Scavenger Life

We haven’t done any serious scavenging in months as we work through our backlog of inventory. We’re hoping that when we’re ready to buy from auctions again, prices will have gone down. But maybe the pandemic has permanently forced most estate auctions to go online which means a lot more buyers have found a new place to collect. Box lots and table lots really couldn’t be beat.

We remember when thrift stores had what seemed an endless amount of cool items for cheap…until thrift stores became popular and the quality of items went way down. Yard sales and estate sales were awesome!…until everyone realized you could look up prices for “solds” on eBay so yard sales started pricing items high.

Obviously there’s always great deals anywhere you go if you look hard enough and have a deep knowledge of things. When we get back to scavenging, we look forward to finding new places to find deals. The places other people overlook. We like to buy cheap!

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Our Store Week December 5-11, 2021

Total Items in Store: 7863
Items Sold: 30
Gross Sales: $1,560.24 (including eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Net Sales: $1,175.64 (minus eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Cost of Items Sold: $68
Cost of helpers: $80
Highest Price Sold: $215 (antique business card)
Average Price Sold: $39.18
Returns: 1
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 30
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(Your numbers can be found here: https://www.ebay.com/sh/performance/sales)

Sales are slow and steady. Can’t say we’re benefitting from any kind of holiday rush, which may be because we’ve moved so far into “weird, old stuff for sale”. Hard to say. We like what we’re finding and selling 🙂

For not being clothing sellers anymore, 35% of our sales were clothes this week. We can’t help picking up nice coats and shoes when we run across them for cheap. Quality always sells. And truth be told, we probably have about 1000 clothing items for sales.

Several people have asked how to support us. Buy coffee as gifts! We roast fresh and mail the same day. eBay certainly isn’t passive but it’s a nice income stream as we continue to grow our coffee business.

Check out our coffee! ► broadporch.coffee
Join the conversation in the forum>> HERE

Our Store Week November 28-December 4, 2021

Total Items in Store: 7870
Items Sold: 25
Gross Sales: $1,188.43 (including eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Net Sales: $926.89 (minus eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Cost of Items Sold: $45
Cost of helpers: $80
Highest Price Sold: $300 (Shearling sheepskin coat)
Average Price Sold: $37.07
Returns: 1
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 30
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(Your numbers can be found here: https://www.ebay.com/sh/performance/sales)

We had a good solid week of eBay sales. Ryanne has been on a listing spree as we get through our death piles. We’re constantly amazed at what sells. You just never know.

Home prices in our area have skyrocketed as they have across the country. Talking to our realtor friends, they say many of the home sales are out-of-towners buying houses to turn into Airbnb vacation rentals. We see pretty shabby houses being flipped for quick rentals. I call these real estate people: “spreadsheet investors”. Forget style or quality. “I pay this much for a house, I charge this much, I’ll make this much.” It’ll be very interesting to see if there’s a point of saturation and the myth of easy money sets in. Our vacation rentals are still doing well, but it’s certainly not passive income. If we didn’t live here, I’m not sure how we’d solve issues or have local contacts to do work.

Our coffee business is slowly growing as we build systems and hire more staff. Definitely a much different business from eBay but we enjoy the new challenges. We’re really proud of the coffee we’re roasting and serving.

Hope you guys are well!

Check out our coffee! ► broadporch.coffee
Join the conversation in the forum>> HERE

Our Store Week November 21-27, 2021

Total Items in Store: 7847
Items Sold: 30
Gross Sales: $1,430.44 (including eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Net Sales: $1,120.97 (minus eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Cost of Items Sold: $60
Cost of helpers: $0
Highest Price Sold: $100 (weird copper mystery cone sold to an “alchemist”)
Average Price Sold: $37.36
Returns: 2
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 50
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(Your numbers can be found here: https://www.ebay.com/sh/performance/sales)

A much slower week for us. With our weird old inventory, it’s not uncommon for the holidays to be blah since so many people purchase brand new electronics, etc for gifts. On the upside, we’re now listing a lot more each week now that we have a consistent helper. I think we have at least 4-6 months of death piles to list before we’d need to start buying again. Death piles came from buying in bulk during the pandemic.

Our cafe and roaster is doing very well but also takes up 75% of our time. It feels good to build a new business. Certainly presents us with a lot of new challenges and things to learn.

Check out our coffee! ► broadporch.coffee
Join the conversation in the forum>> HERE

Our Store Week November 14-20, 2021

Total Items in Store: 7808
Items Sold: 26
Gross Sales: $970.79 (including eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Net Sales: $654.63 (minus eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Cost of Items Sold: $44
Cost of helpers: $80
Highest Price Sold: $65 (vintage drawer handles)
Average Price Sold: $25.17
Returns: 2
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 60
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(Your numbers can be found here: https://www.ebay.com/sh/performance/sales)

We had a decent week of sales though most were around $30. It always feels great seeing that people are still purchasing random items we’ve had listed for multi-months. Our business model works because we purchase these items so cheap. We like that eBay is so low risk because it allows us to take risks in other parts of our lives (like opening a coffee shop/roastery). Being patient and putting weird items in the right context has built this pipeline of cash.

Check out our coffee! ► broadporch.coffee
Join the conversation in the forum>> HERE

Our Store Week November 7-13, 2021

Total Items in Store: 7712
Items Sold: 31
Gross Sales: $1,349.64 (including eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Net Sales: $1,027.88 (minus eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Cost of Items Sold: $54
Cost of helpers: $80
Highest Price Sold: $100 (vintage travel case)
Average Price Sold: $33.15
Returns: 1
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $0
Number of items listed this week: 40
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(Your numbers can be found here: https://www.ebay.com/sh/performance/sales)

We had our best week in six months that was helped by a huge sale. A set designer purchased $1300 worth of vintage markers (the kind used in elementary schools). We mentioned that we purchased three shopping carts of these four years ago and they keep selling. Definitely long tail.

Otherwise, I wonder if eBay sales will keep picking up for the holidays since we keep hearing news of shipping delays of stuff from China. Will buyers look to US sellers on eBay for their xmas presents?

Check out our coffee! ► broadporch.coffee
Join the conversation in the forum>> HERE

Our Store Week October 31-November 6, 2021

Total Items in Store: 7666
Items Sold: 44
Gross Sales: $2,589.33 (including eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Net Sales: $2,000.88 (minus eBay fees, shipping, and taxes)
Cost of Items Sold: $77
Cost of helpers: $80
Highest Price Sold: $1300 (lot of vintage markers)
Average Price Sold: $45.47
Returns: 0
Money Spent on New Inventory This Week: $10
Number of items listed this week: 20
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(Your numbers can be found here: https://www.ebay.com/sh/performance/sales)