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Sept 24 – Sept 30, 2017
Total Items in Store: 363
Items Sold: 17
Cost of Items Sold: approx. $17
Total Sales: $228.89 (excluding shipping costs)
Highest Price Sold: $ 30.00 (VTG jewel encrusted & beaded sweater w/ one jewel missing)
Average Price Sold: $13.46
Returns: 0
International Sales: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $27.23
Number of items listed this week: 24A low but steady week, I chalk it up to not listing much the week before as well as this week. Interesting sale was the jewel encrusted vtg sweater, it went to a fashion biz person in NY. Every once in awhile I get overwhelmed with “stuff” here, and have the urge to purge inventory & skip my once a week sourcing opportunity to stay home and clean up/catch up more – it’s been feeling that way lately. But I just made it a rule awhile back that I need to use my one free kid-less day to source, otherwise, I regret it because I don’t have enough to work with later and get even more behind. Personal thrift score was a big bundle of nice quality yarn for my daughter who is a finger knitting fiend right now and also found a bunch of handwritten letters from the 50’s that I will try to sell. Trying to kick a cold, get things together w/ homeschool schedule, home mess and listing more!
Thank you for the podcast Jay & Ryanne. Happy travels. It made me so happy to see that the podcast was already up today and so early. I think I know what you mean about chaotic lives. I don’t think I’ve been a person that has had a necessarily chaotic life, but I’ve had to step away from some relationships with people that seem to be in that state. At a certain point, you see that it’s probably not going to change (unless like you mentioned, the person is self-motivated, and goes to therapy or something), and there’s nothing an outside person can really do about it. And it is what Ryanne said, at some point, it is about deciding how you’re going to be an adult.
On a lesser scale, I sometimes find myself defaulting in some negative patterns or stressing out in this current life, but then really have to catch myself and remember how I would have killed for this life about a year ago, when I was so unhappy at my last job. Regular reflection is key.
Sept 17 – Sept 23, 2017
Total Items in Store: 338
Items Sold: 15
Cost of Items Sold: approx. $15
Total Sales: $366.93 (excluding shipping costs)
Highest Price Sold: $80 (Dale of Norway Cardigan)
Average Price Sold: $24.46
Returns: 0
International Sales: 1 (Elie Tahari Cardigan)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $45.33
Number of items listed this week: 5 (yikes!)Not bad for a week of barely listing. I think home and homeschooling schedule felt wonky this week, trying to figure out a consistent schedule for us, and what we’re doing when. I can work better when home isn’t chaotic and messy, so needed to take care of that. Getting more confident about pricing. Because of this, getting more decent offers, can run sales without the price dipping lower than I’m comfortable with and average sale price is getting better. I’m trying a new approach with listing. I’m scheduling out listings ahead of time & keeping track on a calendar, so everyday at least some new listings are going up. It’s a more positive frame of mind for me to work ahead and nice to cover a day or weekend that I want to free up. I’m scheduling it, but manually making it go live to avoid the scheduling fees. This shift feels better, working and looking ahead rather than constantly feeling behind.
It was a good day at the bins on Friday, was able to find more than I have been, about 45 vs. the 25 average lately of strong items. A good friend wanted to come along, so it was fun to have her there and show her that world. Great personal finds from the bins was a near perfect condition unicorn book for my daughter w/ the gift receipt still inside and cute wedges for one of my stepdaughters.
Other non eBay related week high points included helping at an urban garden w/ my daughter (this has been a good regular thing in our schedule) & my daughter starting jiu jitsu at a great dojo that emphasizes self-confidence and anti-bullying. The kids verbally and physically stand up to the instructors. The instructors pretend to bully them by calling them things like “watermelon face”, “banana head”, etc. The kids look at them seriously and say things like “Never call me that again”. Hilarious, and I’m glad she’s getting this practice.
Yes, I feel like a broken record when people ask me where I got this and that… “the thrift store”. Nowadays mostly I buy things for ourselves and family members from the thrift store or eBay. Notables include: vintage wire fruit basket, nice sturdy baskets for toy storage, barstool for my friend, dark sheet to cover up things in my hatchback, nice cloth napkins, pillowcases, extra towels for wringing out handwashed eBay inventory, quilt used as a picnic blanket for park outings, snowsuit for my daughter, nice cardigan & skirt for me, awesome handmade tote bag, lots of cute, nice clothes for my daughter, niece & stepdaughters — brands and from stores that we would never in a million years shop at in real life.
I was the opposite, I felt like I wasn’t getting enough news, so subscribed to a very short m-f news podcast NY Times “The Daily”, about 20 minutes, so I feel a little better in touch with what’s going on. Other than this, I also don’t want to overdue it with too much news media.
Sept 10 – Sept 16, 2017
Total Items in Store: 355
Items Sold: 23
Cost of Items Sold: approx. $23
Total Sales: $617.51 (excluding selling costs)
Highest Price Sold: $275 (European equestrian themed toile fabric)
Average Price Sold: $26.84
Returns: 0
International Sales: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $50.98
Number of items listed this week: 19The week ended with a bang with a nice offer on some fancy fabric, and is my highest sale to date. Sales were all over the place, but a couple extra high days evened things out. I continue to notice that kid clothes are selling extra well during this back to school time, a couple items even sold the next day after listing them. I ran sale after sale this week and that seemed to help keep movement going in my small store. I’m continuing to get a better handle on what I like to sell, which are also things that I don’t mind holding onto for a long time and things that I won’t go too low on. Auctioning off for a very low price is now mainly happening if I’ve found flaws with an item after getting it home.
Love to hear about your travels Ryanne & Jay, you guys are my heroes. I love to travel too, but it also has its share of anxiety for me as well, prepping and really all throughout the trip. On a reseller video I watched awhile back, it was mentioned that there is a faction at least, of resellers who have anxiety of some kind, like it’s a common thread. That made a lot of sense to me, and I identify with that. I work best primarily on my own, and have figured out later in life, that I’ve always had some social anxiety. So reselling work actually suits me better than pretty much any job I’ve ever had. I think it’d be important for young people, people in general, to not only know what work interests them, but to also be honest and in touch with what type of work environment is the best match to their true nature (alone, w/ others, in an office, outside, casual, more professional, supervisor, not supervisor, etc..)!
I’ve also found that Exofficio sells well and fast on eBay!
& J. Jill has a line called “wearever” – supposed to be good for travel.
and in my single experience with a top from this line, it sat for a long time in my store, & I ended up giving it to a friend, it was nice though.Yes, I feel the most victorious while I’m making sales while doing something fun, away from home. While my daughter and I were at the best puppet show last weekend, sales were coming in. I had to say to myself, “YES!” It is the best feeling.
I really can’t watch this while I list, because there’s subtitles, but I’m hooked on “Terrace House” on Netflix. It’s a reality show in Japan, where they put young people in a house together to live for a time. It’s SO tame compared to US reality shows, I think that’s what I find so interesting about it. There are commentators between clips that are pretty funny too. Actually alot of the time, not that much is happening… just a disclaimer. Not sure if this appeals to me mainly because I’m of Japanese descent… it’d be interesting to know if non Japanese people are into this show at all or not.
Sept 3 – Sept 9, 2017
Total Items in Store: 345
Items Sold: 19
Cost of Items Sold: approx. $19
Total Sales: $297.63 (excluding selling costs)
Highest Price Sold: $29.99 (charming “Landscape” raw fabric by Peter Pan Fabrics)
Average Price Sold: $15.66
Returns: 1 (buyer’s remorse)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $24.68
Number of items listed this week: 38Did a little better w/ listing this week, getting the number of items in store up. Sales were not that impressive, but steady, average price sold dipped. Sourcing less items lately, though going to same place each week (the bins) just getting pickier and a little more experienced I guess about what I feel like is worth selling, which is good. But that also means I need to add another sourcing trip weekly to be able to list enough, either back to the bins or somewhere else and be willing to possibly pay more.
With the school year started, more kids’ clothes are selling. As has been mentioned, most kids’ clothes are not worth selling, but Mini Boden, Peek, Naartjie, Hanna Andersson and Tea Collection, I still pick up, Mini Boden especially. Running auctions daily and more sales to keep movement going in the store. I find that this is necessary, for me at least, probably for the size of my store, to keep steady sales coming in.
We also started our homeschool school year this week, trying new classes and things are busier, so trying to find a good work – homeschool balance. My tendency is to stay up way too late working after my daughter goes to sleep, just getting drunk off the uninterrupted span of time. But really I know this isn’t the best way, I get things done, but it takes me longer at night because I’m tired from the day, and I let myself get distracted more. So am trying to switch to getting more work done in the morning.
“Ugly produce” was mentioned on one of the podcasts… we recently signed up w/ and received our first shipment of “imperfect produce” (imperfectproduce.com)… you can get produce, not fit for selling in the markets for one reason or another & can customize your order. We signed up for an every other week organic box. We like it alot so far!
Also took my daughter and her friend to their first, old style marionette puppet show at the historic Bob Baker Marionette theater, for any of you in Southern California. It’s really great and a must see 🙂
Aug 27-Sept 2, 2017
Total Items in Store: 313
Items Sold: 14
Cost of Items Sold: approx. $14
Total Sales: $377 (excluding selling costs)
Highest Price Sold: $55 (suit skirt set)
Average Price Sold: $26.92
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $35.42
Number of items listed this week: 24Trying to get total # of items back up to closer to 400 & sales back to more like $100 per day… recording my numbers here shows me I’ve been averaging listing only 25 items a week. I start off ok in the beginning of the week, then have been pooping out towards the end.
Getting a little faster at listing. I like putting all the “facts” (brand, size, country, etc.) in the title, as a rough first draft, then eBay pulls those facts to suggest dropping it into the various categories. That’s been a great short cut I’ve found recently. For contemporary clothing, have also been looking at “thredup” pricing as another guide, can also quickly get a rough retail value for an item that way too.
Curious to know what others say in a succinct way when people ask you what you do? I’ve been wrestling with this one for awhile. It seems so hard for people to understand… and/or hard for me to explain I guess. I would like to just say I work from home…. I do work online… but for when I’m pressed further? “I sell old stuff on the internet”? Any suggestions would be welcome 🙂
I looked up and 4 weeks had gone by since I looked closer at my numbers and stats, not good. These are abbreviated stats, and total sales include shipping costs since I took the quick total off of ebay for each week.
So during this time, I wasn’t focused on listing & of course it shows. I was also experimenting with not running auctions or sales regularly like I had been. I signed up with GoDaddy and got up to date with that for 2017, so far I like the system alot. I also worked on my etsy store and cross-posted alot of my vintage items, but not all, since I’m trying to make that a more curated site, and plan on mixing in original artwork there. I went through inventory and clear bagged almost everything (soft goods) that wasn’t hanging and that I felt strong about storing for the long haul. I donated a bunch and sent in a thredup bag. So the store shrunk, but home feels better with everything gone through & better organized. I also have no more consigned items in the store which feels great. The items are now listed in my mom’s store, which I try to only work on when I’m visiting her. This separation feels good, since there’s more than enough to do at home.
So my small store was able to live off its momentum for just a short while. When there was a run of about 4 days of no sales, that was too much and I did start to run auctions again, which helped alot. My strategy has been to toggle between auctions starting at the lowest decent offer I would take on something, and if it doesn’t sell, doing a bin for 30 days at a strong price w/ best offer. I’ve also been starting most new listings out without a best offer option and holding strong for a month, then reevaluating, this has felt good. I’m also only running sales on my sale category-things I really want to get rid of for one reason or other, rather than a storewide sale, this also feels like a good change. So that’s enough of a break and low sales, time to get back to listing more. Thank you always for the podcast and for this place to reflect.
July 23-29, 2017
Items Sold: 11
Cost of Items Sold: approx. $11
Total Sales: $204.25
Highest Price Sold: $37.00 Mini Boden Girls dress (auction)
Average Price Sold: $18.56July 30-Aug 5, 2017
Items Sold: 11
Cost of Items Sold: approx. $11.00
Total Sales: $262.77
Highest Price Sold: $54.00 Barefoot Dreams Bamboo Long Cardigan Sweater
Average Price Sold: $23.88Aug 6-12, 2017
Items Sold: 4
Cost of Items Sold: approx. $4
Total Sales: $63.52 OUCH!
Highest Price Sold: $29.99 Alice + Olivia cashmere sweater dress
Average Price Sold: $15.88Aug 13-19, 2017
Items Sold: 16
Cost of Items Sold: approx. $16 +consignment payout of 46.50 = 62.50
Total Sales: $468.57
Highest Price Sold: $75 VTG Ruby Z Bean Finneran Ceramic Deer/Reindeer? Necklace
Average Price Sold: $29.28Hi @brooklyn_procurement I was looking into taxjar tonite since I’ve had some questions about paying sales tax for this year. Just wondering if in your eBay store, is it set up to automatically charge sales tax for buyers within your state? or if not, is taxjar figuring out what to pull out of your in-state sales to accurately pay what should be paid for your sales tax?
Currently i’m not charging sales tax in my ebay store, so am wondering how I’m going to figure it out correctly at the end of the year. Any feedback you may have would be much appreciated, thank you!
Thank you for your feedback @Sharyn!
