It's September 2023 - Are you prepping for the Christmas rush? Plans for the next 4-6 weeks?

[rosachs]

September, I'm told, is the start of Christmas Prep for sellers, and the start of Bargain Planning for buyers.  I've never really had Christmas gift type items - maybe a few a couple years back - but I still like to hear what plans others have to get ready to go, Go, GO!

My plans?  To not spend more than I have, to not overeat, to plan with the grands every chance I get, and to continue prepping for retirement in 2024 or 2025.  Oh, and to keep adding new inventory to replace the sold, and working to get to 750 units each in two of my accounts so I can rotate the stock monthly.

-Bob.

[movieman630]

YEP.  I'm prepping to put my store on "time away" from December 3rd to the New Year!  I do it every year and love it!  It's so refreshing not having to deal with anything for 30 days!  Especially since it's the most hectic time of year. 

Ever since December of 2020 when the USPS lost thousands of dollars worth of my items I decided to take off the month of December.  It works out great!  I don't sell "gift" items anyway so it really doesn't effect me.  I look at it this way.  Why should I add to my tax burden in the last few weeks of the tax year.  This helps get my new year off to a good start too when I open back up.

I highly recommend to anyone who can... Take some time off at the end of the year!  Your sanity is the most precious gift of all.

[gloryglorygifts]

Tis the season! Some of my items I keep up all year and get sales on. I have sold ornaments, nativities and magnets in July and August. Other larger items I do have available only during the Christmas season. Yes, I will be getting them all in stock in the next week or so. This is one of our busiest seasons but people buy lots of Christmas items throughout the year as well.

[debbiet22]

Bob, Covid seems to be going around right now in our area.  I may have had it a few weeks ago.  I had a headache, eyes hurt and burned, sore throat.  No fever, aches or pains.  It could have been allergies but the pain behind my eyes was intense.  I saw where the new strain of Covid has different symptoms.  I just took flu medicine for a few days and it helped.  I will still get the booster.  

50% of my sales have been Send Offer.  Last month was better.  This month not as good and I have been listing new items every week.  I have all my Fall items listed and have already started listing Christmas items.  I can't sit too long at my computer because it makes my back worse so I just list 2 or 3 at a time.    I am not too optimistic about the upcoming months with the strikes and government shut down.  People will be selective on what they buy.  Things like dinnerware and glassware are not a "need".   I will just continue to list and "Send Offers" since that is what helping sales.

[dbfolks166mt]

Bob, Covid seems to be going around right now in our area.  I may have had it a few weeks ago.  I had a headache, eyes hurt and burned, sore throat.  No fever, aches or pains.  It could have been allergies but the pain behind my eyes was intense.  I saw where the new strain of Covid has different symptoms.  I just took flu medicine for a few days and it helped.  I will still get the booster.  

It's been RSV in our area especially among older individuals 50+. I managed to contract it in June along with STREP throat at the same time. Really bad two weeks. 

50% of my sales have been Send Offer.  Last month was better.  This month not as good and I have been listing new items every week.  I have all my Fall items listed and have already started listing Christmas items.  I can't sit too long at my computer because it makes my back worse so I just list 2 or 3 at a time.    I am not too optimistic about the upcoming months with the strikes and government shut down.  People will be selective on what they buy.  Things like dinnerware and glassware are not a "need".   I will just continue to list and "Send Offers" since that is what helping sales.

[chapeau-noir]

I'm masking up at the gym again - locally people are starting to mask up a bit more, but that's something that's not unusual. I had Covid last September and it was April before I finally recovered from the parosmia. I'll be doing a bunch of traveling this winter and don't want to get sick and go through that again. I was staying in England a month after I had Covid and all that good food at the pub tasted like paste 😣

I have a race on Oct 15 and after that I'll get my booster - I have to clear like 3 days in my calendar for those boosters as I always get sick. My immune system must be in rude health to make me so miserable. 

Strep AND Covid together sounds horrible!

[blurryrobot]

What rush?  There won't be any rush. 

My sales this September have been one-third what they were last September.  ONE. THIRD.   Literally 70% down.  Oct-Nov-Dec are never much better than September for me, never have been. 

There's no way up from here.  Only down, and eventually out.  

[candd205]

Now is definitely the time. It seems like my Christmas related items are getting more looks lately. Hope that turns in to sales.

[postcardcountry]

I've just been pluggin' along.  I ship Monday/Wednesday/Friday and since the middle of May have had at least one (usually more) to ship each of those days.

Since retiring at the end of April I have been listing more, many items from the pile in the garage and doing a better job of getting the few new purchases listed quickly rather than added to the pile in the garage.

I shut down in mid-December, the last day for non-priority items to ship and arrive before Christmas.  I unlist all my items and use the time to reprice, change tactics and implement the changes I have been thinking about for the year.  I used to wait until after the first of January to begin relisting.  Last year I had a lot ready for after Christmas so I started relisting then.  (thank you Sixbit).   Not sure when I will restart this year, I will wait and see.

[rosachs]

I had three sales to close out September, so my total was up from August, but it was a rather low bar to get over....

I'm continuing to prep new inventory/listings.  All three of the EOM sales were from newly listed stock, and I found a small staff of some really nice elongates.  Copper/Zinc, so they are nothing I would want for my own collection (I prefer all copper), and I try to prep 3-5 every other evening and keep them 'on ice' until the new month starts.  So now I've started listing them - not enough to use up the whole 250 freebies, but at least I'm heading in the right direction!

I think we're going to move the storage units to another facility.  The place I'm at now was super great when I was selling shoes (2001-2008/9), but there are new owners now and things are starting to slide.  It's been months since the access code pads were removed from the inside of the gates - you would enter your code to get in and turn off the alarms on your unit(s), and then enter it again when you leave to both open the gate and reset your alarms.  Now we have just one pad, just one functioning entrance/exit, and getting ahold of anyone to answer questions is proving difficult.  The other facility is new, and the owner/operator maintains an apartment above the office.  And their rates are better, so I'll be able to afford the 5x10 temperature unit I want for my sensitive collectibles.  I'm just not looking forward to renting at two places while we hustle stuff from one to the other.  We'll get the logistics worked out and then start giving it some really serious thought and scheduling.

What I'd really prefer is to sell the house, invest the proceeds in a new place with a big, detached garage/workshop/storage unit.  One final move and then we're done paying rent every month.  I'm pretty sure the loan for the slab and building would be lower than the rent on our units.

So now I start working on October scheduling and new stock.  One step at a time....

-Bob.

[debbiet22]

Sounds like everybody is steadily making progress.  Last month sales were good but so far this month I have already surpassed last months.  Just sold a large dinnerware set.  Will take forever to pack it.  It is going all the way to Oregon.  People are buying kitchen items and dinnerware.  Hubby said I will have to find some more online auctions but not many have been in our area the last month.  Hope it all continues...

[gloryglorygifts]

Bob? LOL. I hope that you are feeling much better!! 

[chapeau-noir]

@postcardcountry  I've found that starting listing again the day after Christmas (if I'm around) is a good strategy.

General: B&M and mall sales are up. There's talk in the trade press about the resurgence of real-world shopping - after Covid and lockdown people are realising how much they missed the lights and experience of the real-world versus the isolation of online shopping.  Stores here are busy.

[postcardcountry]

Can you imagine moving an entire public library in one day?  100,000 books or more plus furniture and those old card catalogs.  It helped that things were going 1/2 mile away but still....

things to look at -

1.   have the shelving in place at new unit(s)  -- actually you need two shelves already set up, once two shelves are empty at the old place they can be moved to the new place

2.  2 site managers  - one to oversee the loading from old location and one to oversee the unloading at new site

3.   two trucks - while is one loading, one is unloading

4.  boxes / items are transported by shelf into one of two trucks.  when they  arrive at the new place they go on the shelves in the same exact location they came out of

5.  lots of muscle (maybe day laborers) because you need a crew for each truck

what you spend in labor you will probably save in rental.  it takes working out some logistics.

organizing while loading is not permitted.  the goal is to get out of site a and into site b as rapidly as possible.  you can sort once you get to the cheaper place.

[my-cottage-books-and-antiques]

My plan is to keep listing on ebay, to do more with Social Media to drive traffic to ebay, but I'm also prepared to dip my toes into the multi channel waters if ebay does not do enough to market used and vintage this Holiday Season. We need buyers here, and no, sneaker and auto parts and luxury handbag buyers aren't what I really need to see.