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It just hit me wrong. This wasn’t a case of running a sale on the item, that would be more acceptable, but that big of price change just doesn’t sit well. I suppose they just weren’t selling as many as planned and wanted to get more sold before the shopping days ended. Amazon storage fees can really cut into profit and pulling inventory isn’t cheap either. Well, it’s done now, maybe a reminder to think about the buyer’s side of pricing decisions I make. I hope Karma doesn’t slap me around too much.
I’ve never sold anything remotely like this, but the thought that comes to mind when you mention selling them in lots is that dimensional weight shipping charges are likely to come into play.
That and the need to pack in rigid enough boxes to avoid crushing the cans seems to make shipping a bigger issue than for most small items.
Also, if you ship internationally these could run afoul of customs regulations in many countries I think.
If I didn’t get sick of listing so many of these I would for sure get sick of the smell if they haven’t been at least rinsed and dried, lol.
This article is also being discussed on the Amazon seller forums. One of the posters there came up with the term “Garbitrage”. I love it.
I don’t buy individual items for resale but I do have searches running for multi-quantity lots and find a few bargains like that. It was easier when eBay let us use wild cards in searches, never did understand why they killed that option.
Stuff like this is why I rarely buy on eBay any longer. I also had a bad experience recently, it wasn’t as much money as your situation, but still.
I’m 70 and started this side business 10 years ago when retirement was on the horizon and I thought I might want to pad my retirement a little and have something to do after retirement. I’m retired now (from a paycheck) and working about as hard or little as I want to. My life changed completely since when I started 10 years ago and I’m glad I have this to keep me occupied and interested. It’s a good thought you have, you can always decide later not to stay with it but it will be harder to decide to start up later if you don’t now.
With the way I upload new listings using File Excahange it’s only a few minutes to upload all or a few of what I have ready, and I sometimes stretch those out and just upload a few daily. Since this is my slow sales time of year right now I want to get everything up that I can. I’m not likely to keep any extra records, its just not that important to me.
I have noticed that when I stop listing my sales go dead, and pick up again when I start listing regularly. Maybe coincidence, but it’s happened so many times I suspect there may be something to it. (stop rolling your eyes, Jay)
Thanks for that clarification, Retro.
I agree with Sharyn, I think the buyers who do that are fishing to see if there is a very low automatic accept price and probably aren’t interested in a reasonable counteroffer. Even then $1 increments don’t make much sense unless its a very low priced item to start with. To me, this kind of activity indicates a potential problem buyer. If you look at the feedback they have left for sellers there is a good chance you will see lots of negatives left.
I don’t set minimum automatic reject because I want to at least see the offer and make a reasonable counter or just decline if it is a crazy number.
The buyer can only make 3 offers.
A problem with cheap scales is they aren’t always accurate. A free method to check scales is 4 quarters weight 1 ounce. The other potential problem is the max weight of the scales.
This is what I have, https://www.amazon.com/UltraShip-55-Digital-Shipping-Kitchen/dp/B000FSWB9K, max 55 lbs.
Is your crawlspace completely dry? Bins might not seal completely and you don’t want to have to worry about mildew if not.
Overall advice, pace yourself so you don’t burn out by working too many hours for too little results while building the business, and alsways leave time for family and recreation.
12/05/2019 at 11:17 am in reply to: What Sells On eBay: Reel tapes, Rummikub game, Cigarette dispenser, fanny pack #71388Steven, I think your cat is trying to tell you to clean off the fence for her.
In my experience, sales of non-giftable items are slow through mid-January every year so keep that in mind when looking at December results. I think much of the used computer items are going to be long-tail, so storage fees and recurring listing fees are going to make it difficult to be profitable without more listings. I agree with Jay that you should try to figure out alternative storage for now. If the business continues to be a drag on the household budget you might not be able to keep it up.
There are buyers out there for these components, folks like me continue running old equipment if it’s adequate to do the job needed. Right now my main system is a Thinkpad T420 which is 8-9 years old and I have an even older Thinkpad T60 running at my warehouse, used just for shipping, that used to be my primary computer.
I think your goal of $250 per week in 2 years is too conservative, you should be able to do much better than that, but it depends on the time and effort you are willing to put in.
I take 20% of the gross monthly sales for myself. The remaining money goes to pay expenses and to buy more items to list. Everybody is different on this, but this works for me.
You got it right, get busy. If you have fixed price listings that renew during that time they will be counted as part of the 500.
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