pricing. Some people said there is a 3x your cost rule, some say 3-4x. I plan to go down to a bigger sale about an hour away in North LA in May and that should give me a good idea. I watched your husband walk around one of your indoor shows on Youtube. 🙂 There is a lot of coverage of the Palm Springs vintage market. I like how one vendor used a lot of trays on a table to place things on. I plan to use solid tablecloths in the same color but will find a way to work in prints that I love here and there.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/335333116973 Bolo. I love these coffee mugs and find them from time to time. If I didn’t have our personal vacation mugs I would be collecting these arts and craft mugs. This got caught up in my sale and sold immediately.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/235510722798 Can’t recall where I even got this but it sold immediately. I only picked it up because it was NIP Vineyard Vines. That brand I only see once in a while over here in the West.
