Regards,
Simply-the-best-for-you Volunteer Community Mentor
In yet another step in eBay's recent strategy shift back to consumer-seller roots, starting April 8, private (non-business) sellers in the UK will no longer pay final value or regulatory fees on clothing sales.
How does free selling for pre-owned clothes work?
Selling pre-owned clothes on ebay.co.uk is now free for UK based private sellers, which means you’ll no longer have to pay transaction fees (final value fee and regulatory operating fee) when these items sell.
For clothes listings, private sellers will only incur fees for any of the following:
Optional listing upgrades
Sending items internationally
Using Promoted Listings to place advertisements
https://pages.ebay.co.uk/fashion-selling/
Interestingly, they are not limiting this by condition. Both new with tags or used condition qualify, as eBay defines pre-owned clothes as "items you no longer want or need in a variety of conditions, for example an outfit that no longer fits, an unwanted gift, or vintage fashion that needs a new home. These items can be new or used."
eBay is clearly responding to recent news from Mercair and Depop, subtly pointing out there are no selling or buying fees and no need to request a withdrawal that may incur additional fees.
But it seems to be more than just a reactionary move as I've been tracking eBay's increased C2C focus and initiatives since February and it appears to be a key component of Jamie's plans to try to meet the forecasts they've given to Wall Street to see a return to GMV growth by Q3 or Q4 this year.
I won't be surprised if they don't bring this to Australia as well, since they've also stepped up pre-loved fashion efforts there, and we may even see something similar in the US by the end of the year.
@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:@valueaddedresource As with most things that require seller compliance, there will always be sellers who feel the rules don't apply to themselves. Enforcement will be imperfect, but I imagine ebay will give it a try. The other thing I foresee is a lot of non clothing items in clothing categories. Time will tell how big a problem this stuff will be.
I suspect one of the reasons for this change is that ebay probably has internal data proving what we small sellers have said for years...many small sellers are also buyers, and ebay probably has some data that convinces them that adding new sellers will be an effective way to add new buyers. So it isn't just about adding more clothing to an already crowded category, it's about adding more people spending on clothing (and other stuff).
I like @dhbookds idea of establishing the baseline numbers today, and using that to see what kind of growth occurs. Of course, it will be imperfect, because IF sales actually increase at a faster pace, sales could hide some of the growth. But we can get a nice rough idea anyway I think.
As noted, I think ebay is also anticipating that growth in an already crowded category will give more sellers incentive to use PL to stand out...so they expect to see PL fees grow.
It will certainly be interesting to keep an eye on this, as something similar could eventually come here.
I do note they emphasize the use of AI for the listings, and God knows what that will do....so far, I haven't been impressed with ebay's AI for descriptions. It will be interesting to see what the Brits think of it...
@my-cottage-books-and-antiques
I think you and @dhbookds have hit some key points ... I think (IMHO) one of the real pushes is for Sellers to feel like they need to use PLS to move their items. Listings can and are manipulated for visibility (or lack there of) in an attempt to have Sellers "think" they need to promote to sell. And I think smaller sellers wind up losing the most with this. I know I have. After many years of using PLS and then watching it lose its effectiveness (unless you use eBay's inflated "Suggested rates") from early 2022 for 2 years I stopped using it in 4th quarter last year ... I am waiting to see how long it takes sales in general AND BIN sales in specific to rebound to pre-2022 levels. Counting 4th quarter last year I am in month 7 of waiting. 2023 was over 10K behind in sales dollars and this year has started with about the same lost sales %. I have switched more items to auction format and March saw the following numbers (based on over 100 sales):
78.3% Auction sales
8.3% BIN sales
13.3% Sales form Offers I sent (NOT the regular Best offer feature, I DON'T use that)
Sell through rate tanked forcing inventory to be moved elsewhere. Sadly, I think this may be a trend for many smaller Sellers. While I love Selling on eBay as my first choice the operative word is "selling" ...
@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:@mr_lincoln I'd love to see ebay's projections for this, because ebay is giving up a revenue stream (the FVFs) , and when they do that, they generally only do so if they feel they can , at the very least, replace that revenue stream. That means they are expecting to see a certain increase in PL revenue, and a certain increase in overall purchasing , primarily from new buyers and from existing sellers who feel they can afford to buy more now that they aren't paying FVFs. Will those numbers be enough to replace (or even exceed) the existing FVF revenue? I'm guessing ebay thinks so.
@my-cottage-books-and-antiques
I don't know what prices used clothing brings for everyday seasonal stuff but that is most of what eBay is potentially giving up. As it relates to my experience with PLS and suppressed listings on BIN items, well, my BIN items are typically NOT the high dollar items that I have sold over the years. The other part of the equation is eBay has OVER 1.7 BILLION listings worldwide. So looking at the math and say less than a million listings and forfeiting FVFs on them is not a big deal ... I believe we are talking about less than 1% of the total listings on the site. It is really a drop in the bucket.
@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:@mr_lincoln I believe ebay's expenses have been increasing (one reason they slashed employee numbers) and so , while I agree this will represent a relatively small part of ebay's overall gross income, my point is: ebay does not give up ANY existing revenue stream without something to replace it. In this case, that replacement could be based on a projection that this change will increase ad revenue and actual sales (including clothing sellers buying non clothing items). Or...the other shoe will eventually drop, and ebay will increase FVFs for some other categories, or make some otehr change. But one way or another, they will definitely try to replace or even increase the revenue they will lose due to this change. The one thing we can be pretty sure of is: unlike mercari, they won't try to replace it with buyer fees.
@my-cottage-books-and-antiques
Correct, I somewhat addressed that part of it in a post up thread with my experience with PLS and eBay's Suggested rates. While I did my own testing, verified what was being done I had no problem walking away from the use of PLS because if became ineffectual others may not make that decision. Some will keep using it and raise their ad rates to the Suggested levels and the venue will enjoy total fees in the area of 25% to 30% ... and to your point, yes, they will recover what seemingly given up with regard to the UK thing.
@onefootflippers wrote:For anyone serious about ebay something like this is a bad change.
Why not flood an already flooded market with more listings from people who aren't selling for profit AND give them a financial edge against the for profit sellers, which would be basically everyone reading this forum.
Why would any of you want that?
Good question ... for myself I would prefer an across the board drop-in fees for ALL Sellers by some %. Something like that might jump start sales again for many Sellers.
Your point about saturated categories makes perfectly good business sense ...
@valueaddedresource Thank you for tagging me & sorry for the delay in response, I have been traveling for a couple of weeks & pretty much offline. I had no idea about this & will be watching closely. Selfishly, I'd like to see it implemented, but I guess that depends on how "private" is defined. I haven't read everything in detail, as I've only been back 2 days.
I will say that I suspect partly this is to stop the bleeding to Posh & other sites. I contribute a bit to Reddit fashion subs & NEVER, EVER is eBay mentioned on there as a place to buy or sell. They talk about PM & Mercari & occasionally others, but no one ever mentions eBay. It's honestly as though eBay doesn't exist for clothing, if you're under 40.
@valueaddedresource Oh, I wondered when that was starting. I'll check it out when I have some time. unforunately, the travels were not for fun & my life is still not my own right now, so very little time. But thanks for making me aware!
