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The thought on here in the past and words from the “sage” Jay and Ryanne was always price high. Then you wait it out until all of the other lower priced ones sell. Then yours will be the only one left and then you are good to go at your priceing. Then as new people come along and do the same research after you, they see your price(s) and price accordingly and you all then set the new bar level.
We also use other sources to arrive at our prices and many times we are way higher than what is currently [if there are any] listed on Ebay, and even then we sell at times before the lower one sells.
My take is, if there is one nut who doesn’t know the difference between anything and nothing and they don’t research and in turn prices low, then another fruit cake comes along and only uses Ebay as a pricing guide and also prices at the first fruit cakes low prices, then you have the blind leading the blind down a dark alley on a moonless night. Sooner or letter they will disappear and then knowledgeable people will again reign the roost and higher prices will prevail. That’s why we use other databases, even though they are older prices to use as a back up source. I know Jay prefers to only use Ebay recent 90 day solds. But if you had 10 nut jobs all price something at $10 and they all sold and that is all you use to go by, then guess what, you will probably price at about $10 or more yourself. But then I look at another source and see 40 have sold in the last 16 months and every one was over $50 each, then $65 will be price and I don’t care about those 10 people at $10. Works for us. I hate it when I am priced at what most people have sold for on Ebay. Most don’t do anywhere the research we do. Now, this goes for unique one of a kind items, not easily gotten, mass produced items.
I assume Jay still has the same mind set as when he said this way back when about pricing high and waiting until you come to the top. Another part of the list it and forget it strategy.
Mike at MDC Galleries in Atlanta
Terri.. the local B&N may know, but usually those types of promotional items were purchased by corporate buyer from the main office. Those purchasing agents cut PO’s for all of the material from vendors like us and then had us drop ship them to all of the stores in kit form. We included instructions in each kit on how to apply, insert, assemble and so on. Many times the local stores, managers included did not know a whole lot about the individual items. Just that they had a promotion for the next two weeks, corporate told them to hang these items and so on. You may hit pay dirt so it’s worth a try but don’t be disappointed if you strike out at the local B&N.
mc in atl.
Yes.. they are called “Translites”. We used to produce many of these types for various customers who used flourescent light box type of displays.
We produced them by first starting with a thin, translucent styrene plastic sheets. Then we silk screen printed the images, menu items [Menu strips or food items], tools for Stanley Hardware, clothes and models for Victoria Secret’s and many national store chains, on the back side of the styrene in a mirror image sequence. We started with the darker detail colors first [wrong reading image], then worked our way backwards to the lightest color white usually was a thin transparent white – milkey color. We then took the sheets to the bindery department and either cut them down to a square or rectangle format if they were going to be slide into a light box style [your x-ray description] type of box or into sub-way light boxes up around the roof of the train car or bus, or die cut them to an irregular shape if they were going to be hung from something or applied to a window. We did large ones for bus shelters which we called translight shelter signs.
The thickness of the styrene would vary depending on how we quoted the job and what type of back lite display box was to be used. Thin ones could be rolled and shipped in tubes but also had to be slide into a box type display that had a milk translucent piece of plexiglass to support it. Thicker material was used for pieces that would go into displays that did not have any such support or hung from some structure.
You did not say how thick yours was but is probably a thin translight based on the type of light box display you described.
Prices to produce them usually ran [depending on size] from about a $1.50 to $2.00 +/- for a small size, and a large human size such as for Victoria Secret and tight quality control of the color and dust spots [cleanliness] to $10 to $20 each. We usually produce 5 to 15 varying images per store, them times the number of stores. Sears [in it’s day] along with Walmart was a larger customer and we would produce thousands for them per promotion and did numerous promotions for our various customers.
In my opinion, there is no real value in the object but more so of the image of the person, subject or celebrity. We used to do life size images of NASCAR Drivers and various sports figures which were high in demand. Also the Life Size Victoria Secret Angels were extremely popular, especially right before and after their annual fashion show. I actually built a large percentage of over run [extras] into those jobs knowing full well many were going to grow legs and walk out the door, especially during third shift.
We also produced many styrene pieces on “opaque” materials where we surface printed in a correct reading format. We did all the clock faces for Swatch, Seth Thomas, West Clox and General Electric for years. The plastic was preferred because it was moisture proof and did not buckle in humid conditions like paper litho printed dials did.
Hope this helps and also gives you a little back ground just for fun.
Mike at MDC Galleries in Atlanta
T-Satt I am pretty sure you know this so just a few questions. When we end listings every day or so, when do, and we are running one of our Sales, then when we do the auto re-list those items now are not included in the current Sale that is running because they were ended completely then re-started.
So one way we deal with this is to make sure our Sales are only run for a few days at a time anyway. We run short Sales for couple of other reasons also. But when we re-list and the items are not on Sale, then it will only be a few days before we start a Sale over again at a different percent off, and we pick those re-listed items back up into a Sale. The short Sales help to make sure the re-listed items don’t sit for a long time without getting included back into a Sale. I know some people don’t include newly listed items in a Sale but we do because many of those newly listed items could possibly be months old.
But just wondered what your take is on the 30 day end and re-list process and how that interfaces with a Promotion Campaign or a Store Wide Sales process.
mike at MDC Galleries in Atlanta
Absolutely. Very Easy in both programs. In WL click on Active Items folder, click select all, click end listing and sit back and wait for them to all unlist. When you are ready to re-list all of them, just do the same process. Click Unlisted Folder, click select all, click submit to ebay and sit back and let the database do it’s work. One interesting option that is available in both SB & WL is you can select to re-submit all of your listings “now” or choose for the database to re-submit them at a specific interval [scheduled listings]. You can select as an example, 60 secs. and both programs will re-list your items 1 per minute until all are re-listed. Ebay has a “scheduled lister” also but SB & WL will handles thousands of re-listings. Click all means just that, “ALL”. You have 15,000 items, you can do them in bulk. Ebay has a lmit, like 500 I think depending on your store level. On WL, the amount is unlimited.
Some people like to do this so they have a constant stream of listings. Some people say list or re-list [either] every hour, thus 24 items listed on a daily basis. I have known guys that create 100’s of scheduled listings and once they have a big stock pile, they then have listings happening every hour, all day long for months on end.
As T-Satt states, as a relational database, these programs are or can be programed to do just tons of stuff.
Mike at MDC Galleries in Atlanta
Just tumble it in Salt Water!! It will smell, taste like sea water. Better still collect real sea water in 5 gal jerry cans and use that to tumble in. 🙂
mc in atl.
Oh I know what you are saying. After reading that link about the e-pack deal for China it just makes me shake my head.
But same here, we turned the weights and boxes everywhich way to try to work it out. But many times we have a lot of one of a kind and a few dollars more or less doesn’t seem to be an issue.
We sold an $880 dollar wide format printer last week but it was for local pick up. The buyer emailed and asked if we would ship. I said no but provided him with several links for services he could contract. Well, it is about 30 inches wide, 18 inched deep and 15: high and weighs 47 lbs. He told us that U-ship was going to pick it up on Nov. 24th. It is going to cost him about $300 ++ for them to come here, pack it and then carry it 3,000 miles. His total will be about $1,100 for that thing. I could hardly move it out of storage.
So it goes to show, who knows what people will agree to on the more unique items if they really want something. But we do what you do, we watch the sizes and weights at auctions and estate sales just for the reasons you mention.
mike at MDC Galleries in Atlanta.
Oh Whiskey I wasn’t doubting your truthfullness of the matter, just wanted to know what the numbers [i.e. cost was, size and the weight] that is all so I could play around with the calculator. I think it is probably #1] the discount and #2] most things we ship are too large for a MFR, so smaller items may be a good fit. That is all. No casting of a shadow of doubt intended. Sorry if sound like that.
as I stated it does depend as you say on weight, size and distance. Guess our items just haven’t hit those magic metrics. I have used FR boxes but only a few times.
BTW… the best place to ship from is Kinsley, KS zip code 67547. It is the middle of the country. It is equi-distance to ship to almost all points, north, south, east, west.
I read an article one time from a seller who used this zip code as his shipping base rate for all items he listed as Free Shipping. His mind set was if he divided all his sales by 3 [1/3rd]. That 1/3rd of his shipments would be less than that so he made money, 1/3rd would be about that rate so it was a wash and the last 1/3rd would be further away and he would lose on those. BUT all in all according to his calculations he made money by year end because most items fell with the “make money range”. This is compared to those “Free Shipping” guys who just calculate the furthest shipping point from their home office and pad that into the item cost and then offer Free Shipping.I still prefer, customer pays for shipping and the cost is what it is based on all metrics. Size, weight and distance.
Yeah we know distance affects it along with other factors. We ship more packages to California than any other state and still have never sent a FR box yet. Our regular priority is still cheaper all the time. maybe just never hit the right combination of size, weight and distance.
When we have had really large, dim weight items it just jumps up to FedEx at that point.
But yes you are right..
mike
Whiskey just read that article. I had a hint of an idea but this explains it perfectly. We are at such a disadvantage. I sure grit my teeth everytime the USPS says it is going up on rates to cover it’s expenses. How about just going up 10% to 15% on these Chniese deals and leave the US sellers alone. Really a bummer. Trump just said last night, Chniese trade is way out of balance and it was us that let it get that way. don’t know if it can ever be changed back. My neighbor does embroidery and sells baby items. Everything she buys to produce the products she sells here in the US is bought in China, shipped obviously through this e-packet program and then she tries to sell and compete on Ebay with all of the Chinese producers.
Sad, just really sad. I knew I should have gone to Law School instead of Art School.. LOL
mike at MDC Galleries in Atlanta
Joe.. I laughed when you said you could hardly find one. Same for me. I have a few of each size, but nd up cutting them up more often that not and using as some sort of extra layered protection or just as a junk-storage box here inside of the office.
I replied above and just couldn’t figure out the math on where anything under 15 lbs. makes any sense. And if it is 15 lbs. or more the item is usually then much larger than those flat rate boxes. Even flat rate padded envelopes, which members seem to really like, have the same sort of metrics. It must be fairly heavy and besides we ship glass, crystal, pottery, dishes, glasses, plates and because of this hardly ever use a padded envelope due to it’s smaller size and certainly less protection. Then if we do a pre-box it usually ends up being too large to slide into a padded envelope. Then on items less than a pound. of course first class padded envelope is the way to go, if it is a “soft goods”.
But for some reason I read about everybody praising FR all the time but just don’t see the savings on the calculator when I weigh up the final package and am ready to ship, our discount gets applied and the Priority Rate is always the cheaper way to go.
mike in atl.
Interesting.. I have a smaller size undercounter radio going out right now. It weighs 5 lbs. 12 ozs. and going to Kentucky from GA. It fits a medium flat rate box easily. My priority shipping rate is $7.29 [that is $10.40 less a 30% discount of $3.11] = $7.29. The flat rate med. box says $12.05 in the column right next to it. So you would ship it FR???
So just to experiment, I started changing the weight on this small rectangle radio. So I added 10 lbs to it for 13 lbs 12 ozs. and Priority shows $11.48 and FR still shows at $12.05. I had to move the weight of the radio up to 15 lbs. 12 ozs. and it came out at $.27 cheaper FR. So according to my shipping calculator items would need to be over 15 lbs. to save anything going Flat Rate. And that is what FR is suppose to be for. Shipping smaller items that are very solid and heavy or multiple items packed tightly that add up to heavy weight.
So if you had this radio, same size that fits in a 11x8x6 box and weighs 5# 12 ozs. you would ship it FR for $12.05 instead of $7.29. and pay $4.76 more? Even take away our TRSPlus discount and it is still showing $10.40 [$1.65 less than FR].
This happens all the time. I have never seen hardly anything that is lower cost going flat rate except when it gets very heavy, maybe shipping bricks or bars of lead at 15 lbs or heavier.
Please show me your math on this size and weight at 5 lbs 12 ozs. and how Med. FR is a less expensive choice. Something must be off somewhere, unless it is just our discount drives that cost way down.
mike at MDC Galleries in Atlanta
Hey SCJ: I just can’t figure out why sellers use Flat Rate? We have been doing this since 2002 and have only used Flat Rate anything maybe 2 or 3 times. Our Top Rated Seller Plus Discounts are anywhere from 20% to 40% off Priority and have always been less than any flat rate costs that we see that are presented right beside our prices when we go to print labels.
In some cases I think Sellers may also just not know any better. We just got a poly mailer into our office for a small light weight item in a Flat Rate poly bubble mailer that is 9 x 10 x 3 inches and weighs in at .6 lbs [10 ozs. and the seller sent it to us Flat Rate?? That could just have gone 1st class parcel for about $3.50 +/- why would they ship as FR?
I have also seen the Chinese sellers sell something for $1.69 and ship to us with Free Shipping. Sometimes it just doesn’t add up to me. But I just keep moving along.
mike in Atl.
A quick update… Anysize package in any type of box can go USPS Priority. You don’t have to use only the USPS Priority Boxes. Those are just for convienence and for some type of cost savings and reward for using the USPS Service. But make any type of box, out of any material [cardboard, coroplast, sheet rock, styro-foam, plywood, masonite, etc., etc [[of course those would be very heavy and costly]]], but any box you can make out of anything, cover it with the black plastic, keeping the corners and edges tight and neat and then put the Priority decals on it and weigh it and pay, then your label and it is good to go. As long as it doesn’t get so large it is outside of their parameters for what they will carry.
Did you know you can even put postage stamps on a box as long as it covers the price of Priority postage. Wrap up a box, weight it and measure it, put an address label on it along with the Priority decals, then for postage, you can put $6.75 worth of stamps on it and it will go just fine Priority. Now of course your mailman will dislike that he-she will have to count up the stamps, but stamps are the same as cash to the post office. BTW, this is confirmed with the post office, so it’s true.
Mike at MDC Galleries in Atlanta
