Forum Replies Created
-
AuthorPosts
-
Posting my numbers now, going to listen to the ‘cast on the way to the contract job…
Week of 5/27-6/2
Total Items in Store: 2,167 (Up 42% YOY)
Number of Items Listed: 95
Number of Items Sold: 76 (Down 10% YOY)
(Includes 0 Etsy, 0 Bonanza, 0 TrueGether, 0 Amazon)
Weekly STR: 15% (Down 9% YOY)Total Product Sales: $1,784 (Even YOY – within $2…weird!)
Cost of Items Sold: $363
Highest Item Sold: $100 – Kiyoshi Saito Japanese Woodblock Print
Competition: Highest Priced Sale: Veronica wins the week (again) and leads for the year 12-10.eBay Clothing
# Listed: 1,344
# Sold: 55
STR: 17%
ASP: $20.75eBay Shoes
# Listed: 236
# Sold: 13
STR: 24%
ASP: $33.57eBay Hard Goods
# Listed: 587
# Sold: 8
STR: 6%
ASP: $25.83Etsy Hard Goods
# Listed: 165
# Sold: 0
STR: 0%
ASP: $0.00May 2018
Number of Items Listed: 476 – (1 short of our Record from last month)
Number of Items Sold: 295 (Forecast: 318)
Monthly STR: 16% (Forecast: 16%)
Monthly ASP: $25.85 (Forecast: $22.75)
Total Sales: $7,627 (Forecast: $7,239) – Increase of 15% YOY06/01/2018 at 3:33 pm in reply to: Scavenger Life Episode 362: Scavengers Are Always Prepared To Clean Out A Basement #41513Thanks. Always wanted to read it…now I think it will be in a yearly rotation.
“The ONE Thing” is another great one for this business…
06/01/2018 at 3:31 pm in reply to: Selling my vintage stuff on Etsy to diversify and pay less fees…Worth it or no #41512Agree on the kids! Worth it all!
I am also like you, I like the folks that get into the details (even if those details are letting others know what we are looking for!).
I think the one thing that most people never show…what it really takes to do this full time. You need to have a low burn rate to start. Veronica and I are doing our best, but we still have a good sized burn rate (way more than Jay and Ryanne!)
You need to either spend a lot of time grinding out solid volume on low to mid-level items, or you need to have great access to high return items (which usually also requires higher capital), or both. Preferably both. I love the home runs (and Veronica is killing it lately), but they are not easy to find. So it takes work and solid processes to get the bread and butter items to provide the income.
You need to be able to handle the swings and the seasonality of this business. Yesterday, one of the worst sales days in as long as I can remember. $108 in sales (and that includes shipping). Today? $489 already. And I know summer is coming (I look at summer like Jon Snow looks at Winter).
The reason I love this site is the reason I found this site. Jay and Ryanne post numbers. When I was running my numbers before I quit a nice career (that I was hating), I did a search on what resellers are really making. Found Scavenger Life and have been here ever since.
There are so many that show X and Y, but I know that they are making very little on those items. The real money they are making would have to be somewhere else. Jay and Ryanne are authentic in what they are doing. A lot of others are not showing their full numbers…or haven’t seen that wall yet.
06/01/2018 at 2:29 pm in reply to: Scavenger Life Episode 362: Scavengers Are Always Prepared To Clean Out A Basement #41499Silver: I’m reading “The Power of Habit”. Fascinating book. Working on those habits now.
Amazing how little habits can help or hurt you…
06/01/2018 at 2:27 pm in reply to: Selling my vintage stuff on Etsy to diversify and pay less fees…Worth it or no #41498I agree. Great look into another business on a different platform.
I think that it is also interesting to me to see someone at such a different stage in life and with much different needs. Seeing a single (assuming!) guy with low requirements and what he needs vs. Veronica and I with a mortgage, 2 kids, and goals for other businesses.
Hard to remember what it was like for us back then!
06/01/2018 at 1:49 pm in reply to: Scavenger Life Episode 362: Scavengers Are Always Prepared To Clean Out A Basement #41493Retro: For me, it is to list just one thing. I will sometimes say I’m going to list just 1-2 items when I’m not feeling it. 90% of the time, I get in the groove and list more. The other times, I walk away, but it is OK since I listed a few items (1 is better than 0), and I met my goal of listing 1.
We haven’t seen an increase at all. We were below 2% returns when we started Free Returns about 6 weeks ago. We are at 1.72% returns right now.
No change to us at all.
Maybe just a one time spike. Sometimes these things go in waves….
I agree that at a certain level, relisting is an issue. This is why we went to SixBit last year, so that it would relist for us. This saved us the time we spent relisting to other tasks.
I also agree that changing things in the listing will help. We have seen that. It would be interesting to see someone that stays GTC what their STR is if they tweak their listings every 30-60 days: change keywords, change photos, change pricing.
It also really only helps on high moving items (clothes, shoes, etc.). Unique hard goods that have few active buyers will still be long tail, no matter what we do.
I would also say that to really get a good test, you need a baseline of about a year, and about a year with the change. It is hard to see if things are working if you are going into summer. Somehow, you have to remove the seasonality of your sales out of your test results.
I would agree with Retro. Did you measure the waist and provide that measurement? If so, and there is this discrepancy, I would have noted that in the listing (this happens about 5% of the time).
If you don’t have the measurements, I would just accept the return and move forward. At that point, it is you vs. them. Hurts a bit, but just move on.
If you have the measurements, I would contact eBay and ask if this can be changed from INAD.
06/01/2018 at 1:08 pm in reply to: Selling my vintage stuff on Etsy to diversify and pay less fees…Worth it or no #41486Interesting video (I listened while working, peeking every once in a while). I find it interesting that he is doing this full time but only has a goal of listing 20-30 items per week. Considering the lower STR on Etsy (though he may be killing it more than us), I would be interested in seeing his ASP (if he ever shows it).
At 30 items per week listed, then sales could get to 30 items per week.
At $100 ASP (high), then that is $3,000 per week Total Revenue.
At $50 ASP, that is $1,500 Total Revenue.
At $30 ASP, that is $900 Total Revenue.He said his 2017 was total sales of 616 items (so that is 11-12 items sold per week):
At $100 ASP (high), then that is $61,600 Annual Total Revenue.
At $50 ASP, that is $30,800 Annual Total Revenue.
At $30 ASP, that is $18,840 Annual Total Revenue.Shows that you REALLY have to have low cash flow needs to get started when going full time, or you have to be running strong before you go full time. And especially when growing. Growth can kill a business. Sounds counter intuitive, but you can grow yourself to death.
Now that we have a photographer that we are keeping fed, we are purchasing more as well as spending more for his labor. We planned on a 4 month hole in net income for this growth. This is why I forecast…
But after that 4 month hole…we should be growing well. Gonna be a tight summer, but I’m really looking forward to Q4, and definitely 2019.
Don’t get me wrong. I really like his stuff and will check some more out to see how he is doing at Etsy (he is kicking our butt on Etsy!!!). There is always a lot to learn from other people. I just love to see how numbers shake out and how different people run their businesses to fit their needs.
Incompetent: I agree with you. I believe I had what the PayPal policies stated.
The concerning part was that he said it was up to the discretion of the rep if they wanted to have more information. I could have tried to push the issue and ask for a supervisor, but since I had the data he wanted, I chose the easier route with him.
Ouch. I would call eBay on that one and ask. We haven’t had anything that was on Priority that has been returned yet. The shoes that we are waiting on the return were Priority, but a regular shoe box.
I wonder if it was because it was Flat Rate, but eBay just uses Priority?
I know that we have this potential issue on Suits. I charge a flat $9.99 Priority for Suits and Sport Coats as I know that they will fit into a Regional A box. I am usually covered on cost, though sometimes the extreme East Coast I lose a little.
Since you can’t put Regional A on the listing, you have to put Priority. So the return label would be Priority and calculated on weight. This may be the issue on your listing.
eBay (Griff through eBay Radio) states that they don’t know what Label you used, they will use the first shipping option you have on the listing for the return trip.
Maybe. That has always been a question to me…
The concerning part for me was having to provide a label (or some other documentation) to prove the address. I really wish that the tracking would show that on the USPS side.
On the returns that I have paid for, it is at the same price as the shipping that I paid for.
-
AuthorPosts