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[ThriftShift]

My Store Week Oct 28-Nov 3, 2018
Total Items in ebay Store: 710
Items Sold: 17
Gross Sales: $698
Cost of Items Sold: $29.10
Highest Sale: $200 for lot of ribbon and medal racks from my 20 years of service

I cross-list my clothing onto Poshmark too and am beginning to list everything onto Mercari too.
Of the 17 items sold this week, three were sold on Poshmark ($108) and 3 on Mercari ($60).
I do like those platforms because after three days of receipt, no complaints allowed. But ebay has a much wider audience of course for weird vintage stuff.

I kept one ribbon/medal rack from my USMC service and put the rest of the ribbons/medals in a big lot and sold for $200. Going to Virginia to a store that creates custom orders for racks.

Had a GREAT sourcing week! I went to our Catholic thrift store on Wed and found two Kawano Kaoru woodblock prints from the 70s for $5 each. Solds range from $150 to $350 about. Also got 6 Starbucks mugs for 25 cents, which I normally don’t buy anymore, but for that cheap, I’ll sell them for $20 or so each.

Then on Thursday at 11 am I went to another favorite charity thrift store; they had changed their winter hours to noon opening! But the manager saw my 4 year old and me outside, so she let me in and locked the doors behind us; we are regulars there. I shopped the fresh stock for an hour alone! I picked up 5 USMC Dress Blue jackets and several green Alpha jackets and uniform pants for 1 to $3 each, total $33. I gave them an even $40 since it was nice to let us in early! Dress Blue coats can sell for $80 – $200 on ebay depending how good shape they are in…and how eager the Marine is to buy it for an event coming up.

I also did an online auction this week too, picking up on Saturday. I purchased 70 reel-to-reel tapes, Akai, etc. for $68 total. I hope to sell them in lots for $10-20 each based off Steve’s videos. I also bought two record boxes of 45s with jazz records in it that should sell for $10-20 each; I spent $23 for 100+ of those 45s in the boxes. So I went out of my traditional items this week on records, but it seemed a worthwhile bet.

[ThriftShift]

MDC, good point on the Chanel shoes. If Florence heads to SC, I am planning to go to a Chanel store in Palm Beach next week actually with both pairs, while sheltering with family down there. I am also going to list them locally on FB Marketplace too, to get them out of my inventory. Otherwise, I will likely pay for an online service. The original customer doesn’t have any receipts but says she bought them in NYC.

[ThriftShift]

Jay, I retired from the Marine Corps as an officer; 1998-2018. My DoD salary pension will be $45K a year. I receive word on Oct 1 what my VA Disability payments will be, which could be anywhere from $1800-3900 a month. I’m not trying to sponge off the government, I was a woman who joined in 98, got breast cancer in 2008 at age 33; the Marines were so great that they never considered separating me; I could still do my job of lawyering. So the DoD assumes my cancer was service-related (I deployed 3 times to areas with burn pits) and pays me accordingly. I had several side effects and resulting surgeries. Thank God I had two wonderful step-kids already and managed to have a miracle baby (my four-year old) before the last round of surgeries. After the experiences, I decided no way would I waste my life in an office after retirement, and so I am “owning my time” as you and Ryanne say. So MAYBE I will have a combined monthly pension of DoD/VA benefits of $5550 minimum – $7650 maximum. I find out Oct 1! A majority of it will be feds tax-free too. Sorry to go on. I am excited with my current ebay sourcing/nomad lifestyle.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 1 month ago by ThriftShift.

[ThriftShift]

College girls love those overalls! I sold an A&E one last month for $50.

[ThriftShift]

ThriftShift (Port Royal, SC)

8/27/18 – 9/2/18
Items in store: 791
Items sold: 36
Sales: $2353.05
COGs: $101.50
Consignment payout: $170

I had a great week. The best sale was an experiment. I had bought 7 antique Thonet bentwood “ice cream parlor” chairs last November at an auction for $17 total. I sold them for $1,000 on this past Sat with free shipping. I had them as local pickup initially but changed to F/S two weeks ago to try and entice buyers. The sale was Sat afternoon, I placed the offer on UShip on Sunday night for $250 (to New Orleans restaurant from SC). An individual hauling a truck to New Mexico contacted me Monday afternoon, picked up 7 am on Tuesday, and put the chairs in the cab of the new truck he was hauling; he dropped them off to my customer on Thursday night. The $250 helped cover gas expenses for him, and was really no trouble. He said he does the NY to TX trip twice a month down the east coast and across, so maybe now I have a reliable POC in the future.

I also sold two pairs of Chanel shoes from my mother-in-law’s friend in Florida, but they are both being returned within a day of receipt for “fit” and “inauthentic”. Ugh. I had sold them for $200 each and sent the consignment to the customer already, so now they are “mine”. I re-listed at $390 each and will take an offer. I dislike selling these brand name items. I’ve sold a vintage Gucci briefcase before and had such drama with buyers. I’m not fighting the INAD on the Chanel shoes; it’s just not worth it with these buyers. If someone is going to pay $200 for a pair of ballet slip-ons, I don’t need their kind of drama.

This past week we also sold our house and put profits in our retirement accounts. Now I am retired at 42, my husband has his own consulting business that he loves, and we have a 4 year old/17 year old in a rented house. We plan to move onto a boat this June, so all cash from ebay and consulting gigs is mostly going to the boat renovation (wooden catamaran “Wharram Pahi 42” model) and monthly retirement account deposits. We are trying to live off pension income. My husband is going on a two week trip to PA from SC for a project, so I’m looking at online auctions ending in his area, and he wants me to find a UShip job for him on the way back down if possible since he will have his truck. I like the idea of covering travel expenses doing UShip. Once the teen is in college next fall, myself and the small one can travel with my husband too, and we will try UShip along with ebay sourcing.

[ThriftShift]

July 29-Aug 4

In store: 751
Sold: 24
Sales: $874.50
COGs: $120.50
Consignment payout: $23.75

Highest sales were a Vietnam fatigue Army blouse with great patches and 0-6/Colonel insignia for $129.00. I guess I had ignored the best offers on this! I listed it at $129 on this past Sat morning. While watching the “Incredibles 2” with family (for $4 a ticket locally!) from 1400-1530, I turned phone off; had two offers for $65 and $75, then one of them bought it full price during the movie.

Other high sale was perfume (Ralph Lauren Romance Body Mist) for $90; bought 50 of NIB tester
bottles for $10 at church sale on July 13.

I retired on July 13 from day job and now spend days with my 4 year old. It’s a lot of work; I had no idea. I am planning days around gym time, reading/“school”, meal preparation, listing and shipping, and taking her thrifting with me. So worth it though! I’m 42 and own my time now. No more Sunday night dread!

[ThriftShift]

June 25-July 1

Ebay items in store: 849
Items sold: 27
Total sales: $1,394.20
Consignment payout: $574
COGs: $25

$1,148.00 was consignment sales of antique tools for an acquaintance; I don’t seek out consignees but she heard about my store from another friend for whom I sold furniture when she moved to Japan. I had 90+ listings for the new client of individual machinist parts and Woodworking items. $574 goes to the owner of those tools for this past week; I took 50% of her items sales. I have another 70 listings for her still and watchers on many of the items.

Highest sale was $580 for a wooden toolbox “Gerstner”. Several tools fit into nested holes in it, but I removed the rest and are selling them too. I also liked my $22 sale of an IBM coffee mug and software lot sales of $48 and $25.

So my share of sales is $820.20; I received $574 from the consignment work. I don’t have a Cost of Goods for the consignment items of course; for my other items the COGs were $25. So I made $820.20 with a COG cost of $25. And I have learned a ton about antique tools. Now they are all listed, my time was well spent, and I hope more sell this week. You can view the listings in Sold or Active by typing in my client’s code “SAZ” in the Collectible Tools category of eBay.

[ThriftShift]

June 17 – 24
Items in store: 816
Items sold: 34
Sales total: $1,077.32
Cost of goods sold: $107.75
4 clients got Consignment payouts totaling $120.50

One person bought 8 items and is doing local pickup equaling “free shipping” so I took lower offers to clear out some inventory. I’ve actually been having higher sales the last 6 weeks than I did earlier this year, equaling about $1K of sales each week. I have found myself taking low offers on lower-priced inventory (50% of my items are under $20) and scoring some higher end inventory. I took a PayPal loan of $4K three months ago to buy higher end inventory and paid it back within 2 months. I still have a lot of that inventory up.

I retire from the Marine Corps on Friday, 13 July after 20 years and am so excited. I can concentrate on ebay and my husband’s business. It’s all going swimmingly.

As far as states being able to tax internet income, the Supreme Court usually leaves it up to states to develop their own tax regs. It’s what attracts businesses to certain states. For example, the majority of corporations in the US are incorporated in Delaware. So perhaps states will offer tax breaks to small internet businesses to attract them. We may all end up living in Alaska and the Dakotas!

[ThriftShift]

Hey “ThriftShift” is my name! Glad you like it. It has a couple meanings I think. A second job after “regular” 8-5. Or changing a lifestyle to be more thrifty. Or shifting excess goods from one home to become income for another.

Total Items In Store: 839
Items Sold: 18
Cost of Items Sold: $51.80
Total Sales: $455.98
Highest Price Sold: $130 (Judaic Art Lithograph by Abram Egbi)
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $40
Number of Items listed this week: 27

I’m at the end of 20 years in the Marines Corps, and I have several friends who are in the same boat. One friend lives in Japan right now and has a storage unit 30 minutes from me full of furniture from a former marriage. She asked me to sell the furniture for her. It’s all grand brown furniture, very classic NC look. I didn’t really want to charge her 50% or drag it to an auction house; we are good friends. So I offered my teen daughter and her boyfriend a job. I went with them to the unit yesterday; they moved the furniture, took pictures, and I posted them on OfferUp, Facebook, and LetGo. The kids are getting 30% for the furniture. Anyway, they are happy to have made $80 for three hours of work so far, meeting people there and selling the furniture. My friend’s younger son also had a bin of 27 lbs of Legos, all mixed up. The teens spent 8 hours sorting it into bricks by color, mini-figures, and other stuff. It’s in lovely labeled gallon bags. I’ll put that up on ebay for them; they are getting $8 an hour for sorting + 25% of profit after fees+taxes taken out. Something funny happened “family-wise” too with the Lego sorting today. We actually all talked for several hours at a time, together, and joked, etc. It was nice. Normally teens are on the go. I got to hear about their lives and more. They were excited and I am happy to start having their help. Training them to take photos next for me. If any other friends want their help selling big stuff as they move onto other duty stations, we are saying 50% though.

I also applied for a PayPal Working Capital loan; I had planned to buy an expensive set of Tiffany flatware on an online auction in my town, but it got too high. So now I have money in my pocket plan to attend more auctions and really up my “high end” stuff; the teens will be attending with me and be my helpers. There is a great one coming up mid-June.

And here is my MOST awesome scavenge of the week: On Thursday I went to my favorite hidden charity thrift shop (no online presence). I bought a large leather duffel bag that I could tell was nice for $8. It sells for $650 new as a “Joseph Hanna Made in NYC” #102 “Antique Finish” bag. The donor of the bag was even there when I picked it up! She said “Ugh, I hate that old bag, it’s so cruddy looking”. It is GORGEOUS. Listed it for $590 OBO because it is beautifully distressed. Have a good week.

[ThriftShift]

Items in store: 812
Items sold: 32
Sales: $1,002.78
Average price: $31
COGs: $227.55

Highest sold: Preowned and lightly used set of three Deep Sea Cosmetics creams for $161.50

Second highest: sold two green canvas and leather LL Bean duffels tonsame buyer for $59 each

Question: my husband has a consulting business (metallurgical and corrosion control engineering); and I have Ebay. He needs a new accounting software platform because his old Mac laptop cannot support his version of 2014 Quickbooks. I use a spreadsheet for Ebay now. We are considering moving it all to a cloud system. I cannot send invoices for his business unless I have his computer, which is crapping out more and more. I’m beginning to research subscriptions that might allow multiple businesses by one owner. Godaddy, quickbooks, any other suggestions?

I become CEO/CFO of his LLC in July when I retire from federal service, and I’d prefer to have a cloud system that I can access anywhere.

[ThriftShift]

April 8-14
Total items in store: 828
Items sold: 30
Total sales: $829.64
COGs: $78.25

Great week! Had some higher dollar sales and low COGs. A lot of my items that sold came from “lots” when I make a pile at a store or yard sale and make an offer. It won’t work at GW, but it does at our local Franciscan thrift store, run by awesome nuns. Make a giant pile of hard goods, and they say $5. Love those ladies. They get their money from the clothes in their shop, which range from $3 to $10.

Highest sale was $120 original painting of a Gullah African shopping scene, bought with another print for $25 at Habitat (Buy One, get one free day for art). I sold the other print for $79. I sold another piece of art (random San Diego paper collage art) for $79 that was $1 lot from online auction; a 1980s denim jumpsuit for $79 that was $2 from hospice thrift; and some funky brass jewelry for $50 from a local artist’s estate sale (was $10). I just realized I list a lot of things at $79!

Also went to my church’s annual clothing sale on Friday where they give you a cardboard box about 36″ x 24″ with a string on it, and you drag it around like a sled, filling it up. I skipped the Ann Taylor and focused on higher end Brooks Brothers, NWT items, and good looking shoes. I like to look at “amazingtaste”‘s sold items and sort by highest price to look at the brands they find. I did find a St. John tank top that sold for $42 in 24 hours, so I was happy to discover that brand.

I thought I had calculated shipping costs well for two paintings but I ended up short about $20 on each. So I plan to add a handling charge now on all larger items; it seems the boxes I create out of other boxes are always heavier than I think. That or add an extra lb even when I think I have estimated it correctly.

I have a regular job, but I retire in 2 months, 3 weeks, 5 days – Friday, July 13. I’ll get to do this full-time, while also helping with my husband’s independent consulting business, and caring/home-schooling our 4 year old. I can’t wait to own my days!

[ThriftShift]

Week of 3/11-3/17
Total Items in Store: 703
Number of Items Listed: 28
Number of Items Sold: 26 (25 ebay, 1 FBM)
Total Product Sales:$559.85
Cost of Items Sold: $76
Highest Item Sold: $78 vintage Pierre Cardin suede trench with LOTS of stains, going to Italy. Bought for $6 at Florida thrift store.

What an apt podcast! I am sitting in a “retirement seminar” this week, 5 days of required attendance from 8 am to 5 pm. I am due to retire from the DoD this July. Tonight my homework is to do a comparison of my current job skills to future jobs in the civilian sector. I am an attorney now – I want to sell on ebay in my pajamas. That didn’t go well, and apparently to be given my class completion certificate, I have to write in a “real job” according to the instructor (who is all of 28 bless her heart). So I will do “retail sales”; they don’t have any options for online sales. It’s very antiquated. Interestingly enough my personality test said I should be a facial reconstruction surgeon or an acupuncturist. So I am all over the place. I like ebay – I can have lots of interest and have adventures, be it sticking needles in people or sitting in pajamas and listing old shoes. BTW, I have no medical education! I guess I can have that luxury of choosing to be my own boss because we have lived frugally for so long and KNOW our budget and plans. So my retirement pay + expected ebay income will be nearly the same as my current paycheck. One of my other homework assignments this week to create a 5 year budget so I will have real numbers on that prediction of a similar income. It’s kind of a pain in the ass, but I do appreciate the DoD making its service-members do this before they get out. We mostly get everything handed to us during active service – housing, food allowance, and steady paychecks. Many of the folks never learn to manage their own lives’ logistics. However, in exchange for this you can lose your life of course…

It was a “down” week for me. I had 2 unpaid items, but anytime I am $500 or over, I’m happy. So looking forward to retirement!

[ThriftShift]

Feb 25-Mar 3

Items in Ebay store: 658
Ebay Items sold: 29
Total Ebay sales: $704.78
Ebay COGs: $92.80

Offerup sales: $55
Items/COGs: red toolbox sold for $35 (cost $5); red lantern sold for $20 (cost $1)

Facebook sale: sold MCM 9 Foot green couch for $550; cost $350 one week prior at Estate sale (we thought we’d keep it but it needs too much restoration work and we are downsizing in a year anyway; I just loved it so).

Sold a vintage Headbangers MTV Tee for $30 with all kinds of marks; sold a needlepoint bellpull for $89; sold 7 packs of Rolodex refill cards for $65 (10 cents each at store); sold 70s Fantasia blacklight poster and small Disney print for $85 together.

I will likely move to free returns and up price on those items too; if it’s the way of the world, I do not want to lose out.

I had a buyer fail to return a Gucci briefcase she bought for $480 within the 5 day window…well it just showed up last week on my porch. I did give her a refund minus original shipping costs, insurance and delivery confirmation cost + $20 for my trouble, so she got $420 Back. Ugh. It’s over and I made double that this week so I moved on.

[ThriftShift]

I had the Gucci briefcase INAD…called yesterday on business day #6 and closed the case, no problem. Same with the shirt, never got returned. That was $500 held up for a week. Glad I stayed calm and it’s all closed out.

[ThriftShift]

Jay, this is the first time we are experimenting with it. She gets two free suitcases which she packs full, and paid some extra in baggage fees. She already made the baggage fees back with a sale this week. She does travel stateside about 3 times a year. When I retire from the military in June, I can fly on military cargo planes over to Germany for $15, as long as there is an extra seat somewhere in the plane. I am allowed 150 lbs of baggage there too. She scavenges mostly household goods – blankets, vintage American clothing, needlepoints. She got the blankets for 1 euro each at a local store near her. I told her to price it high and we’ll see what happens. I have the storage space for her here in the US.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 8 months ago by ThriftShift.

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