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Jay & Ryanne – I follow your stores, and I noticed an over $1500 sale of a vintage Louis Vuitton Briefcase. You didn’t mention it on the podcast. Did someone buy it by mistake and you had to cancel? Or was that a real sale?
I noticed when the $40 RCA mug sold. RCA was a big manufacturer of satellites with headquarters in NJ. When I started interviewing in my senior year of college (1986-87), RCA had just been purchased by GE. I did not interview with them at that time. My first job took me to LA, but I decided to move back to the East coast after about 5 years. I ended up with a job at GE as an engineer working on communication satellites (not weather). The name of the company changed twice and the plant was moved to PA during the over 20 years I worked there. When the plant moved again to Denver a few years ago, I decided not to go with it.
When I worked on a specific satellite program, I would often get a mug or shirt around the time it was ready for testing. The mug you sold was more of a general history of RCA weather satellites, so it was probably a company wide event. Maybe some day I will sell all of my company mugs, but I’m not ready to do that now. I don’t have anything from GE or RCA.
Anyway, my numbers …
Week of Aug 27 – Sept 2
* Total Items in Store: 974
* Items Sold: 14
* Cost of Items Sold: $18.82 + $10 Commission
* Total Sales: $263.20
* Highest Price Sold: $49 Set 6 Antique Bavarian Plates
* Average Price Sold: $18.80
* Returns: 0
* Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $55
* Number of items listed this week: about 25 end & sell similar, no newThe kids go back to school Wednesday. I will FINALLY be able to take photos and start back on listing. I have a HUGE backlog, which will take me quite some time to get through.
My sales reflect my lack of listing. However, I have been ending a few old listings each day and then relisting them with sell similar. My high sale of the antique plates was one of the “refreshed” listings, but it is the only one that has sold so far.
For the tablecloths, that’s easy. People like to have different tablecloths to change up the style or, if they have people coming over a few days in a row, they don’t have to clean one right away. All the tablecloths were close in size.
For the gloves, I don’t know, but I definitely didn’t want to sell them separately. Maybe someone is gearing up for Halloween, and they have a few daughters that want to dress up in old fashioned dresses. Or maybe they don’t know their hand size.
For sunglasses, I know someone who loses theirs all the time. They need to have more than one. Or, perhaps you want one for the car, one for the backpack, etc.
Another thought is to look at other listings for similar items. Put the word “lot” in your search words to see if listings come up or not. Make sure to be looking at sold items. That might give you an idea if people would buy a certain item in quantity or not.
I don’t really know what it is, but it reminds me of the thing in the center of a roulette wheel.
For some reason, the tablecloth link isn’t working. This isn’t the first time this has happened today. I was able to get the correct link via a roundabout way. The only difference in the link is the removal of the “s” at the end of http. I assume this is an eBay bug.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/182508012317My biggest sale this week is also my biggest sale ever. I was given this antique brass lamp that I believe originates from the Middle East. I was not able to find any hallmark, but the sockets were made by Ostrander, which is a brand that went out of business during the 30’s. It sold for $300. The person (from San Francisco) who purchased it said that they have a very Bohemian style home. I can see where this will fit right in! I hope that they have it rewired first.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/182378829044These are vintage gloves that I sold on consignment (actually the same person that gave me the lamp above). Sold for $32.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/182467750236These are 5 Russian made tablecloths. I had the high bid of $1 for the contents of a linen closet. It was a risk because the online auction really didn’t provide very good photos, but I have been able to list (and sell) many great things from that purchase. These sold for $37.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/182508012317I paid $4 for this doll house patio set that sold for $25. Doll house furniture sells pretty well.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/182350694007I’ve mentioned before that I haven’t been getting it. Do you want me to email you my email address (I don’t want to post it here).
Thanks for looking into this – I miss my morning SL injection!
Very neat video – nice to see all the houses. Seems like the drive is somewhat long between each of them.
I am not getting the forum firehose email. I have had the problem for about 4 or 5 days now. Is this an issue for me only? I did subscribe to the sub-categories in “Buying & Selling”, and maybe that messed me up? I really miss reading those in the morning and catching up. I hope it is an easy issue to fix.
Week of Aug 20-26
* Total Items in Store: 983
* Items Sold: 16
* Cost of Items Sold: $8.70 + $26 Commission
* Total Sales: $526.40
* Highest Price Sold: $300 Vintage Middle Eastern Brass Lamp
* Average Price Sold: $37.60
* Returns: 0
* Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $50
* Number of items listed this week: 2 + about 15 end & sell similarWe still have about a week and a half until school starts, so I am unable to do much photography or listing with both kids home plus my parents are visiting right now. I started to end several older listings and relist them with “sell similar” just to show some activity.
I did finally buy a lighting kit. The two items I listed were ones that I used to test out the new lights. I’m pretty happy with the results, but I think I can get it better. I will end up spending more time with setup, but much less time adjusting photos in eBay. I also FINALLY downloaded my camera’s manual and figured how to set it to a 1:1 aspect ratio. Should have done that a LONG time ago. Duh!
It would have been a slow week without the lamp sale. Actually, the lamp sold the previous week, but the seller wanted time to pay. It is my biggest sale by $100!!
I don’t normally go to estate sales these days, but my mom and I decided to go to a few on Sunday. I ended up buying one item – a vintage set of silverplate in a box for $50. The price was a bit high, so I went back to the sale twice to try to get them to lower it. It was already at 50% off and they wouldn’t budge, but they did throw in a set of salad servers. It won’t get the ROI I’m used to, but it will be a bigger sale in the end.
Jay & Ryanne,
I didn’t receive the forum firehose email yesterday (the 24th) or today. Is there a bug or is there a problem with my subscription? There is nothing in my spam folder. I tried to re-subscribe, but I got a message that I was already subscribed.
I am getting updates when there are new submissions to a topic that I am subscribed to.
Thanks!
I should have mentioned: the teapot sold to someone in Australia who paid over $40 total for shipping. That information comes up in the packing slip.
Steve – You mentioned that you bought the brass pipe stand in an auction lot for $8. Was the whole auction lot $8, or just the stand? (I assume just the stand).
Also, my first car was a 1987 Ford Mustang GT with a 5.0 liter engine in dark red / maroon – similar to one of the cars you sold, but I don’t think it was a GT.
Anyway, my interesting sales for the week:
Bordallo Pinheiro is a brand of ceramics from Portugal that is on my BOLO list. I might have priced this one a bit high because it did take about a year to sell. The buyer paid the full price of $47 through GPS to Abu Dhabi. I bought it for $2.50.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/182348661985I have sold a number of items now from a rummage sale I went to a few weeks ago. The first pile I walked up to contained various bags. I remembered that Steve had sold a Jansport backpack recently, so I told myself to look for one. Ask and you shall receive! This one had some significant pen marks inside, so I listed it for $30. Paid $3.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/182704208089At this one auction I attend regularly, they will combine box lots until they sell. This Stadler teapot was from the lot I didn’t want, but it came with the box I did want. It was in fair condition with crazing and a chip, but the prices were higher than I thought. My mother tells me that it was a popular style. I paid $0.75, and it sold for $19.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/182716966181I also received the message. I did find one place where it might show the affected listings. I went into eBay Seller Hub, then Growth, then Listing Improvements. That page lists “Underperforming listings”, “Restock advice”, and “Add product identifiers”. Under “Add product identifiers”, there is a 0. So, what is the deal?
Does anyone have something other than a 0 there?
If I have any other reason to call eBay, I’ll ask them about it. Otherwise, I guess I’ll wait for more clarification or perhaps I will see some listings not renew.
I’ve been told by a toy aficionado that Steiff is a brand to look out for. I saw a few in an online auction a few months ago, but the price went pretty high. The brand is a BOLO, but I’ve never had one to sell yet.
Great find, and good way to get the best price! I’ve promised myself that if I find something highly desirable in the future, I will put it up for auction.
