posted on June 24, 2001 12:05:30 PM
I'm with you. I was wondering if it was just me. My bidding has slowed some, but the big problem is the NPB's. I have had more of them the past month than the previous 5 months combined. Very odd. Those with 0 and those with 100 feedbacks are just not paying and most are not even responding! No excuses or anything, lol. Hope it is just a trend, but frankly I am beginning to wonder. Anyone else? Peace.
posted on June 24, 2001 02:16:07 PM
Sales are good. Many people pay immediately but I have a whole lot of sales that are really straggling along, necessitating a lot of email back and forth before payment shows up.
posted on June 24, 2001 05:13:25 PM
loosecannon: I know that you are a veteran of eBay and Auctionwatch and eBay and so am I. I have always read these ' eBay slow ' threads with great interest, but lately got so tired of hearing it, I stopped coming to Auctionwatch, until recently.
What changed for me was when half.com added Baseball Cards to their list of categories. I had, literally, an attic filled to the brim with baseball cards, mostly vintage. They never seemed worth listing on eBay, but so easy to drop onto half.com with very little effort (i.e. - no scan required in most cases). Sales have been robust.
I used to be a very vocal proponent of the 'no reserve, $1 start ' auctions on eBay. Of course this came to an end around the first of the year. I still do it on occasion when I know I have a high demand item. But eBay bids have dropped to the point where even the gambler instinct in me is no longer excited. There's no point anymore, and the reasons are many.
For now, it's the Fixed Price market for me. I'm very surprised at how well it's going, and I believe the key for me is the depth and breadth of my inventory. I may only sell a tiny percentage of my inventory each month, but it adds up to a very nice monthly payment.
One day maybe eBay Stores will be viable. Seems to me like they have a lot of work to do, and I will be more that happy to pay their negligible fees when they make it useable.
But the point I wish I could make is that the auction fad is over (long-over), as we all predicted, with the exception of truly unique items. For reasons I can't fully explain, the Fixed Price market is doing great for me.
This should be no problem for a veteran dealer with a good inventory - just a matter of finding the appropriate venue to market from.
posted on June 24, 2001 05:36:19 PM
If it wouldent be for buy it now my sales would be very nasty. I agree with kathy that the auction format has had it. Why should I make a buyer wait 7 days when I can sell it in 2 or 3? I have repeat inventory so its great for me. I know I hate waiting 7-10 days for an item to end.
Fixed prices eh? Sounds good for you and your inventory. I wonder about mine though. I still offer a variety of things--anything from A to Z really. It depends on what I find from week to week. I've got a garage full of electronics parts though. To many people it's just so much landfill material, but to the right people...
I've also got some 1960 Topps baseball cards! But like you, I see no point in selling them on ebay for $2.00 each.
I'm not in total agreement with you about the auction fad being over. I do get worried lately about all the ups and downs though, and I do know for a fact it isn't the same as it was even last year, let alone 2 or 3 years ago.
Of course, all of this relates directly to the quality of merchandise a person can find from week to week and month to month. I still believe if you put good stuff out there, it's going to sell, and for a fair amount.
posted on June 24, 2001 06:27:03 PMLoosecannon:You are so right!The quality is really what counts.If you put the "right" item on it will be found and it will sell.I really think that is true no matter where you sell.Sure the time of year should and will have an impact so you have to "adjust" accordingly.I still must agree though as we all know the good stuff always sells.The hard part is not selling it,the hard part is finding it on a consistent basis.
[ edited by wildanteeker on Jun 24, 2001 06:27 PM ]
[ edited by wildanteeker on Jun 24, 2001 06:28 PM ]
posted on June 24, 2001 06:32:00 PM
imabrit: May I point out that I think there is another piece to the puzzle here. When I first started to sell on Ebay, most people, including antiquities dealers, had never heard of the place before.
Of course, we all know what happened next - even dealers who where not he least bit computer savvy learned about eBay, and adjusted their prices accordingly.
I see brick and mortar prices slowly coming back down. You either do 'the internet' or you don't.
posted on June 24, 2001 08:25:19 PM
so much depends on what you sell. what i've noticed, for what i mostly sell, is bidding is definitely down overall. buyers are getting more picky, because they've now got more to choose from within a category. so i've been buying/putting up only the best finds.
even so, there aren't as many bids and the ending price doesn't go as high as it did several months ago on similar, more present-season-appropriate items. but, they are selling, and i'm happy about that.
posted on June 25, 2001 05:54:29 AM
My sales are very slow right now too.... of course my usual market is teenagers and 'young adults', whom all seem to be outside enjoying the summer. I've also been moving my inventory to half.com (trading cards) as most of my items sell for less than 2.00.
Right now, half.com is helping me loads, and I end up with more in my pocket at the end of auction. Now, if there was only a way to allow the buyers to combine shipping, sigh ;(
Loosecannon, maybe this is a good time to put the other bat up
posted on June 25, 2001 06:26:51 AM
Wow...surprised at some of the reports here. No doubt it's my stuff, but in contrast, my fixed price sales are way down. I hear from Amazon pretty often, but half.com is nearly dead [and I double list on both sites, so it's not like I have nothing listed there]. BIN sales happen once in a while, but by far my sales are coming from regular old auctions.
I do like the 5 day format, but just lately have been using 7 days more of the time.
I'm even having modest success on Yahoo again, who would believe that?
I don't think auctions are dead. After a long hiatus, just this weekend I wanted to buy some stuff on ebay and bid on some low price auctions...I even came back to SNIPE them. Got great deals. I would have been less excited or likely to just buy outright on these items [lots of clothing] unless the price was really low and in that case, why would the seller bother?
posted on June 25, 2001 06:29:32 AM
Ebay changed some of the categories--again. This might be a small part of it, for me anyway. I've been trying to find which categories work best for me now since they've been fiddling--again.
I didn't used to think that category was of the utmost importance, because I've always assumed that most people found their items by keyword search as I do. I've changed my mind on that. In otherwords, before, I thought if the item didn't go in the best possible category that all would be OK anyway because of keyword search.
[ edited by loosecannon on Jun 25, 2001 06:49 AM ]
posted on June 25, 2001 06:33:52 AM
Weather's great. Summer's here. 4th of July is around the corner. Meanwhile sell-through's been heading south the past week.
posted on June 25, 2001 11:45:01 AM
Almost all my sales are BIN and that is hard to use because I have a lot of one of a kind items I am afraid to offer BIN because I am not sure what price to set.
Everyday items that I can buy wholesale are not selling even when there are no auctions offering the same item and my price is less than 1/2 retail.
posted on June 25, 2001 12:07:10 PM
I think bidding is slower--there's still a lot of last day bidding even though I use BIN. Had a big flurry of activity on Half. About one third of what I have put on Half has sold thus far which really isn't bad.
]
