Treasures from a Garage Sale
I am a self-confessed shoe snob. My thought has always been that you can get by with cheap clothing, but never cheap shoes. Spend $150 on a dress and pair it with $14.88 shoes from Pay-Less and it cheapens the entire outfit. What I prefer to do is purchase name brand/designer shoes at an extreme discount. For example, and yes, these are shoes for my husband:
This past weekend I made an awesome buy. I actually bought six pairs of dress shoes (my husband is wearing a pair as I write, thus they did not make the photo) from a man who is retiring from white collar world. The lot included two pairs of Johnston & Murphy, Mezlan, Polo/Ralph Lauren, Rockport, and Cole Haan. The pair of Johnston & Murphy loafers shown above retail on their website for $200+. And people wonder where all the good deals are…
Oh yeah, I paid $20 for all six pairs.
The Mommy Juggle
All moms struggle with time. I seem to be a bit challenged at the moment, some of which I can blame on our sweet dog, Molly. I walk her an hour a day (she is very high energy and should be with cows or sheep. Instead, she got us.). I am challenged at the moment by doing for my family, my sales on ebay, and this blog. The blog has been the one to suffer, much to my chagrin. But, as is the case with most “working” mothers, something pays the price. It makes me wonder about the women who have real jobs, how do they do it and live with their home life?
In the next few entries I want to explore the life of the stay-at-home-constantly-working-mother. I am curious about avenues of income available to the stay at home mom. In my circle of friends I see many of my friends who are attempting to earn some extra income with various forms of business endeavors. I am curious what works, and am equally perplexed as to why I have been able to be successful with ebay where my friends have tried and given up.
Your thoughts are welcome. Sorry I have been gone.
Sell What You Love
You know, I just love designer handbags. And shoes. And wallets. And…just about anything designer. When I was sixteen I purchased my first Gucci purse. This was way before every woman on the street had at least one designer handbag in their closet. The poor bag had to be thrown away finally-it was not even worthy of a garage sale. This was WAAAY before ebay and you just could not find second hand designer items like you can today. I still love Gucci.
My passion for handbags has not diminshed over the years. What has diminished is my wanting to pay that much for a bag-your perspective tends to change once you mature and get a mortgage. When I first started ebay I had no idea that there were people willing to pay for someone’s second hand purse. When I sold my first one on ebay I realized that I had sold something that I absolutely loved handling. So, my focus on designer handbags and accessories began.
I relate this story because oftentimes it is what your are most passionate about that becomes the focus of what you choose to sell. Now, this does not mean that you cannot change paths and sell something else (as I will be doing in the near future!). What focusing on one particular category will allow you to do is really hone your skills when it comes to making purchases for resale. Once again I bring up profit margin, because without a good margin ebay will not be fun for long.
You need to brainstorm what you are passionate about in an effort to come up with the focus of your sales. Hobbies are a good place to start. I know so many women these days who scrapbook (my version of scrapbooking consists of a new Rubbermaid container every now and then to pitch my photos into. I also let the date print out on all of my photos. Scrapbookers can stone me now). If you are passionate about something-no matter how quirky-there is a good chance someone else out there shares your excitement.
Big Money Garage Sale
I participated in a garage sale this past weekend with some girlfriends. The total sale grossed over $700. Personally, I made about $240. Not bad, I guess. Usually I don’t do very well because anything I have that is of any value I put on ebay.
My largest item (dollar wise) was only a $10 sale. I had lots of $1 sales. Having been a fan of garage sales for many years I am still impressed by the die-hards who are first at the sale. We were still setting up when two guys arrived, our first customers, prepared to look with flashlights!! I knew these guys were ebayers or collectors. One guy bought a slew of my cast off desginer purses that I had for sale for $1 each. I bet if I looked hard enough I could find them for sale on ebay today. But…believe me, they should not be sold! The condition of each was poopy.
I am always amazed at the people who will try and steal from garage sales. To be honest, it bothers me less than one may think. If you feel compelled to steal from a garage sale then you must be in pretty bad shape. All my leftovers go to Goodwill after the sale is over anyway-I won’t cry over losing a quarter, even if you are sneaky and want to steal it.
Dave Ramsey is always talking about the benefits of having a garage sale to raise money. I fully support this idea, both if you are in debt or not. What this weekend cemented in my brain is that our driveway full of stuff confirms that we are all over-consumers. We buy way too much stuff. Shopping is now for entertainment purposes, not done out of necessity. Fortunately, for my family, the act of having a garage sale helps to purge our house of stuff-hopefully not to be replaced too soon.
Check out the blog YardSaleQueen. She is hilarious.
The ebay Boycott
To start, I did not see what the big fuss was about. I have never been one of those ebay users who saw ebay as an online community , even with as much as ebay wanted all of us to.
So, over the years, when ebay has a fee increase I just took it in stride, kind of with the “Please Sir, may I have another?” attitude. What could you do? Get on the ebay sponsored chat boards and complain?
Ebay has stated that the new fee structure is in response to complaints and issues raised by the members. In a effort to increase quality, ebay has started to reward sellers who have stellar DSRs, or detailed seller ratings. This tool was put into place by ebay back in 2007. Theory being, if you are a quality seller with good customer service than you will naturally get great DSRs. I have no trouble with the tool, with the one exception being the evaluation of shipping. I will from this moment on print my shipping dollar amount on the label. People think that they are being gouged when in reality I just charge the amount charged by the post office. It is never my intent to make money on shipping.
With the new fee structure, I think ebay has created one large antbed of problems waiting to be stepped on and unleashed. What I find interesting is that ebay is doing all kinds of promotion on how much they have lowered their insertion fees. In fact, in the email I received from ebay, I don’t think it even mentioned that the Final Auction Value fees were going to be raised. The FAV fee on items sold under $25 will now be 8.75% vs. the previous 5.25%. I think they left that part out of the email.
Also, PowerSellers will be rewarded with a 5-15% discounts for good DSRs. I did the math on a sale of $27 and it is still a price increase, no matter how you look at it. In addition, sellers will no longer be able to leave negative feedbacks for their buyers. If you read my previous post, you will understand why I have issue with this change.
My oldest son can’t resist stepping on an antbed when he walks by one. Ebay has got ‘em one and it is only a matter of time before all the angry ants start coming out.
Step #10 The Do’s and Don’ts of Feedback
To begin, this will not be the first post regarding feedback. Feedback is such an emotional topic that it deserves more than one post, so this will just be an introduction.
Starting on ebay it will be imperative that you obtain feedback from the ebayer who not only buys from you but that you buy from. Your first one hundred feedback responses will probably your most treasured. To get them, you must work very hard.
There are many sellers who will not sell to you if you have less than 10 feedbacks. The thought behind it is that many ebay newbies are very quick to the negative draw if they are unhappy. Most, but not all, reputable ebay sellers will work with you in some way if you are not satisfied with your purchase. My recommendation to all new sellers is to be aware that any negative feedback when you have less than 100 total could prove catastrophic to your bottom line. Like it or not, that is the way it is.
A great debate exists over when to leave feedback. I used to leave feedback whenever I was paid, considering that the buyer had done his/her part and deserved it. However, over the years I have come to the conclusion that I will leave feedback only after a buyer leaves feedback for me. Perhaps a bit unfair, but I put this in practice after too many neutrals were left by folks unwilling to contact me if they had an issue with what they purchased from me. I know this may cause some people a little unrest, but that is what I have found works. In addition, I believe that I have left negative feedback only once in my entire ebay career. This is because I want to avoid retaliation feedback, that is, getting a negative because you left a negative. This is the crux of the feedback dilemma, and one that ebay still continues to battle.
You must-if you plan to sell even part-time on ebay-work to maintain a good relationship with those you do business with. A negative hurts a lot more when your feedback is less than 100 than on someone whose feedback is over one thousand. Ponder that thought before you give someone a piece of your mind via email.
Step #9 Fun With USPS
Ok, it took me several years to jump on the online postage wagon. I drug my two lovely children to the post office about every two days, scads of boxes in tow. The looks I would get from the other customers! Not because my chidren misbehaved or anything, but the stares were without a doubt due to the mountain of Priority Mail boxes I carted in with me each time (I even had a little postal cart). The people in front stared, thankful they made it in before me, and the people behind me stared, trying to will me back into my car with their ugly looks. The funny thing was, that I, even with my package mountain, was usually quicker than the one gal with one cardboard box who couldn’t decide if it was safe to mail without delivery confirmation. All my stuff was ready to go.
I am not one who changes my ways easily. My system was very organized and worked well for me, even if my kids did hate going to the post office. Not until this last summer did I finally decide it was time to explore printing my own postage online, via the USPS website. It is very easy to do if you have established your Paypal account, and even if you are choosing not to use Paypal.
When each auction ends, and you have sent an invoice to your customer (and assuming they have paid you), ebay has installed a handy button that reads: “Print Shipping Label” . If you press on this button it will take you directly to the USPS page where you can fill in your shipping information. You can tie your ebay account to you Paypal account to simplify the process. Money will be taken directly from your Paypal balance or you can pay with a credit card. There may be some info to fill in regarding shipping specifics, but once you have done it once or twice it should be pretty easy to navigate. Just remember to keep scrolling down to the bottom of the page to proceed.
Once your postage has been printed you can tape it directly to your package. If you trust leaving your packages on your front step the post office will pick it up for free…but so could your neighbors or any theif passing by. I never do this, even though we are in a nice neighborhood. Too tempting. The other option is just taking it to your local post office and presenting it to the counter help (you generally will not have to stand in line for this). Again, the people standing in line will look at you like you are breaking a rule or cutting or something, but you can just smile at them and tell them to have a good day growing old in the post office line. You are outta there!
Step #8 Sold!!! Now what?
One may assume that all bidders are sitting on the edge of their chairs at the end of an auction, on pins and needles to see if they have won. In auction dreamland this is how we want it to be, but such is not the case. Many times people will enter their max bid and, in ebay’s case, the computer will bid for them until they are outbid (called proxy bidding). As a result, you will probably need to notify your winning bidder via an invoice. This button will appear once your auction time has concluded. Sending an invoice is as easy as pressing the button.
After you send the invoice it is time to wait until they respond. To the veteran ebayer this is elementary, but to the ebay person just starting out please note that you do not ship the item until it has been paid for.
This past weekend I co-chaired the silent auction at my son’s elementary school that was held in conjunction with the school’s spring carnival. The silent auction alone raised over $10,000. We had a signed Emmitt Smith football (we are in Dallas Cowboy’s country, you know) that sold for $695! The surprise of the evening turned out when our family won one of the raffle baskets put together with various themes. They only have twelve of these, so it is kind of a big deal to win one. Our luck was slim, because we had only purchased ten raffle tickets. I made sure to fold our tickets funny, so they stick up away from the others. Lo and behold, we won the “Do Not Try This At Home Basket”! Full of fun science stuff that can stain your cabinets, as I learned today making our Magic Rocks. Here is a look:
As I had mentioned, we are now harvesting a fine crop of Magic Rocks. The instructions on the box say that it only takes 10 quick seconds to stain clothing, carpet or cabinetry.
Now what do we do with it?
Step #7.1 (Continued) Paypal Payments
Paypal is a very easy way for your bidders to pay you on the Internet. It is widely used and if you wish to do even a moderate amount of business on ebay it is an absolute necessity. Now, with that being said, I must say that the fees are the pits. I predict future competition stemming from disgruntled Paypal users looking for a cheaper method of online payment. Perhaps it is already out there and I just don’t know about it yet-feel free to educate me if you know better. Remember though, that as of this writing, if your monthly business on Paypal is less than $500 you are not charged any fees.
In the meantime, Paypal is what is readily available and promoted on ebay (ebay owns them so it is obvious why they want everyone to use it). You can operate a Paypal free auction business, but here again there are people who will avoid your auctions if they can’t pay with Paypal. I have done it myself.
Two things to remember when accepting Paypal payments if you want to be covered by their seller protection: 1) You must ship to a confirmed address and, 2) You must ship with delivery confirmation. A confirmed address is when a buyer’s credit card billing and shipping addresses are the same. Delivery confirmation can be purchased in conjunction with your postage-you can charge the customer or, if you print postage online, it is given to you for free. A delivery confirmation slip from the post office looks like this:
I have my own sad Paypal story. In the thousands of transactions I have conducted on Paypal, I have had only one fraudulent payment. Someone had hijacked someone’s ebay account and also gained access to their Paypal account. They went on a shopping spree on ebay, purchasing a gorgeous red Coach purse from me. The hijackers paid me, via Paypal, with a confirmed address. Because I am the trusting soul that I am, and really having no reason to think anything fishy was going on, I shipped the package off without a thought. About a month later I receive an email from Paypal reversing the payment. It caught my attention, especially since the reversal took about $105 out of my Paypal account. I called Paypal and was incensed because I had done everything right, or so I thought. Well, as it turns out they would have offered me the seller protection if I had paid $.55 for delivery confirmation. But I didn’t (ugh!!!). So, I was out the $105 simply because I had not included delivery confirmation (this was before I started printing all of my postage online). Lesson learned-ouch!
Step #7 Pay me, please
So you have come up with a good, eye catching title, honed your photo skills, decided that it is ok to ship overseas and weighed your package. You have now reached the payment section on the sell your item form. You do want them to give you money for your item, but how does it get to you? You have a few options:
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Cash
Arrives in the mail, not a good way to go. Every now and then someone will send cash in an envelope, but I never would consent to this if I knew they were going to do it.
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Money Order
Arrives in the mail, and is a very acceptable form of payment. I like money orders because you actually have to have the cash to purchase one. In addition, it takes extra trouble to get in the car, get the cash, go to the store and purchase the money order, and then actually stick it in the mail. Previously I discussed the fact that you can cash postal money orders, both from the US and abroad, at any United States Post Office. I like ‘em.
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Check
Arrives in the mail. This method scare some people, but I (truthfully!) have only had one personal check bounce since 2000. Now that I have said that I will probably have one bounce tomorrow, since that is usually how it goes. I would gauge whether or not you accept personal checks based on what you are selling. If you are selling used car radios, ipods, or big ticket items you may reconsider. When I sell a Louis Vuitton I will not accept personal checks-or, if I did, I would wait until it cleared my bank. Trouble with waiting for it to clear the bank is who the heck knows when that happens? At least at my bank they can’t give me a clue as to when it takes place.
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Paypal
Internet payment, and bottom line you must be prepared to take this form of payment. 99% of all of my transactions are paid via Paypal. I firmly believe you will lose bids if you don’t accept Paypal. You will need to register with Paypal in order to accept payments. Also, there is some seller protection with Paypal, but you need to make sure you are shipping to a confirmed address and also ship your package with delivery confirmation (will discuss next post). When you are just starting out you will not (at least at this writing) incur any fees with Paypal if you do direct deposit. If you start to sell more on a regular basis and make more than $500 per month they will start charging you fees which pretty much equate to roughly what you pay in Final Auction Value Fees. Kinda like giving ebay an arm for your Final Auction Value Fee and then giving Paypal (also owned by ebay) a leg. The fees add up when you start selling on a regular basis. So, if I sound a tad bit bitter about Paypal I guess I am, somewhat. Someone needs to come up with another form of Internet payment…and someone probably is as I write.
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Wire Transfer
I have done this once and it wierded me out. If they inquire if you would accept this method I would turn it down. Too many unsavory things transpire via wire transfer.
I am sure there are other ways for people to pay you, I just utilize the methods listed above. Just remember you don’t ship the item until you have been paid.
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