Ep 275 || Using Volume Pricing with Jude Lugo

[podcast_team]

eBay Seller Jude Lugo of J&L Making a Difference on eBay shares his strategy for using Volume Pricing to make more sales as well as how important sustainability is to his business. Griff and Brian answer questions on changing the default listing format on eBay’s mobile app, frustrating buyer packaging requests, and what to do when a piece of apparel does not have a size tag.

Episode Links:
Jude Lugo’s eBay Store
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Brian: I'm Brian.

Griff: I'm Griff, and this is the eBay For Business Podcast. Your source for the information and inspiration you need to help you start manage and grow your business on the world's most powerful marketplace. And this is episode 275. Welcome back Brian. The year begins.

Brian: The year begins. It's good to be back. How was your break?

Griff: It was okay. I did a few things. Went to a concert, saw Heart.

Brian: Oh, you saw Heart? I was listening to them back when I was in high school.

Griff: A friend as and I decided to go, what I really loved is the opening act was Jason Bonham, you know John Bonham? John Bonham from Led Zeppelin.

Brian: Was it his son?

Griff: Yeah.

Brian: Oh!

Griff: He was fantastic. And they did a whole bunch of Led Zeppelin tunes and it was perfect. It was tons of fun. Tons of fun.

Brian: It sounds like fun.

Griff: I wanted to ask you a question. You know how eBay has so many tools to help a seller promote more sales, right?

Brian: I do.

Griff: Well, one of the most underused tools apparently is that tool that's called Volume Pricing. And today we hope to change that if only a little. So joining us to talk about the benefits of using Volume Pricing and how to do so effectively is our guest this week. It's eBay seller Jude Lugo. And I'll be right up front. We actually recorded him last August, but it's timeless information so we have to look forward to that.

Brian: Question back at you, do you use Volume Pricing?

Griff: You know, I have, and I'm doing so right now and I gotta tell you it works but with a caveat because in my experience you can't just set it and go, you actually have to tinker with it. You have to tune it so that you get the settings just right so that you can make the sales, the extra sales, while at the same time making a profit. Jude is gonna talk about that. And in addition, we have three questions this week and they're on the following topics. So I give you a heads up one's about the mobile default listing format. If it's changeable, that's what the seller is asking in the email. Another one, it's not so much a question. It was one of our regular listeners, Terry, who wanted to tell us a story about an unusual request they got from a buyer regarding packing. And then finally another topic. And that's describing apparel that has no size indication. So there's no tags that say XL or L. Well, how do you indicate what it is?

Brian: How do you That'll be interesting.

Griff: Well, I don't know . I didn't say I had the answer. I mean I have some suggestions, but yeah,

Brian: Well, looking forward to that.

Griff: And that's coming in the, as it always does at the end of the episode. But first I don't think there is, but I'll ask anyway. Is there any news, Brian?

Brian: No breaking news. But I did wanna mention something that was on eBay Inc. Blog last month. Some of our sellers may have missed it. There's a blog post about celebrating eBay Sellers of the Year and there are some interesting sellers profiled from around the world. You can find it at ebayinc.com. So that's eBayinc.com. So check it out.

Griff: There's a seller from Lithuania, one from China, one from the UK. Very interesting profiles so check it out. I always go to the eBay blog to read the latest stories.

Brian: That and Main Street. It's always good to stay up on kind of the corporate side of eBay.

Griff: Oh, good point. Main Street. So that's eBaymainstreet.com. Yeah, it's easy to find. And there's some interesting news up there. We talked about it in a previous episode about the delay in the 10 99 K Reports going out. So I don't see the problem, but a lot of sellers just, they kinda lose it over this. And this is one more year. You don't have to worry about getting one unless you're at the current rate, which I believe is $2,000?

Brian: $20,000. But, but it's gonna go, I think the proposal is $5,000 that might get implemented at some point during the year. But I would say just stay tuned.

Griff: Yeah, stay tuned. And, so that's it. That's all that we have for this week.

Brian: Some good questions and Jude.

Griff: Yeah, and Jude's coming up. So why don't we get right to him. Let's talk about Volume Pricing.

Griff: Jude Lugo has been fascinated with business from an early age. And in fact, his first sale, this just amazes me, his first sale was a book that he purchased for $1 with birthday money, and then he sold it for $8 with the help of his mom Lynell back in the seventh grade. He's come a long way since. And he has expanded his business interest into a full fledged business that sells electronics, clothing, and office supplies and a lot more. The name of his store is J & L Making a Difference. That's an eBay store with a focus on making a difference in both local and global communities. Welcome Jude.

Jude: Thank you Griff. It's great to be here.

Griff: Okay. You started with a book. What did that lead to? I mean, did that start you thinking about how you could continue this or was it just a one-off and then later you started a business?

Jude: The whole time I wanted it to be a business. Now that book was actually not the first one I bought. I bought a book, uh, at another bookstore that was more than a dollar. It might've been $8. And I saw that it would sell for 30 or 40 bucks. I was like, wow, this is amazing. You know, I can make all this money. The thing I didn't realize is that the sales rank was in the millions of items. This was actually on Amazon that I listed this first item and that didn't click for me. So I had to go return that book. And on the way home we stopped at the Dollar store and got this book that went on to actually sell. So I learned the importance of not only do , does the item have to be profitable, but you also have to have people want your product. And so since then I've figured out different things during my time of selling every, everything is a lesson. And I think that's one of the great things is over the years, treating it as a lesson first and a business second, which I know is kind of a strange thing to say, but if you approach a business with a learning mindset, the business pieces will fall into place.

Griff: And I have to say f as a lesson, it wasn't very costly. It didn't cost you a lot of money Because some of us who are in business, our first lesson sometimes cost quite a bit of money.

Jude: That was the great thing about eBay was the stakes were low when I first started selling. And that's what made it possible for me to sell with the help of my mom. At 13, the stakes were low and it was a place for me to learn. And now that I'm in business school at college, I feel like all those lessons that I learned while the stakes were low are helping me out while the stakes are a little bit higher because I've learned all these lessons throughout the years from, from running this business.

Griff: That book you bought for a Dollar, do you remember the title?

Jude: I do. I was actually at a used bookstore a few weeks ago and I saw the book, I had to send a picture of my, my parents. It was called Salt, Sugar Fat. It was a book about nutrition and talking about how we eat so much salt, sugar, and fat. And we sold a bunch of copies of Salt, Sugar, Fat until we couldn't find them at any of the stores in our area. And then we moved on to some other books.

Griff: So was out of print?

Jude: No, it's, it's still in print, but it was, we couldn't find it for a dollar anymore. It sold out all the dollar stores.

Griff: You mention just now that you're in business college, can I ask where?

Jude: Sure. It's a school called SMU in Dallas. We live close by, my parents live close by and I never thought I'd end up that close to home, but it ended up working out and that's been great to be close enough to home to still be able to run the eBay business. My mom runs the day to day. She does a lot of clothing and fashion, but it's great to have her be a huge part of the business as well. She's got her side that she's really passionate about and she helps me with my day-to-Day as well.

Griff: Now one of the things that you're here for, we're talking about seller week, and these are the sellers that come to eBay for most of the week. And we're filming a lot of the sessions that are seller led sessions here right now. And I know you're here for that reason. And your topic is Volume Pricing. And I'm fascinated by Volume Pricing because to me, of all the tools that I can use as a buyer, which I've used in the past and as a seller, this one to me is just like a no-brainer. It's so effective if you have more than one item in a SKU for example, it's a great way to incentivize a buyer to purchase items. So I want to talk to you more about your process because everyone has a different strategy it seems when it comes to using Volume Pricing. Can you talk a little bit about how you use volume pricing and what some of the pros and some of the pitfalls to look out for?

Jude: I love Volume Pricing too, Griff. And one of the things when we started out, I remember there was this book I sold and, and my parents were like, oh you're only making 20 or 30 cents on this. And I was like, but everybody's buying it. It's, it's selling so quickly. And I think Volume Pricing is kind of a similar concept. There's some of the skews in our store that if somebody just buys one, we may only make a dollar. But if somebody buys five, we may make $40. You know, the savings on shipping on some of those items is really amazing and it lets us sell items that we might not otherwise be able to sell. They wouldn't be profitable. And so that's been really effective, you know, finding the right technique for every item in our store. For some, some items, volume pricing isn't the right technique. For the fashion items that my mom sells, they're, they're unique, right? She's only got one. We're not encouraging people to buy more than one. But on some of the office supplies items that people are constantly reordering, that's a great way to get them to save the planet in a sense. Because we're not constantly shipping the same thing to 'em and we're saving on shipping. They're saving a little bit on, on buying the item. So it's a win-win win.

Griff: Do you use volume pricing for every single listing that has multiple quantities of the same item?

Jude: It depends. If we have, I would say maybe the threshold's about 10, like if we have more than 10 and we can keep replenishing, then those are usually those listings where we would use volume pricing. There's some things, maybe it's a higher dollar amount. We only have a handful where we won't do that, where we don't think people are gonna buy multiples. But it never hurts to set a low amount, you can offer 2%, 5% and just see what sticks. But you know, as the item prices go up, the shipping savings are lower. So we have to price that in.

Griff: And that's the main factor, isn't it, when you're considering using volume pricing for a multi SKU item, that it's the shipping that is where you can end up saving or even making money.

Jude: Right? And then that's what I was mentioning earlier. If we sell just one of, say a $10 item, we make, make a dollar in profit, but if we sell five, you know, we may make $30 in profit. Who knows? And so the shipping is a huge factor in that and it lets us sell a wider variety of items. And so we're always considering with those smaller and lighter items, not what am I gonna make if I sell one, but what am I gonna make on the average sale? And for our replenish-able items, we offer free shipping. And so that's a way for us to continue to be able to offer that free shipping and not have to offer paid shipping with a discount and all that. I think that gets really complicated for buyers. So I like to just simplify it by saying, you get free shipping and if you buy multiple, then we'll give you a discount.

Griff: That really works. I've discovered myself as a seller when I've had the few times I have multis SKU items, especially if it's a, like you said, a limited quantity. I find it isn't so much that it is the quantity for me. It's the competition. So I have one item right now where there's a lot of sellers that tend to offer it seasonally and I had bought directly from the store an entire lot at a good price. But I find that if I offer free shipping and just work out what the different scenarios are gonna be for shipping, like how many can I reasonably fit into a envelope that I can ship by ground advantage or UPS Ground or how many can I fit into a Flat Rate or medium rate box, a UPS box, then I can make my determination about the discounts that I'll offer. And at the same time having to keep an eye on the competition, right? So you don't want to be overpriced. And that could result in, I think I've talked about on the podcast before, some really friendly competition with sellers who will then try to undercut you. I love when that happens because it keeps it real and live. Do you find that happens? Do you have competition where you have to take that into consideration as well?

Jude: I think that Volume Pricing is a way for us to stand out from the competition quite honestly. We have some of our items that, you know, we've sold for years and we have newer sellers come on the scene and start selling those items and they're not taking advantage of the Volume Pricing.

Griff: Shh. Don't tell them.

Jude: I know! And so on those items, that's a way for us to compete better and to get more sales. And you know, as a buyer, if you're looking through the search results and you see, oh, this person sold 10,000 of these versus well this person sold two, you're probably gonna go with the person who sold 10,000, even if that price is a little bit higher. And so I think just getting that volume in is great too. And I've always been a firm believer in that you don't always have to make money on the first few of the item or on all of the items, but you wanna make money on that SKU as a whole.

Griff: And the SKU on that's so important, isn't it? Right. And a lot of people focus, a lot of sellers will focus on the individual transactions within that SKU and feel like, oh, you know, I have to get this amount for every time I make a sale and it's the entire SKU that matters.

Jude: Right? And it's so easy, Griff to get caught up in, oh, I didn't make money on this thing, I lost money, whatever. But I think of it as not even just on the s skew level. I mean that's, that's one way to look at it. But as a business as a whole. Sometimes I'll buy things that don't work out and that's just a cost of doing business. You know, some things are gonna fail and that's okay. Maybe I sell it for less than I bought it for and lose a little bit of money. But the product that does go on to sell a thousand of that SKU, wildly successful. And that's what business is all about. And that's what I love about eBay is the trial and error and it's seeing what people love.

Griff: I do too. We talked about, and we're talking about the Volume Pricing feature on eBay, which I believe that's your session is gonna be about.

Jude: Yes. So it's, it's quite a long title. We're talking about volume, pricing, promotions, oh, seller initiated offers, all the things that you can do to really grow your store. But volume pricing is one of the biggest things that we take advantage of as a store for sure.

Griff: I'm gonna ask you about the others then, because there's, for every seller there seems to be a different strategy for using, for example, promotions. How do you use them? What, what is your strategy and tactics for using promotions for your particular inventory?

Jude: Volume Pricing is is obviously a really big one for us. For my mom who does more of the single quantity for SKU items, she takes advantage of the sale events and markdowns, that's pretty big for her. Trying to move old inventory. She's got a lot of clothes and like we were saying earlier, some things stick, some things don't. And so you've gotta just be willing to, okay, this thing hasn't sold for a year. We've gotta, we've gotta clear it out. And so she'll run some sales. Sometimes I'll run sales on new items if I'm trying to gain traction, but maybe don't want to set the standard for that price being so low maybe gives people 10% off as we're introducing a new item and gain momentum in the search that way. That's been one of the big ones for us. One of the things we recently switched to paid shipping on clothing actually as a way to try to balance out those buyers' remorse returns. I mean, people, I'm guilty of it myself. Will order more clothes than they need knowing they're gonna return the stuff that doesn't fit or that they don't like and stuff like that. And I think that's just adapting to a changing environment, changing consumer behavior. And so offering discounts when people buy multiple things on the shipping to still kind of give that free shipping incentive, but trying to protect ourselves returns wise on some of those items.

Griff: Yeah, I think there's a misconception among a lot of sellers that they feel like eBay is telling them or almost kind of mandating, well you must use free shipping. You must use free shipping. And I want to clear that up while we have this opportunity and thank you for bringing that up. It's not what we're telling you you have to do. What it can do is it can help you in a particular category, but you need to, as a seller to test whether it's gonna work for you. We don't want you offering free shipping and then losing money that's not gonna serve anyone. Free shipping is a strategy that you can employ depending on your own needs as a seller, your own business setup. I'm glad we cleared that up.

Jude: . Yeah, My mom and I talked about that forever. Should we offer free shipping on the close? Yeah, not, and ultimately she decided to go forward and try it and I'm glad she did to not offer the free shipping to offer a minimal paid shipping. We're not charging anything crazy, but just that little bit of shipping I think makes people think about doing the constant returns and the, I'll just order a bunch of stuff, which, you know, going back to the sustainability thing we were talking about earlier, I think that's good to put that in our mindset because we are really just changing the way we buy and not thinking about that impact that we could have, not only on the seller's bottom line, but on on the environment too.

Griff: Can you talk a little bit about how that idea of sustainability and reuse governs the way you conduct business in your business model?

Jude: Quite honestly, when we first started out, we were doing things that were very sustainable, but I never thought of it in that way. The more and more I think about it though, I think about our business. I'm thinking we are really giving a second life to so many of these items and saving them from going to the landfill and giving someone else the opportunity to use them. And in turn they're also getting a discount over what they'd pay to have that item new. One of the things we do too, in addition to the sustainable fashion, 'cause a lot of our fashion is secondhand and we're saving that from going to the landfill. We have a lot of refurbished electronics and some of that stuff we get in people the same return issue. They use it for the day, they decide they don't like it and they return it and it's practically like new, but stores are getting rid of it 'cause they don't wanna deal with it, they can't resell it. And so we're taking this, we're basically resetting the item, maybe cleaning it a little bit, sealing it back up and sending it to the buyer. In that case, we're saving on the e-waste that we're putting out there. But I think we are trying to be more conscious of that because as you mentioned, it's a big concern, especially with Gen Z buyers. And I think that's one of the great things about eBay that we don't see on these other marketplaces or these other shopping platforms as a concern for sustainability. It's almost like their seconds are coming to eBay for a chance at sustainability, which I think is a great thing.

Griff: Do you find that your buyers now tell you in whatever way that they have, that this is an important concern and a factor that they use when they're shopping, regardless if it's on or offline or with you or another seller? That sustainability of the product is gonna be really important part of the decision making process to purchase?

Jude: I think there are groups of people who, that is a big concern for. I've talked to people before, other clothing sellers who are also clothing buyers. I've talked to friends who just are really passionate about sustainable fashion and I think for some people that is a concern. But for better or for worse, I think for most people the primary concern is the cost. And if there's a way for them to save money. And also in the people in my generation, it's having something that not everybody else has. We like fashion that we can't just go into a store and and find, so then I don't end up at a dinner or something with somebody who's, or two other people who've got the same shirt as I do, right? As much as we like to think of ourselves as the generation that's gonna save the earth, I think sustainability is a concern, but it's not always the primary concern motivated by money or style, maybe first and then sustainability second. But there is a segment of the population that is looking for that sustainability, I think.

Griff: Do you find ways to actually include that message of the important sustainability in any of your business presentation, your item presentation or your marketing?

Jude: Honestly, in a lot of our descriptions we put things in there like, you're saving this from going to the landfill or buy two and, and we'll ship them together and we'll save some of the impact to the earth on some of those volume listings items. So we do try to ask people to consider that, but I don't know if that's what they're looking for. Primarily if there were maybe a sustainability label, uh, that went along with those used items, maybe that would help people to, uh, to look at it differently. But I think people who are looking for used, there's some people who I don't think they'll buy used no matter what. They always want new. But I think people who are looking for you, some of them are looking for the cost savings, but some of them are looking for the sustainability aspect too.

Griff: And if they're not looking, it doesn't hurt to remind them, Hey, you're actually helping out here.

Jude: It could be that thing that they, maybe they're 99% of the way there. We're giving them the last 1%. Who knows?

Griff: Keeping it out of the landfill. Okay, I'll buy it! Your mother Lynell sells more of one of a kind items. A lot of our audience, that's the kind of merchandise they sell. What would you do to advise somebody who is entering that same sphere on eBay to better, not guarantee, but at least give them a foundation for success?

Jude: We talked about earlier the importance of being willing to make mistakes and learn. And I think that is huge, but something else I always like to say is sell what you are an expert in and what you're passionate about. There's a lot of fads that you can make quick cash in, but if you want to build a long-term business, you really want to sell the things that you know and that you as a person, as an individual, not as a business person are passionate about. I think electronics for me are something I've always loved. I've always loved office supplies. I still remember I had a neighbor who brought me a basket of office supplies when I was like seven and I was excited for Christmas, It was the best gift I got. My uncle got me an Office Depot gift card and I was like, oh man!

Griff: Jude, you're such a nerd. .

Jude: Maybe. Maybe. But I think that knowledge and that passion has applied so well in the stuff that I do because I'm like, oh man, you know, carbon copy forms. I used to love those and still still love carbon copy forms. Let's sell some carbon copy forms.

Griff: Wait, do do people still use carbon copy forms?

Jude: They do.

Griff: Wow.

Jude: Yeah, and I think one of the beautiful things about eBay is there's things people are looking for that they can't find, find in a regular store and we're able to get it to 'em quickly. But people do still use carbon copy forms. You know, we have people collect rent or stuff like that who don't want to do it on the computer, you know, they just do it the old fashioned way. But one of our best sellers honestly.

Griff: Well Jude, I want to thank you for coming into the studio. I know it's been a busy couple days here on campus and I want to thank you for coming in, not just to the podcast, but giving your week time over to helping us make eBay Open the special event it is.

Jude: Thank you Griff It really, it's an honor to be here and if you would've told me a year ago or two years ago, or definitely seven years ago, that I'd be here at eBay, I wouldn't have believed you. So it's really great to be here.

Griff: Well we're, we appreciate it. Jude Lugo is the owner of J & L Making A Difference on eBay. And as we always do, I'll include a link to Jude’s store in the summary for episode 275.

Brian: You got questions?

Griff: Of course you do. And guess who's got the answers? We do!

Brian: We do.

Griff: We hope we have answers. Brian, our first question in this episode this week is about the eBay mobile app and I was wondering if you wouldn't mind doing the honors?

Brian: Of course. And this is from Brenda who wrote to podcast@ebay.com. I've been on eBay since 1998 and really appreciate your podcast anyway. I would love to use my phone and the app to create my listing drafts, but every time I hit the sell one like this, the default setting is for auction, which I never do. Is there some setting I'm missing to set my default listing preference to buy it now with best offer turned on? Also, I've recently started using Terapeak for research. Yes, I'm an old dog trying to learn new tricks. Well you go girl !

Griff: It's so unlike you.

Brian: I have kids.

Griff: Okay.

Brian: But don't see a way to do that on the eBay app. There also doesn't seem to be an option for sell one like this with the Terapeak result. I use the Sell Similar or Sell One Like This feature exclusively because it simplifies the process so much and saves a ton of time. Am I missing things or what? Thank you for your help and I'd love a new mug or whatever swag you're offering when you get this message. The mug with the speaker sounds cool.

Griff: Oh doesn't it?

Brian: It does. It would also be great if you guys had a regular segment on what's selling really well right now and sourcing opportunities for sellers in the boonies. Thanks again Brenda. Whose user ID is Sewing Mech on eBay.

Griff: That's an unusual one, isn't it?

Brian: Like sewing mechanic.

Griff: I got this question, Brenda's question and I didn't know the answer right off 'cause I never started my listings on the mobile and when I went to, I discovered that she's right, of course she know she's pretty perceptive that you start a listing on eBay and the default it defaults immediately to auction. So I wrote to the mobile team and I heard back from Morgan on that team and this is the response they had. Thanks for reaching out Griff. When it comes to the default price format on native, which is their terminology for mobile, we've been experimenting with which format works best for sellers by seller segments or categories and optimizing listing conversion into an order. And on the other hand, we're also experimenting whether we will always use a seller's last use format for any new listing being created. With that being said, we haven't concluded yet what would be the right approach at this moment. There's no way for sellers to set a preferred format on native listing app. My advice to Morgan and team is stop overthinking this. Just give sellers the option and don't worry about it.

Brian: Let them choose.

Griff: Exactly. One of the things I thought Brenda could do, and it's not gonna be the easiest thing, and a lot of folks don't know this, but you can go to the web browser on your phone, either Chrome or Safari, you can type in ebay.com, scroll to the bottom of that page in the web browser on your mobile phone and select classic site and that will bring up the full eBay website at which time you can actually go and you can list items. The thing is, it's not ideally set up for the real estate of a a mobile phone screen, but with a little pinching and expanding with your two fingers and scrolling, you can actually start a listing there with your own format. And if you have templates set up, which is what I do, so I have a bunch of templates based on the categories I tend to sell in and use those.

Brian: I find I can do that on my iPad and it's, it's pretty convenient. But I think to your point on the phone, you gotta be willing to pinch and scroll.

Griff: Right. So if you have a a tablet, you can do it that way as well as Brian has said. But yeah, Brenda, I wish I could tell you something, but unfortunately, like Morgan says right now, there's, there's no way to set that and hopefully the team will come up with a decision. I think the decision is just choose a format and let the seller do it.

Brian: Let the seller decide how they want it to work intuitively. She also had a question about Terapeak, I think.

Griff: Yes.

Brian: So as for Terapeak and there not being one like this, the results in a Terapeak search can show up in one of two possible ways, live or ended. For any results that are still live, a seller can always click on the link for the listing and then locate the Sell One Like This link on the listing page for listings that are no longer live. That actual listing page no longer exists. So a Sell One Like This option would not be possible.

Griff: Yeah, and that makes sense. And by live by the way, it means that it's still on the site. It may have closed, it may not be actually available for sale, but if you look at the results, there are listing results for a lot of these searches in Terapeak where there's a link, the item title is linkable, it's because it's still on the site. I believe it's after 90 days, it disappears.

Brian: 90 days.

Griff: And so that's why there's no option on the Terapeak page is because the vast number of return results are ended listings that have been eliminated from eBay except for the thumbnail that you see in Terapeak and the title. There's no description, there's no other information. So it'd be impossible without all that information to actually provide a link on the Terapeak page that says Sell One Like It.

Brian: That makes sense. It's also like you pointed out, not enough information to create a listing as a Sell One Like It.

Griff: And Brenda finally for what's selling really, really well at the moment. Well that'd be hard to summarize. As there are literally thousands and thousands of items that are selling really well.

Brian: There are.

Griff: It'd be really difficult to do. I know in the past we've listed some items that are projected to be like hot holiday items. Yes, we've done that.

Brian: On seller news. Um, in the announcements. I know Adam Ireland will sometimes do a post with like what are hot items.

Griff: Talking about what's selling really well Now there are not just thousands, there are literally millions of items that are selling well on eBay. How do we determine?

Brian: You know, we could flip this around though.

Griff: What do you mean?

Brian: Like it's hard for us to say, right?

Griff: Yeah, it's hard.

Brian: Our listeners could actually write us in what is selling.

Griff: You're a genius.

Brian: Tell us.

Griff: Tell us what's selling well and then we'll pass it on to Brenda.

Brian: We can just mention it and maybe we'll mention your user ID at the same time and that might even get you to sell more.

Griff: You know, what would be even more controversial is talking about what's not selling at all and using examples which would, I think some sellers would get really angry. So we found this listing and none of this, these things are not selling at all. No one wants these items!

Brian: Though you have to be careful with some of that stuff.

Griff: Why?

Brian: Because it, some items have really long tails and meaning that it takes them a long time to turn over and sell. Yeah, like books. And you could imagine something like an antique car. Someone might have a part for a 1958 Chevy and there's only so many out there and the guy doesn't care that it takes them four years to sell that part because he knows he is gonna get top dollar when he sells it and he's willing to wait.

Griff: I always worry about people who go into like a thrift store and just willy-nilly, pick up tchotchkes and then get upset because they don't sell right away. Right? You have to, you have to be discerning, you have to do the research, you have to have somewhat of an eye. You want to know what it is you're buying and what the demand is and that'll help you with sourcing. And as far as sourcing in the boonies, I don't know what to tell you. Where do you source in the boonies?

Brian: If you're very discerning, you can use a site like eBay to source.

Griff: Yes you can. And I do.

Brian: And you know, the other thing is it's gonna be like drives to estate sales and all of that stuff. That's gotta be more difficult.

Griff: Yeah. Looking for sources where you're not near an urban area can be a a challenge. That's true. So Brenda, sell your house. Move to the city.

Brian: No, don't do that.

Griff: Problem solved.

Brian: Enjoy the fresh air.

Griff: There you go. See there's benefits and cons, pros and cons to everything. Our next email comes from an eBay seller who writes to us all the time. Hi Terry. We're very happy to hear from you. And this time it's not a question, but it is, it's an interesting topic. So I'm going to include it. He says, hi guys, this falls under the category. Don't tell grandpa how to milk the ducks. Okay, , Very carefully. As noted in one of your recent podcasts, buyers will occasionally make specific requests on how their purchases should be packaged. And it happened to me recently. Again, the buyer purchased a game and post-purchase said, please bubble wrap it and put it in a box for shipping. Okay. At least they said, please, as suggested on your podcast, I replied, I do package securely check my feedback, but I may not necessarily use bubble wrap. I don't use bubble wrap says Terry, or usually styrofoam, peanuts as Griff will be happy to know. And yes I am. I have a source where I get free sheets of foam packing material, very light and about the size of a baby blanket. They work quite well for me. Mazel Tov. Terry says, still not satisfied the buyer asks me, and this is where I, I lose my stuff. The buyer asked me to use quote padded envelopes from USPS. You can cut those up and wrap them with that. That's what I do. Says the buyer when he sells OMG, says Terry, I really wanted to reply pointing out that misuse may be a violation of federal law, which is printed on the padded USPS envelopes. But I let this pass with no further comment. Thanks for all you do and hope you guys had a nice Christmas, Terry.

Brian: Well thanks Terry. It sounds like you had an interesting buyer experience.

Griff: And people do this and it drives me crazy. I know you want save money so you don't want to invest in bubble wrap. So you go to the USPS or your order from USPS, a bunch of their patented envelopes and then you use those instead of using them for mailers, you use them to pack an item and you don't think there's anything wrong with it. But I disagree.

Brian: I think they might be the same people who complain when the price of postage goes up.

Griff: There you go. USPS gives you those to use for their specific use, which is not as packing material. Right? So I source from other sites, Brenda and then I sell on eBay and from these other sites, which tend to be more amateur sellers, I don't care. Send me hate mail. That's what they are most of the time. They'll use among other things, USPS envelopes that weren't, they're not second use, you can tell that they're in great condition. They actually, because you can order priority mail supplies from USPS for free if you have an account there, it's really easy to set up. And then they use this instead of investing in bubble wrap. Or my favorite, which is tissue. Tissue actually for items that don't weigh a lot, can be the perfect packing medium for filling and a void. I buy the eBay tissue sheets from the eBay shipping store and I use those mostly. And plus they're environmentally friendly. They're compostable. They're gonna dissolve into the landfill. Whereas that plastic bubble wrap or the plastic USPS bubble mailers not so much.

Brian: Plastic will eventually become a rock. The padded envelopes though, I, one thing you did mention pretty quickly, but I, that would be the only time you could use it really if let's say you buy a lot of stuff and you wanna collect them for the times that you sell and use 'em as padding material, go for it. Well, but even then it doesn't come across as professional as a seller.

Griff: No, it doesn't.

Brian: You know, the goal is to try and get repeat buyers and one way you do that is in the quality of your shipping and packing and communication.

Griff: We have discussions where people say, well I do that because I'm reusing it and uh, you know, that's more echo friendly. And I say, no, no, no it's not. And I'll tell you why. It doesn't matter how many times they get used. Eventually that stuff gets into the trash flow and it's gonna go to a landfill. Or if it's compostable or or truly recyclable, it's going then be recycled or reused. Or like tissue paper can be, I don't think actually if you put it in with your recyclables, that's paper and I think it goes off with cardboard and gets reused. So I think it's a mistake to fool yourself into thinking that you're being echo friendly. And there's nothing that screams I'm an amateur more than..

Brian: A cut up USPS package.

Griff: Right, exactly. You might as well just change your user ID on whatever site you're selling to. I have a rank amateur.com or whatever your user ID is. So, and I know you're gonna write, you're gonna write to podcasts in ebay.com and you're gonna be outraged that I said that. But look, what we're trying to do here is we're trying to make you professional sellers that are, you're proud of your business and you take pride in every aspect of your business and you want your buyers to feel that way about you as well. And you know, using pizza boxes or cut up USPS envelopes to pack your items. It's just nothing wrong with being an amateur. Nothing wrong at all. Admit it. Own up to it.

Brian: Well I do think this, you know, Terry has given us a great idea though.

Griff: What's that?

Brian: Well, if other listeners have suggestions or guidance for our sellers under the category of don't tell grandpa how to milk the ducks, send them in! .

Griff: Okay. You heard Brian. podcast@ebay.com or (888 )723-4630. So Terry, thanks for sending that in. That really made our week. That was funny.

Brian: And finally, this week's last question comes from seller Angela and it's about a perennially popular topic. Hello, thank you so much for your podcast. I find you guys entertaining. I have learned so much from you. Please keep doing what you do. I'm hoping you have a suggestion about a step that seems to really slow me down. Figuring out what size a piece of clothing is.

Griff: Uh oh.

Brian: Frequently the size label is missing from used clothing, even if it has a label a size from 40 years ago is often meaningless in today's standards. And between current brands, sizing still varies. I always provide measurements within the listing so the buyer can review it to determine a proper fit. But I think a letter or number size is important to get a buyer to initially find and look at the item. Is there a tool that allows you to punch in a clothing items measurements and have it kick out what size it is based on those measurements? If not, has eBay ever thought of creating their own size standards and building their own sizing tool that does just that? Maybe there are other suggestions I'm not thinking of to more quickly use measurements to be able to list something as the best size. Thank you so much for your help and I would love it if my very first piece of eBay swag came from you, Angela, user id, Angjjur_94.

Griff: And her eBay store is Brave Vintage and she put in parentheses, (Griff, don't roast me over this word) Haha. I'm past that now. As it was a losing battle.

Brian: He's not really past it.

Griff: Well, I may make the occasional comment, but I ran the white flag up the poll and it comes to the misuse of the word vintage, which is now global. They're misusing it everywhere so you know.

Brian: Hey, we even use it on our site.

Griff: I know we do it. I was so embarrassed when I saw that. Anyway. Well, you've hit a nerve and I'll tell you why I, I don't mean about vintage, but about sizing because everything you said is true. There's no standardization, not only just across brands, but within brands themselves. I've seen brands that, uh, I'll give you an example, territory ahead and as you mentioned over time what they considered an XL has changed in a man's shirt over the last 10, 15 years. So there's no way for there to be a standardization. So my advice is to do what you're doing, always provide the measurements. And if there's no tag that indicates a letter size, like S-M-L-X-L-X-X-L, put those measurements in the, in the title so people know, make room for something that says, for example, a man's shirt. Make sure you have room that says a 52 inch chest. Put it in the item specifics as a custom if it's not already there as a standard, put it in the description. A lot of sellers do something that I never really did, but I think is really helpful. And that's putting pictures of the item with a measuring tape or a yardstick where you can actually see how wide it is or how long it is or what the pant waist is or what the dress size is. It's the only way to do it. And one other thing you can do is if it's a standard piece of clothing where the tag is missing, but there are other examples of that same piece out there on eBay or somewhere else. Look for something that's the same measurements and then safely put in. This happens to be in Excel, but the tag is missing. But always indicate that there's no tag with the letter sizing and it's so people don't ask you where's the letter sizing.

Brian: And the other piece though is she did mention like sometimes older clothing has the tag, but she's smart enough to know, okay, but that wouldn't be that size today. So what do you use? You have to use the letter it's tagged with and then in your title or in your description, make it clear that it's an older vintage item.

Griff: And if you're a woman, because it's not so much a problem with men usually, but if you're a woman, you know that a size four or size six dress from 10 years ago is not the same today. Anyway. So yeah, Angela, it's always gonna be a problem. And the solution is that you as a seller should provide as much information about the size as you can so that your buyer can make an informed decision.

Brian: She sounds like she's doing the right thing.

Griff: She is. She is doing the right thing. I, I think one of the things you learn when you're selling on eBay is even if you're making the information as clear as possible, you have to be prepared for the buyer who just doesn't read. And they are out there, they make snap decisions whether they're on their phone or when they're desktop. And I've had this happen to me twice now. I sell these little samples of a very hard to find highly sought after men's cologne from like the year 2000. It was when Tom Ford took over Gucci and he came out with a line of fragrances that were only in production for a short period of time. Gucci Pour Homme and there was a version one and a version two. They're really highly sought after. So these little 0.17 ounce samples are worth some money. It's not a few bucks. I can sell them with no problem for about 30 to 50 bucks, depending on the market, right? I've had two buyers in the last two months who have bought them and then returned them because they thought they were getting a $500 bottle of cologne for 40 bucks.

Brian: Of course they did because

Griff: They didn't look at the pictures, they didn't read the title, they didn't read where it says sample size in big, big letters. They didn't read the description, they didn't read the item specifics. In their mind they thought, I've just found a treasure. And they buy it and then they get it. And the first buyer was really disappointed in the seller who was obviously trying to trick me and, and I said, look, buyer, I just wrote back. I said, buyer, look at the listing. And then I heard nothing from them. They left me positive feedback and then I just had one. Same thing, but they didn't say anything. They said, just purchased by mistake. They're gonna happen. No matter how explicit you make your listing in this look, it's part of doing a business. I don't get mad anymore. I just sort of do a Talmudic shrug and say it happens. Hey, what are you gonna do? Move on. But I gotta thank everyone for sending in these great questions this week because that was a lot of fun answering them.

Brian: Those were some good questions. Well we depend on your questions.

Griff: We do.

Brian: So call us on (888) 723-4630 and leave your question on the machine.

Griff: That's (888) 723-4630. Call that hotline anytime of the day. And you can leave your question on the machine and we love to put it on the air.

Brian: If you're not a call on the phone person, you can email us at podcast@ebay.com. That's podcast@ebay.com.

Griff: And now you know it, you're ready for it. It's your weekly three point podcast checklist.

Brian: Check the announcement board at ebay.com/announcements for UpToDate Seller News every day.

Griff: And you heard Jude, if you have multi quality listings and you aren't using Volume Pricing, now's the week that you start doing so every time.

Brian: Maybe a New Year's resolution.

Griff: Yeah. One of those

Brian: Need to review anything in this episode? It's easy. Check the transcript for this and all episodes for follow up on what you've heard and to find the links we referenced during the episode.

Griff: Oh, Brian, I'm so excited about our next episode because we're gonna be talking with eBay seller Paul Apollonia. You know Paul?

Brian: I do know Paul.

Griff: He runs a seller group. He's a great guy. And we're gonna be talking about death piles and he has got advice on how to make them disappear and turn them into money.

Brian: Cool.

Griff: Death piles.

Brian: Looking forward to that. And we'd like to, again, thank our guest this week, Jude Lugo.

Griff: The eBay for Business Podcast is produced and distributed by Libsyn and podCast411. See you next week, Brian.

Brian: See you.