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Thanks Nancy. I mentioned this to her last night and she said she would start some research today. She also said she would come up to the office and do photos during the times when she feels better.
Appreciate the input and concern. We are praying she will survive and make it through all of this. After 50 years of marriage we have been a “team” for most of our lives. We first met in high school in 1966 and got married in 1969. Been together ever since. So I will take her to treatments everyday and we will see how it goes and where we are around mid November.
Mike at MDC Galleries and Fine Art
I have book marked about 8 or 10 current or former SL posters / members who have Etsy stores. Some going back to Flim Flam and Omfug, and even earlier. I think. Troy does, totommyto, us and several others. I have approx. 25 Etsy stores bookmarked that I follow and think some of those I did get from SL members saying in their posts they had Etsy stores.
Some said years ago that they made more on Etsy than their Ebay stores. Etsy fees are still $.20 for a 3 month listing so $.07 per item per month. Etsy fees are lower and almost all of our Sales are for the full price. Every now and then someone will message us and offer a lower amount but not often.
So far this year we have had 58 Sales for a gross of $3,125 in Sales, about $53.88 avg. per item sold or about 10 items per month for about $520 per month. Items sell for more on Etsy and higher priced items seem to sell well on Etsy and almost no offers, which come primarily through a private message asking if we would take less and they mention an amount. If we agree, we just go and change the price to that number and tell them they have 24 hours to buy or we will change the price back. Etsy doesn’t have a formal “Make an Offer” process.
Our Ebay store grosses during good-strong months about $2,000 plus and on slower months [late spring and summer] about $1,300 to $1,500 per month.
We plan on eventually having all items cross posted on both platforms EXCEPT for those items that are not old enough to be classified as 20 year old vintage [pre-2000] on Etsy. A loop hole is on old stuff, some things can’t be dated so we list it even if unsure.
Currently we have 1,212 items on Ebay and 581 of those are also posted on Etsy. The only reason we don’t have all of our Ebay items on Etsy is because we are working on updating and re-formating several hundred of our very old items that we listed years ago and need to be updated within SixBit first before we send on over to Etsy.
Just got my bay box shipment and noticed a sticker on the box that mentioned “Sales Tax”. In my post over in the shipping forum on my post about having a slim selection of supplies to choose from, I also mentioned a few things I personally thought Ebay could consider to help Sellers out a little bit more.
One of those suggestions was to allow those of us who have a formal business structure to provide our Federal ID number and State Tax Resellers ID number so that we do not have to pay all of the various states Sales taxes that are now being imposed in 26 states I think.
Well the decal said to go to the following link: ebay.com/salestax and register your Tax Exempt Dept. of Revenue Resale number. Well that is good to know. By doing so, anything that you buy that is part of your business or inventory that we source off of Ebay, anything for your business that is to be resold, we won’t be taxed on it because it is all for resale and will be taxed to the buyer at their end when they purchase from you.
How far that can be stretched, because some things while not for actual resale are used in the process of making an object saleable, but that is a fine line for your CPA.
But thought I would share in case you have a Dept. of Revenue resale number or business license in your state.
I haven’t jumped over there yet but will do so shortly and see if there are any snags.
mike at MDC Galleries and Fine Art
Thanks to everyone for the special thoughts and prayers for Susan.
Tomorrow is the group meeting with the hospital chemo and radiation team. Schedules will be set-up, a small injection port inserted for chemo and a small abdominal tattoo to serve as a target for the focused radiation. Supposedly after tomorrow we will find out the start date and appointment times for the coming 18 weeks.
Thanks again everyone for your thoughts and hopefully Susan can walk away from all of this by next year as a well person.
Same goes for us here at MDCGFA.
And if time is more of a consideration than just money, use the ad income to to hire a person who can handle the technical side, moderate and all Jay and Ryanne would do is post their once a week pod-cast. Cut down on the amount of time they spend actually reading and replying in person.
Johnny Carson ended up having co-hosts do his shows for multiple weeks in a row. Do a weekly 45 pod-cast and save up some stuff for a longer once a month pod-cast and cover several bigger topics more in dept.
So lots of things to think about that may cover either the associated costs or the time constraints.
But again, just an opinion.
mc@mdcgfa
Yep, I got an Etsy update and read this same article about an hour ago.
It was posted in an older Seller Update but that was end of last year if I remember. In any case Etsy is going to request Sellers to go with free shipping on items over $35 and offer it on smaller dollar items if the total purchase reaches or goes over $35. Their incentive for Buyers to add a few more items to their shopping carts to get Free Shipping.
Here is the link to the email from the Etsy President for those who want to read his complete statement. We got this in our email box yesterday.
https://view.e.etsy.com/?qs=02f05644376c956cda4a7f7cb97b313f076e268d7166876dd71b09786574bccc109f06142d2052ae83aa291164d2f62d5f3a4097d400d592c8f238d44063273b78727a7a1a30195cAnd here is the link to the Etsy suggestions and help on how to go about doing and implementing the Free Shipping Program. It even has videos.
https://www.etsy.com/seller-handbook/article/get-priority-placement-in-us-search-with/540244125961Etsy right out front states to add the cost into the pricing of your item and even has a few tutorials on their suggestions of how best to handle all of this. And to offer Sellers their incentives to do this they come right and say, up front, you offer free shipping and you will be listed in all searches, advertising, sponsor pages and online and even television advertising up top and in front of those who don’t.
At least they are open about it. Ebay for years has kept whether they do or don’t do special things for those who offer free shipping. One of the conspiracy theory topics.
We have almost 600 items on Etsy and about 1,200 on Ebay. The goal, using SixBit will be to try to get almost all of our items cross listed since most will qualify.
So, simply put, Offer Free Shipping, build it into your prices and we will give you preferential treatment. Don’t offer Free Shipping and we will handle you differently and with less attention than those who do. “DROP the MIKE!”.
So if I am going to have to do this for the Etsy listings and they are cross posted then we will have to think about just going ahead and doing it on Ebay since they will be the same item.
But as we have discussed before here on SL the only way to get your butt covered is to take the furthest zone and build the highest shipping cost into your items OR to build in the mid-point of the United States and build that in and make money on the shorter shipments and loose a little on the longer shipments.
BTW, Kinsley, KS or Lebanon, KS and approx. zip:67547 is considered the middle of the United States.
The USA is 2,680 miles across from New York City to Los Angeles, so 1,340 miles would be a mid point across. So build in 1,340++ miles or about 5 USPS zones into your item’s price by taking the estimated SHIPPING weight [object+box+packing-dunnage] and that would give you the averaged out scenario. Any buyer you ship to closer will pay more and any buyer further away will pay less. When the buyer pays more, you make more, when the buyer pays less you make less.Then of course the extreme of this is to build in zone 8 prices into all your items and you will make more on everything you ship except for the buyers located in zone 8 itself.
The whole philosophy to all of this hoopla, and Etsy is publically saying it for once and for all, is that buyers are lazy, they don’t want to or can’t do the math, they will pay more for something if they “think” they are getting free shipping, even though it is not. The other thing is with the shipping built in, the buyer has no way to separate the cost of the item from the cost of the shipping. So it makes it tough to comparison shop. Is the $50 they just spent a $25 item with a $25 shipping cost OR a $40 item with a $10 shipping cost OR a $10 item with a $40 dollar shipping costs. They don’t know and seem not to care. As long as it says FREE SHIPPING.
And, Etsy is saying they did the experiments and TEST [there you go Jay] and they say, more Sales Result from those with Free Shipping. And they believe it so much, they are now willing to promote it heavily and offer incentives to do it and disincentives to not do it and PUBLICLY saying so. In other words, NOTE to our Sellers, Beware, if you don’t do this then we are not going to help you much. You want some type of Promotions, then do it yourself, run a sale or pay for Special Promotions, but those Sellers with Free Shipping we are going to help them out.
Back to Ebay, it has long been tossed about if Ebay does this but no one really knows, thus still a conspiracy or mystery theory.
We have bounced back and forth on this for several years now and looks like time for us here at MDC Galleries to re-think it all again.
Mike at MDC Galleries and Fine Art in Atlanta
I would guess J&R would know the traffic stats. SL has about 5,600 members and I usually see about 40 to 50 logged in at the bottom most of the time. Many whom seem to stay logged in continually. So don’t know about random visitors that can pop in.
Maybe Jay will drill down some numbers on this and see if they do stay, if the ads can generate enough cash to cover the expense of a “Forum Helper”.
mc@mdcgfa
@MDJ: Sounds good to me. And if the costs of a helper for J&R to handle everything for them could be easily covered by paid ad clicks then, it seems like that would be the way to go. But, the BIG BUT is IF the ads would produce enough clicks. Most of us are hardcore resellers with our own outside, local sources and with only about 5,000 SL members are there enough non-members who visit regularly to provide enough clicks to earn enough money.
Looks like an experiment for Jay is in the wind. đ
Some time back I saw the phrase “Jay for President”. I am still waiting for his name to appear on the ballot.
I would love to be a fly on the wall with Jay sitting down with the Chairman of China and saying, “No, no more tin, metal fakes from you guys! I am going to make America Vintage again!”
And, “Hey Mr. China President, if I want to go all in, who do I talk to about buying a whole container load full of this China, vintage knock off stuff!” LOL đ
mc@mdcgfa
Thanks Joe: Appreciate it. We are hoping for a full recovery.
They will do some tests and a Cat scan this week to establish some benchmarks to gauge her progress by. That way we can see how she is responding as she goes along. The original prognosis at the Stage I-B was in the 97% or higher. Now at the III-B stage it drops to the 70% range but these ranges are all fairly loose and open. It depends on how each patient responds to the treatments, thus the benchmark “markers”, cell counts and others have to be declining throughout treatments.
mc@mdcgfa
Thanks. Ok will do RTWV. We are doing a bunch of research since we got the final reports last week. Anything that may help both physically and financially.
We have a list of resources the oncologist team gave us, where we can get gas cards for the trips back and forth, the chemo will be once weekly for 6 weeks, then radiation everyday for 6 weeks, then a second round of chemo weekly for the last 6 weeks so about 40 treatments in all. So the gas cards will help with the mileage plus we will track the medical mileage.
Another resource will pay one utility bill per month. Every little bit will help. The surgery rounded out at approx. $64k and each of the after treatments say about $12k to $15 x 3 = $45K +/-. While we have not gotten any actual invoices-statements yet, we are expecting in the range of $100k +/-. Then we will have to wait and see how much the insurance will cover. We both have a Medicare Advantage Plan through Aetna.
There seems to be some caps on the totals but not sure yet, how much and if they are per year or lifetime totals and what our co-pay share will be. Think it may be an 80/20 split but still $20k may be out of our pocket. Got to sell a boat load of “Vintage Stuff” to cover that! LOL đ
Then if the chemo is considered as a separate drug cost or included in the hospital bill. Just so much to be determined.
Susan’s advice is for all the ladies make sure you get your regular PAP Smears and Mamograms done by your GYN and guys do a colonoscopy and prostate exams.
But thanks and keep her in your prayers..
mike at MDCGFA
To Reddit or Not to Reddit, that is the Question?
Yes, even if you can make the Reddit private, in my opinion, there will be a lot more outsiders or newer incomers than before. Not a bad thing but what is your ultimate goal? Grow the forum, monetize the forum, have it on robotic auto pilot and not have to monitor it, stop it or abandon it. What are your goals.
Well take the following from a good place, the heart and in stride as just a personal opinion and maybe from a little different perspective than just the navigation and organizational of reddit point of view.
I have participated here on SL through the years and provided and shared a lot of information that I have acquired through 6 years in art school, teaching a few years on the collegiate level and 32 years in the printing and publishing areas.
I donât mind dispensing this harder to come by information which cost me lots of sweat and money, but only to those I feel have contributed to my well being and success also. Here on this forum, with the current group of approx. 5,000, I feel Jay and Ryanne as well as many of those who have been around a while have helped Susan and I tremendously. And still to this day, while we have gotten down the basics, we are always learning from others who keep digging into the why things happen and how to avoid issues going forward, especially after Ebay does major updates.
I also feel that I owe something to J&R especially for creating and building this community into what it is today and instead of large cash donations to J&R, I dispense my âwalls of Textâ [detailed replies in other words], to those newer members here to help them succeed because that is my way of paying it forward for J&R and in turn in hopes that these newer members will âindulgeâ into the world of providing detailed replies to other newer members.BUT to jump formats and your own homestead place to a location with hundreds of thousands of subscribers having access to information that I post as a courtesy, I would just stop doing that because I have no idea how my information will be used and I surely know I will get no royalties on it.
About the only way I would post on a place with that much exposure, trolls and potential for argumentative, negative rebuttals would be to sell my information or market a book I would write about my experience with art, prints, fakes, forgeries, tips and techniques and only market to sell my information there. No way am I going to just throw all that hard-earned information out to hundreds of thousands of total strangers. Many of whom, would probably use it in their own efforts, via plagiarize and cut and paste techniques to make money for themselves.
I know people here on SL, so much so, we communicate directly even off the SL forum. We call or text each other at times. We have shared spread sheets with each other, tips and techniques because I feel there is a true and appreciative nature in the people I communicate here, and that number is a smaller, interactive group. Not that wouldnât be the case on Reddit, but as many have already expressed, they may cut bait and not be there anymore. That would leave us with our private communications and no more âpostingâ live any longer. In todayâs world it is hard to trust anybody or anyplace other than a place you feel secure and at home with. I feel that here at SL, not Reddit.
To also put the value of participating on SL into a mini time study format there is a âcostâ associated with being an active participating SL member.
Participating on SL costs a poster time which we all know is money. My SL profile metrics say I have created 34 topics, not too many but replied 1,396 times, and those who know me, understand many of my replies are longer and detailed which Jay calls âwalls of textâ, as such is this one. But I can say, that some members have thanked me for the details in many of my replies. But my main point is in creating 1,396 replies comes at a cost which I am willing to donate as a âpay backâ.
If my 1,396 replies have averaged 500 words per reply, or 698,000 words, at an avg. of 8 to 10 characters per word = 5,584,000 charters. Thatâs almost 6 million characters. I type slow and with 3 fingers, so letâs say 10 to 12 words per minute thatâs about 58,166 minutes or 969 hours and at 40 hours per week that is approx. 24 weeks or 6 monthsâ worth of time just typing on SL nonstop.
Now think about the time to read thousands and thousands of other peopleâs replies. Hard to multitask when reading.
Now to the cost of participating. At the 969 hours of replying and at a random choice of $20 an hour fee for posted information [if anyone is really interested in it] the information, comes to approx. $19,380 worth of time spent just in the replying on SL to try to help anyone that is asking for help or trying to shed more light on a topic, all the while not trying to be critical of any other member, nasty of hateful like some of the âAnonymousâ members used to get before Ryanne started screening more carefully and eliminated the anonymous sign ins.
In my opinion I just am not going to be willing spend that amount of valuable time to just throw my knowledge out into a more public domain and the online âjunk-o-sphereâ ď, than it already is. My knowledge and information, even though it may not be very good, or such âsecretâ information, out in that âjunkosphereâ I have even less control on how it will be used and it will be for anyone to grab, cut and paste, and maybe used for too many other purposes other than helpful information for my fellow SL comrades. Then add to that, to possibly read a bunch of arguments from people who donât appreciate the comments and understand the place in the heart they come from.
Jay and Ryanne, I understand if you two are getting over whelmed with your other diverse work, donât have the time for this more warm, cushy, cuddly âprivate placeâ you have created for those of us, who truly care for each other and wanting to help each other out, then I would rather see you abandon it all together and wish us all a good and safe journey for the rest of our lives rather than put the content and community into the hands of a quarter of a million of other people who I donât know from Adam. Personally I am not going to spend the time to get to know all those newer members the way I have the current SL members and even more time due to the influx of many more members with questions and arguments and spend time reading all of those. The SL Fire Hose serves me well enough daily. My time and knowledge to another batch of newcomers is not something I would look forward to.
And if so, then color me âouttaâ hereâ.
My time now is even more valuable because Susan pathology report came back and the hysterectomy did not get all the cancer and it has moved downward and is now classified as Stage III-B and she will have to do chemo and radiation treatments now for approx. 20 weeks.
So, between our Etsy and Ebay stores, building a few new homes to sell, our basement rental, some art creation and selling and then all of Susanâs medical trips, I personally just will cut bait as well on going over to Reddit and doing that whole gig.
That is just my humble opinion coming from A southern guy which that and $.75 will get you a third of a cup of coffee. ď
Did this come out as a ânew rantâ???? LOL ď
Ta Ta for Now!Mike at MDC Galleries and Fine Art in Atlanta
We have had business policies set up for years. Only have 5 shipping policies and a couple of others. Makes it easy and quick to list. Set a standard business policy in our templates and only change it when something doesn’t fit the description.
Easy to just change the handling time at one procedure. If we are going on vacation for a week, we set it to 10 days [built in couple of buffer days]. Then change it to 5 days when in the middle once.
One tip. Some buyers do not “see the extended handling time” when buying, so we do as J&R do, when we make a Sale we send a short cut and paste email to the buyer reminding them we are on vacation and will be shipping later. Only 2 or 3 times have we ever had a customer ask to cancel because they needed the item quick for some special reason. Otherwise, we get a short message back, saying, sure thing, no worries.
Enjoy your vacation, but do try to watch your store for special message requests or to take offers that may come in.
mike at MDC Galleries and Fine Art
The bigger the better in sizes for us. We focus on home decor and tall candle holders that are over 24″ tall will fit into an 18″ box if placed diagonally. The 10x10x10 cube and the 12x12x12 are god for glass tumblers, and on the rock glasses, dinner place settings. 6 layered plates stacked, then a separator then roll glasses. Also any cookie jar, soup toureen or canister sets go nicely in cubed boxes. Then we will just skip the lamps and shades because 18x14x12 and 24x18x18 we use and just re-size / cut down any of the height we don’t need.
Also I make some boxes myself. I know the pattern by heart now and will tea apart any box USPS, FedEx or plain, drop it to the size I need and if it’s a USPS Flat Rate box, I cover it in opaque plastic and throw on my labels. So we make do. All in all I wish we could get $50 credit on our invoice, $55 if we are top rated and $60 if Top Rated Plus or some type of “reward system”, for doing everything right, all the time [mostly :-)]
Well I will just let it go and move onward and upwards. Way to much to do than belly ache about Ebay not offering enough shipping supplies. Just feels good to every now and then, give them a punch on the shoulder LOL!
mdc @ MDCGFA
That very well may be the case Sharyn, but the fact still remains that the total amount of products to choose from is very slim pickings. 7 box sizes, tape, some tissue paper and a some poly and bubble mailers.
One thought Susan mentioned was that maybe they are trying to just offer box sizes in between the USPS sizes. But the USPS boxes are all for Priority which is maybe where all the larger heavier sizes fall.
I just wish they would knock $50 bucks off my bill 4 times a year or $200 total and let me worry about my shipping supplies on my own.
AND while I am at it, how about adding another store level between Premium [1,000 listings] and Anchor [10,000 listings]. That would help the Sellers more than offering a few over priced boxes in return my store and fees they take.
But we all agree it is still a good selling platform and guess they try to help the sellers out. We surely don’t want to go down the “Online Community Rabbit Hole” of bad bashing Ebay.
Have a good week-end Sharyn…
mike @ MDCGFA
