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Steph and I just came back from vacation yesterday, so I’m a little late to the farewell party. A part of me is really sad to see the podcast ending, but I’m also really happy for the time our little community got to spend together over the last several years. I started listening to the podcast almost 5 years ago, starting on episode 1. You two have taught me an enormous amount about the eBay business and gaining financial independence. If not for you, I’d still be in a cubical making money for someone else. You’re the catalyst for our independent lifestyle that we love so much.
I think I could feel the end coming for a little while. And honestly, I’ve been sluggish lately in posting on the forum every week myself. I can’t even imagine recording a 30-60 minute podcast every week, especially with your busy workload and endeavors. I’m honored to have been a part of this community, and I wish you nothing but the best for your future! Trash elves for life!
I’ve shipped quite a few pennants and I’ve come up with a method you might think about. I take two USPS Priority Mail long boxes (the 12 x 3 x 15 size) and push one inside the other just enough to have a REALLY long box. But I don’t open them. I keep the boxes flat if that makes sense. Then just apply tape to the middle. The pennant will fit inside as long as you make it long enough. I then fold the flaps of the box inside itself and tape them up. It’s kind of hard to explain in words, but I’ve never had an issue with the dozens of pennants I’ve shipped this way. Of course you now have to ship Priority mail, but in my listings I make it a selling point that I ship these flat hence the shipping cost.
@retro-treasures-wv Wow, it’s been a heck of a weekend for sure. An understatement indeed. Congratulations on the baby girl! I’m hoping you all get well soon.
@mycottage You’re absolutely right with the pendulum analogy. It’s just really tough to be on the downswing. This pandemic situation has really upset the balance with a lot of things. I can’t wait for some sort of normalcy, whatever that may be. Here’s hoping to a great Q4 too!
Aug 8 – 14
- Total Items in Store: 4,235
- Items Sold: 15
- Total Sales: $347
- * BELOW yearly average of $987
- Highest Price: $75 (Pelican 1500 Protector Hard Case)
- Average Price: $23
- Returns: 1
- Cost of Goods Sold: $49
- Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $0
- Number of New Items Listed this Week: 47
Whew boy, I’m feeling the slowdown bad. I’m having worse profits than back when I first started recording my numbers in 2018. This summer has been such a bummer in terms of sales. I know I haven’t been listing quite so much and instead have been focusing on other areas in life, but this is starting to not feel right. I can’t help but wonder if downgrading my store negatively affected my sales. Steph is doing even worse though. She’s lucky if she makes a handful of sales a week. I’m not worried too much yet since I’ve got a comfortable amount saved up for emergencies, but I’m hoping things pick up here soon.
As I mentioned, eBay’s been sort of taking a back burner for a little while this summer. It’s been nice to have free time to work on projects and adventures. But like after a long vacation, I’m looking forward to getting back in the swing of things again once the summer ends
July 11 – 17
- Total Items in Store: 4,203
- Items Sold: 17
- Total Sales: $352
- * WAAAAY BELOW yearly average of $1,021
- Highest Price: $60 (Antique Ornate Wood Carved Gesso Picture Frame Gold)
- Average Price: $21
- Returns: 0
- Cost of Goods Sold: $14
- Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $22
- Number of New Items Listed this Week: 33
It’s been a few weeks since I’ve posted. It’s somewhat reassuring in a weird twisted way to see others on here having crappy weeks of sales like myself. At least I’m not alone. I keep telling myself that this is a typical summer, and that we were spoiled last summer with the stimulus checks and the bored buyers. I’m hoping things will pick up again for all of us.
Not much has been happening around here lately. I’ve just been slowly working on projects around the house while maintaining my eBay store, all while trying to enjoy my summer. We’ve been hitting the yard sales every weekend. It’s hit or miss, but I did manage to score TWO like-new Wilton bench vises that sell for over $120 each. I also bought a unique Bible at a tag sale which can sell for over $70. Plus all kinds of bread and butter stuff.
I hope you have a nice relaxing vacation. You two deserve it!
I found that 10 fit perfectly inside one of eBay’s 16x12x8 boxes. Any larger and I would risk the oversize box rate for shipping. They’re a slow seller, but I just fill a box as I use them.
June 13 – 19
- Total Items in Store: 4,157
- Items Sold: 20
- Total Sales: $1,117
- * ABOVE yearly average of $1,070
- Highest Price: $240 (Grim Reaper Skull & Skeleton Sake Decanter Set)
- Average Price: $56
- Returns: 1
- Cost of Goods Sold: $66
- Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $42.50
- Number of New Items Listed this Week: 41
Good for you for deciding to spurge on air conditioning! Our last house didn’t have it for the first couple years so I know how brutal summers can be. Not bad of a week over on my end thanks in part to a few higher dollar sales. I’ve been sitting on that sake set for a while waiting for the right best offer. I got plenty of lowball offers, but finally someone gave me a good price. I also sold a suitcase style record player which is still in transport. I’m really worried about a return on that one. I packaged it as well as I could, but I still feel nervous since it was over $50 to ship. Another neat sale was a lot of 10 cardboard tubes that I collected from the empty rolls of bubble wrap. $17 for something that anyone else would just have thrown away.
I had a more productive week this time around. I got back into eBay after a couple weeks off. It was nice. I’m experimenting with a 3-or-4-day work week this summer and it’s working out I think. Not that I’m being a couch potato on my off days. I’ve got so many things that I need to get accomplished with the house that it seems like a job in itself.
Another thing I did with eBay this week was purchase a new photography station desk. I found the perfect metal and wood teacher’s desk on GovDeals and won the auction for the starting bid of one dollar! I had to get help getting it in my van since it was so heavy. Getting it down to my basement was a chore! But it’s just the perfect size and will last forever. And I checked the brand online and found out they retail for almost $800.
June 6 – 12
- Total Items in Store: 4,165
- Items Sold: 23
- Total Sales: $519
- * BELOW yearly average of $1,067
- Highest Price: $130 (MCM Gold Three Pierced Cone Light Pole Tree Floor Lamp)
- Average Price: $28
- Returns: 0
- Cost of Goods Sold: $27
- Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $103
- Number of New Items Listed this Week: 16
It’s been a few weeks since I’ve posted here. I’ve been keeping eBay on the back burner and taking care of several projects that I’ve been neglecting. I built a sidewalk around my garden, removed the carpet in our backroom and replaced it with laminate, and some other home improvement things. I also hit a deer with my car, so I’ve been dealing with that. eBay’s been pretty slow anyways. I’ve averaged about $640 in sales over the last three weeks.
We’ve been hitting the yard sales pretty hard in our area. Last weekend, I scored a few goodies, including a vintage Pittsburgh Penguins Starter jacket that sells for around $100, and a high-end electric deli weight scale that I think I just might keep for the business.
I decided to treat eBay kind of casual over the summer. I’ll try to list 50 or so items this week to make up for the last couple of weeks, but I think I want to actually enjoy the summer rather than spend it down in my basement office like I felt I did last year. So maybe I’ll work every other day instead of constantly. It’ll be like an experiment.
May 16 – 22
- Total Items in Store: 4,188
- Items Sold: 42
- Total Sales: $1,257
- * ABOVE yearly average of $1,087
- Highest Price: $180 (Large Lot of Pre-Recorded Reel-to-Reel Tapes)
- Average Price: $30
- Returns: 0
- Cost of Goods Sold: $67
- Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $13.25
- Number of New Items Listed this Week: 17
I had a great week on eBay. It was weird how sales really picked up in the last few days though. On Thursday night I felt like I was packing for hours.
Yard sale season is picking up again here in the Ohio Valley, but we’re not seeing a lot of good stuff yet. I don’t know if there are more scavengers now than before or if people are getting smart and not selling the good stuff. I still much prefer auctions, and even the online auctions are slowly winning my favor.
I wanted to share a fun group of sales I had. I bought a flat of Wagner-ware aluminum pots and pans at an auction last fall and just recently went to list them. The sold prices on the aluminum stuff wasn’t very exciting, but I saw that the black plastic handles on these things were selling for more than the entire pieces themselves. So I removed each of the handles from the pans, cleaned them up nice and just sold my last one (out of six) for $40 each. I wouldn’t have gotten more than $25 per pan had I sold it all assembled. LOL! I ended up giving all of the aluminum to my brother who collects scrap metal to recycle.
May 9 – 15
- Total Items in Store: 4,202
- Items Sold: 36
- Total Sales: $965
- * BELOW yearly average of $1,086
- Highest Price: $130 (Framed Numbered Picture Print Signed by Artist Greg Kempf)
- Average Price: $27
- Returns: 1
- Cost of Goods Sold: $62
- Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $89
- Number of New Items Listed this Week: 57
My numbers were a bit better than the previous week. Sales were definitely up, though the average sale cost was pretty low. Every time my phone cha-chinged, I was hoping for that high dollar sale to balance out the week, but only saw $8 or $15. Oh well, if I didn’t have those cheap things listed, then I wouldn’t have made any money.
This week I purchased a van load of junk from an online auction. It was a decent haul with a lot of gambles. Many of the listings were single grainy photos of “contents of shelf.” I got really lucky with one which was loaded with old electronics manuals and 1980s arcade and pinball promo fliers. All in all, about half of the van load was junk to be thrown away. But a few gems will have made my time worthwhile.
May 2 – 8
- Total Items in Store: 4,179
- Items Sold: 24
- Total Sales: $643
- * BELOW yearly average of $1,095
- Highest Price: $100 (Pace Two-Way CB Radio Base Station)
- Average Price: $27
- Returns: 0
- Cost of Goods Sold: $44
- Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $0
- Number of New Items Listed this Week: 47
I had an alright week. Kinda slow in sales. I managed to get a lot listed though. With the crumby weather came an opportunity to put all my efforts into the eBay business. This week looks to be more of the same while it slowly warms up again.
April 25 – May 1
- Total Items in Store: 4,152
- Items Sold: 45
- Total Sales: $1,324
- * ABOVE yearly average of $1,099
- Highest Price: $100 (Mitutoyo 0-6″ Dial Caliper With Original Case And Manual)
- Average Price: $29
- Returns: 0
- Cost of Goods Sold: $70
- Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $7.50
- Number of New Items Listed this Week: 27
It was a nice week of sales. I didn’t get to list a whole lot like I said I would. Spring-time chores really took up most of my time. Maybe this week will be different since it’s going to rain pretty much every day.
Last week I mentioned a return request for one of those rare cassette tapes. I thought it seemed fishy seeing as how it took him almost a full month to open the return, but I accepted it anyway. I later received a message from him asking for a partial refund because he didn’t want to return it. Nah, that’s not really how it works there, bud. I’m just going to ignore him, but it sucks that my $70 is now held up for another month until I can get it closed (if he really doesn’t return it).
April 18 – 24
- Total Items in Store: 4,170
- Items Sold: 43
- Total Sales: $1,334
- * ABOVE yearly average of $1,091
- Highest Price: $125 ( Four-Layer Oak Baroque Gesso Gilt Picture Frame Mirror 27×31)
- Average Price: $31
- Returns: 2
- Cost of Goods Sold: $51
- Costs of Goods Purchased this Week: $51
- Number of New Items Listed this Week: 30
Congratulations on the grand opening! I’m so excited for both of you! Steph and I might think about taking a little road trip this summer to check the shop out. It’s only about a 5 hour drive so it’d be a nice day trip, or maybe even a one-nighter.
My sales last week were a lot better than the previous few weeks. I sold several $100+ items which really helped my numbers. That mirror that I mentioned above took way too long to pack. Good thing I got a decent price for it. I got a couple hard-hitting returns though. A pair of designer sunglasses for $50 and one of those rare cassette tapes for $70. The cassette buyer waited until almost 30 days to open a return, so I’m kinda suspicious of something shady. But I really didn’t have a choice since he claimed it was damaged and sent photos. I didn’t think to purchase insurance either so I’ll just have to eat it. I’m making him send it back though just in case he’s trying to con me.
I didn’t get a whole lot done last week. We got our second COVID vaccine shot and were totally out for the count for two days straight. This week I want to try to get as much listing done as possible because when the warm weather starts back up I won’t want to be stuck inside.
