nycyn
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posted on January 15, 2002 12:26:21 PM new
Is it the economy? Or that my stuff is crap?
<br />
Or are people jut using sniping programs and taking the fun out of it all. Anybody else with like flat sales lately? I don't have any big ticket items out there but I did used to watch things go up an/ or get bids of anything, which was a kick. I check my auctions now and it's nothing new, nothing new, nothing new...<br />
[ edited by nycyn on Jan 15, 2002 12:29 PM ]
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springmoon
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posted on January 15, 2002 12:37:01 PM new
Sales are down everywhere...hang in there.
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jdk156
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posted on January 15, 2002 12:45:03 PM new
same thing here. I don't ever have much on at one time but I think WHAT FOR? I had a great week on collectible peanut butter dog glasses when I first started selling. Not much since. Like you say it is not any fun looking and never anything new to see on your auctions. I used to JUST buy (another id) but decided to see what it would be like getting money instead of sending. Be glad when the fun starts!!! LOL !
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computerboy
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posted on January 15, 2002 12:47:56 PM new
We've found business to by quite robust.
Must be dependent on what you are selling.
Here's to better months ahead!
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richierich
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posted on January 15, 2002 01:00:49 PM new
I get some opening bids within the first two days......then wait.....maybe 50 cents here, 50 cents there....but closing day....they come.
The days of driving up the bids are gone but I will take the last second bid anytime.
The thing I always thought was kind of funny is that it could sit for a few days with no bid. Then you get that starting bid and then it gets another bid or two. Like nobody wants to be the first one.
I love snipers. At least they bid! I do not like the watchers...that forget to bid!
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Nanasturtles
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posted on January 15, 2002 01:27:33 PM new
I have to say I'm one of the sellers that has seen an increase in sales in the last week and a half and I'm glad......seemed like things were slow but are now really picking up.....I listed this past Sunday night (only 22 items) but had bids on 7 of those items by the next morning.......as far as bidding wars......I think more and more people are realizing (like myself when I am the buyer instead of the seller) that if you are interested in an item.....don't place your bid until the last minutes.....otherwise you are bidding against yourself not to mention others that come back in and bid back against you. So I think others are catching on also.......but I do love it when I see a new ebayer continue to bid and rebid during an auction......brings back the old excitement when I first started selling!
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Antelope67
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posted on January 15, 2002 02:05:58 PM new
The bids on my items began to decline when ebay started the "watch this item" thing and they never recovered. The first 2 years on ebay I was mainly just having fun with it and my net sales would exceed $100 per month. Last year I put in 35-40 hours per week and my net was in the red for the year! At least I got some stuff out of the house. Too bad I didn't do it full time those first 2 years when I had the chance.
[ edited by Antelope67 on Jan 15, 2002 02:07 PM ]
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kyms
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posted on January 15, 2002 02:24:57 PM new
Sales are up for me.. I sold a common doll last night and she brought a whopping $97.00! (usually sells for less than $20.00!) and I've sold over 200 Lp's in the past two weeks! Books are doing well and games just fly out of the house.
We usually do well until early April. From April until August is normally pretty lean.
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jdk156
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posted on January 15, 2002 03:50:58 PM new
I have 82 hits on one of my auctions. I can't WAIT to see if just ONE of those people bids on it.
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tomyou
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posted on January 15, 2002 06:48:17 PM new
Just checked my january sale so far and am at 94% sales so seem to be good and getting better. lots of luck to everyone.
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nycyn
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posted on January 15, 2002 07:27:55 PM new
Admittedly I'm not selling sexy stuff at the moment. I'm afraid to sell the good stuff; e.g., I saw an exquisite piece, that I also have, go for $33.00. I yanked my auction. The stuff I have up now, for days, have like 5-7-11 hits. Whoo-pi-doo! Maybe I'll dig out the LP's and books. The higher end stuff I'm afraid to put out. And sheesh, I put up some of my kid's older clothes, 3 pieces, like new, that retailed for an easy $50. I got $1.00 and a request to send it the cheapest way possible. I'll never do that again. It looks like a buyers market, to me anyway.
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nycyn
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posted on January 15, 2002 07:37:12 PM new
Just curious--to the guys and gals that are doing ok to well: what's hot? (You don't need to worry about me as competition; i work 10-11 hours a day for a paycheck. 
Just curious.
What do buyers want? God, what do buyers want?
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quickdraw29
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posted on January 15, 2002 10:14:12 PM new
If you're selling things that only serve for collecting dust you may be in for a hard time. Practical items are selling very good for me while my collectibles go ignored.
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REAMOND
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posted on January 15, 2002 10:29:15 PM new
Well, we have to admit that some of our buyers were laid off, and some are just worried they will be laid off.
The economy has had to have some effect. The longer the economic "funk" goes on the worse it will get.
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Antelope67
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posted on January 16, 2002 08:07:43 AM new
If practical items are selling very good and collectibles go ignored, how does one explain this?
http://www.auctionwatch.com/mesg/read.html?num=2&thread=445776
Maybe instead of using my boxes for shipping my stuff to the occasional high bidder I get, I should sell the boxes on ebay. I'm really only selling all my belongings to avoid bankruptcy and if I can get $7+ per box/cardboard scrap, I might end up not not only avoiding bankrupcy but I might end up filthy rich. WOW! I never knew there was such a demand for cardboard! My house is filled with cardboard boxes and scraps of cardboard from floor to ceiling in almost every room. I'M RICH, I'M RICH!!!! I feel like I've won the lottery!
Just joking, of course. Or am I?
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pelorus
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posted on January 16, 2002 09:14:45 AM new
Trend #1: There is much more competition on ebay, which is driving down the prices for my items, usually books.
Trend#2: Lots of looks without bids. One of my items got 300 looks and one bid. Of course, it had the words "sex" and "porn" and "gay" in the title.
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buyhigh
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posted on January 16, 2002 10:28:18 AM new
Sure -the last few seconds they bid. And if it is a collectable or an old piece of jewelry, the bid usually comes from a dealer but then there is the present poor economy added to the high volume of listings on ebay.It could not be so bad if ebay made 14cents a share this past quarter.
buyhigh
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REAMOND
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posted on January 16, 2002 11:35:15 AM new
That's the beauty of eBay's model. eBay makes money whether your item sells or not. eBay also added 4 million users in the last quarter- and I think most of them were sellers !!!
It would be nice if someone could produce a reliable metric of sell through rates on eBay, either overall or by category. eBay has the information but doesn't release it.
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MAH645
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posted on January 16, 2002 01:32:05 PM new
My sales are fair, mainly because I'm needing to buy more merchandise to sell.This month has been bad for me as far as bills and unexpected things popping up.So my sales being down is my fault.Where I am working they are talking closing the plant.Looks like alot of us are going to HAVE to make with our own business or go under.
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nycyn
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posted on January 16, 2002 02:01:11 PM new
Update: Well I've been watching my auctions and
Ho hum.
Not even hits.
antelope67: LOL!
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belalug3
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posted on January 16, 2002 10:23:51 PM new
Well, I feel some of the sluggishness is due to lots of folks (myself included) being out of dough after Xmas. Also, I personally am taking a rest from buying & selling after going hot and heavy for several months in a row leading up to Christmas. I've even put my Half.com stuff on "vacation". Just cannot face boxing one more item for awhile! (Of course, I have the luxury of having a day job.)
[ edited by belalug3 on Jan 16, 2002 10:25 PM ]
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mballai
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posted on January 17, 2002 01:20:21 PM new
Rule 1: People need stuff. They have to buy it somewhere.
Rule 2: Where they buy it often depends on how easy it is to do business and then at what price.
Rule 3: See 1 and 2
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blairwitch
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posted on January 17, 2002 01:32:00 PM new
Just wait till the new postal rates go into effect this summer. Customers complain now about shipping and they havent seen nothing yet.
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antelope67
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posted on January 17, 2002 03:45:34 PM new
Not only is USPS raising shipping rates but ebay is raising their auction fees again. They are now gonna charge for BIN feature. I'll have to start grouping stuff together since most of my individual items only sell for .82-$2 and once in a blue moon I'll get $3 or more. When stuff sells that cheap & I never scalp on shipping/handling (as a matter of fact, in the long run I lost $ on it so raised it recently but only by a little in an attempt to break even) there is really no $ left over. Any profits made on the few that sell go to pay the losses on the others that didn't get bids at all. Bummer. I either need to group stuff together or quit while I'm behind.
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mballai
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posted on January 17, 2002 04:23:30 PM new
The same comments appear every time things get slow. Yes bids are down and people are remarkably cheap, but you can still get a good price on things. I found that many of my regular selling items drop off in amounts and bids, so now I sell less of them and put out items that still get good amounts. One of the reasons that people go out of business is that they have no flexibility in selling. Markets change. eBay requires more volume and variety to be successful.
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nycyn
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posted on January 17, 2002 04:38:44 PM new
It's looking awful to me. I mean when you can't get $5.00 for an LP that is collectible and vogue. Got a gorgeous item for a song tho', not that I should be shopping. I'm sorry, but it's dead out there--at least for collectibles.
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Antelope67
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posted on January 17, 2002 05:08:27 PM new
mballai, flexibility in selling? I am NOT a business. We are trying to avoid bankruptcy by selling all our personal belongings. I'm even selling all my collectibles I've had since childhood. December 98-December 2000 I averaged a net of $125 per month and for the year of 2001 my net was in the red even though I worked harder at it. Same kinda stuff, but no bids. I cannot slack off now since early in the year is the best time for me and if the best time of the year is bad I'm not looking forward to the rest of the year. On positive side, anything that goes out the door via ebay can't be taken by creditors. We just happened to fall on hard times when my hubby was forced into early retirement from military because of health problems. Couldn't get work right away and when we did, we worked ourselves silly. He was attempting to work 2 jobs and I worked a stressful job and did ebay. Things still only got worse. Only thing that more jobs did was put us in a higher tax bracket and put more miles on the vehicles during the HIGH $ gasoline periods. Maybe bankrupcy is the only way. Well, I can think of only one more way but shouldn't even think like that.
[ edited by Antelope67 on Jan 17, 2002 05:10 PM ]
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imabrit
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posted on January 17, 2002 05:29:28 PM new
Things are slow and its getting harder to find things cheap enough to make a profit on ebaY.
At one time diversification was key but I do not think even that is worth the time and effort for the small profit that you make.
I see the only way some people must be making the money is to have stolen the items.
Or its been in the house for so long that they do not care what it brings.
Collectables are dead I only sell one line these days and I think this is the last week I will sell those on ebaY.
In fact after 4 years of selling I think I am finally done with it.
I see more and more sellers loosing money on what they have bought to sell.I know one guy who bought a bunch of rare bird prints over 100 years old that used to do very well.There is not an over supply of these either but it looks like he is loosing 100.00 or more a piece on what he paid for them.
I see this in a lot of areas so I keep wondering where the bottom is and it keeps falling.
I watch ebaY more and more as a place to buy items and re-sell at a much higher profit at traditional brick and mortar auctions.
Adrian
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springmoon
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posted on January 17, 2002 05:41:22 PM new
imabrit, you are right -- eBay now seems to be a very affordable supplier of goods for brick-and-mortar stores. May be, I should now open my antique store.
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imabrit
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posted on January 17, 2002 06:25:40 PM new
I have been emailing auction houses in Europe on some of the items I see up for sale and there are a number that will bring more at those sales these days.
Most of these auction houses are frequented by dealers who buy such items for the store or online sales sites.
It seems odd that you can get a better deal by buying on ebaY than you would at what has traditionally been a great source for dealers over the past 100 years.
I wish it was the other way as I did have a really good business that made me in most years over 40,000 after expenses.
I had wanted to do about 30,000 in sales this year but at this point looks like I will be lucky to do 5,000.
Oh well just the way it goes.
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