Ep 289 || Unplanned Business Disruptions: One Seller’s Story

[podcast_team]

eBay Seller LaRee Peters' business was put on hold last year when she damaged her wrist. Learn how she recovered and the importance of having a business continuity plan in place. This week’s question is about discounts for Offers and Volume Pricing and if they can be combined.

Episode Links:
LaRee’s eBay Store
Recurring Links:
eBay for Business Podcast
eBay Seller Spotlight Podcast
eBay for Business Podcast Listener Survey
eBay Seller News Announcements
eBay for Business Facebook
Community Chat with eBay Staff
eBay Seller Center
eBay Help
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Seller Hub
eBay Events

Kayomi: I'm Kayomi Kayoshi.

Griff: I'm Griff, and this is the eBay for Business Podcast. Your virtual cornucopia of information and inspiration to help you start and manage and grow your business on the world's most powerful marketplace. And this is episode 289. We're inching towards 300 Kayomi.

Kayomi: You know it, it was nice seeing you a couple days ago, Griff in person.

Griff: Yeah, it was good to see you. We had a good time. We were all together in San Jose last week for Seller Week, where we had sellers from the Bay Area come in and attend different things. I was there for the seller panel and then the seller presentation. There were a lot of sellers there.

Kayomi: There were, I was impressed. And that whole night we had for the social, I forget how long it lasted, either two or three hours for the entire two or three hours I was speaking nonstop. So I mean, that was great for seller meetings. I think if you're located in the Bay Area, you should see a couple of chapters pop up across the entire Bay Area. So it was useful. It was good

Griff: For those of you who don't know what we're talking about. So in our team, Kayomi's main focus is on seller events, specifically seller initiated events or seller meetups as some people call them. And she manages that program now. And does a really good job at it.

Kayomi: Well, thank you Griff.

Griff: By the end there were at least a hundred or so sellers that showed up for that social. That was terrific. And then I know there was a seller dinner the next night and I didn't attend that, but you did, right?

Kayomi: I did. I did attend that. That went over really well. I think every eBay staff member that attended got a ton of great feedback. Yeah, I don't maybe it was also the environment, but we also got a lot of compliments too. And so that's great to hear that they're enjoying what we're doing and that we're succeeding at certain things. But then of course, we always want to hear where we can improve.

Griff: So all of the team members who were talking to sellers recorded that feedback onto a main document that's being circulated with not only among teams, but I think the, uh, leadership is going to be seeing some of this feedback as well. So yeah, it was a very productive week. It was great to see everyone and hopefully we can do it again in the next few months.

Kayomi: I'm excited. I think New York is coming up?

Griff: Oh, New York.

Kayomi: Yes.

Griff: Well, it's been a long time since I've been in New York City.

Kayomi: You and me both.

Griff: Well looking forward to that. But onward, we have a show to do.

Kayomi: Okay. Well, who's our guest this week?

Griff: Her name is LaRee Peters. She sells on eBay and she had an unexpected emergency last year that ended up disrupting her business. We're going to talk about how all sellers, all business people that eBay sellers in included, should have what's called a business continuity plan. Before we get to that, do you have any news?

Kayomi: I do have some news. USPS is back in the eBay news again this week. We are aware that many USPS domestic shipments are taking longer to be delivered than typical service standards. At this time, we are monitoring the network and we'll adjust estimated delivery dates as needed to ensure your buyers see the most accurate delivery time possible. If there are developments that impact your transactions at eBay, we will also update seller protections as needed. As always, thank you for selling on eBay. The eBay Shipping Team.

Griff: Yeah, I mean, they've said a mouthful, wasn't it you who mentioned it recently, that it's some operational change that USPS has made that's kind of threw a monkey wrench into delivery estimates?

Kayomi: It was something to do with their hub, some operational or like systemic change that they were doing that was causing this. Not sure if that's the same reasoning this time around, but who knows.

Griff: Last week there was some pretty extreme weather that could be disruptive on very localized areas across the country as well. And speaking of disasters like that, do you have a plan in place for your business, one, to handle unforeseen emergencies? If not, this week's seller guest story may be all the motivation you need to start putting one together.

Griff: All of us hope that in our lives everything goes well. There's never any tragedy. There's never unexpected obstacles thrown on our way. Of course we know that doesn't exist. And it's really important if you run a business to have something in place in case something unexpected happens. And our guest this week is LaRee Peters of Unique Valuables on eBay, and she has a story to tell about what happened to her and her business last year. So welcome LaRee.

LaRee: Hi Griff. Thanks for having me.

Griff: Tell us what you sell and how your business model is structured.

LaRee: I have been in business since 2008, just my husband and I on eBay, buying and selling. And then I graduated into consignment and that's where we're at today.

Griff: You said you were selling up till last year. What happened last year?

LaRee: Well, in May I got hurt. I waved at my son as I was sitting in my passenger vehicle and gave him a funny wave out the side window and something snapped in my wrist and it hurt. I thought, oh, what did I do? And that was the start of the nightmare, basically. But we're doing well. We're doing well.

Griff: Okay. What, what happened to your business while you were recovering?

LaRee: I had to close the location that we were at. I had to let my employees go and we boxed everything up and I moved home because we didn't know where things were gonna go and what was gonna happen to me. And there was nothing that I could do at that point. So we just closed everything up.

Griff: What was the actual nature of what happened that was so severe and serious?

LaRee: Apparently I had tore the, the sheath that goes around your wrist, whether I tore it earlier in the day or however, when I waved, it got worse. And then a month later I went and got groceries and there was somebody parked too close to me. And instead of setting it down and waiting or whatever, I thought, well, I'll just lift it up and set it in the passenger seat and it snapped. And so the tendons in my wrist started to get inflamed and if they would've burst, I would've gone septic and would've been gone in a couple hours. So that's where I was at and I couldn't do anything. It was my right hand and I'm right-handed to even hold onto the roll of eBay tape in the dispenser to get it to go across the box. The tears would just rolled down my face. There was no, no relief. And at that point it was come home and tell the kids, I'm sorry guys, but they were very supportive. But they still didn't wanna come to work for me and help me all day.. Yeah, they did not come and help at all. Thank goodness. I had some girlfriends that were amazing and stuff to help, but.

Griff: So what is the state of the business now? Are you back up and running?

LaRee: We are . We're in amazing shape. I just, matter of fact, got off the phone with my husband and said, I need to hire. I can't do this on my own anymore. And it's just too much. I'm not getting the listings done. I'm not getting the things done that have to happen. That's been the hardest part. Before when we were open, I had six employees and this was before I even got sick. And so to let them go and you know, shut everything down and then have to restart, it's been a challenge. But as a small business owner, with the amount of items that we have and the things that we do, I just can't do it on my own.

Griff: Have you managed to hire anyone yet?

LaRee: No. That's a scary part because I had a bad experience with one of the employees that I didn't have and it kind of made my husband and myself skittish to go through that again. And so I reached out and said, you know, I'm reaching out to my family and my Facebook followers and friends and if anybody knows of anybody. And so yesterday I was at the store and It was so cute because I thought, oh, I saw somebody I knew. And so I went over and I was talking to her and I said, gosh, if I could just find somebody that could do a couple of the things that I need, she's like, oh, well I have a friend who is retired and so I'm waiting for that person to call me. But that's where we're at right now.

Griff: When you look back on last year and what happened to you unexpectedly, what would you tell yourself back then to have in place? So the unexpected would not have disrupted your life so much?

LaRee: Oh, well, you know, Griff, I think the things that I thought about were having the inventory all in the computer, whether it's on a smart sheet or however you do it, to have everything accounted for. I should not have bought things and thought, oh, I'll get to those. It should have been if you buy it, you go through the steps and and you just do it. One of the regrets was my foundation was good, my foundation of how I do business and how things go and how when do I do things? And we always did our shipping at noon and all of those kinds of things. That was all in place. But the things that were was what is the pile?

Griff: Death pile.

LaRee: Death piles. I had so many shelves of death piles. It was crazy. I wish I wouldn't have just focused on one section. I wish I just would've done one thing at a time. That was probably the biggest problem that I think I had. Because as we box things up, it was, oh my God, I forgot I had this. Or Wait, where's the rest of this? And how come this isn't together? And those kinds of things. My regret was that I didn't do a better keeping it all in one place.

Griff: So have all your inventory on the computer and don't let disorganized death piles. Sit there, get them organized. And of course we say this regardless of anything, the best thing to do when you go out and buy stuff is to get it listed the minute you get at home.

LaRee: Right. Yep. Griff, have you ever heard of anybody say, oh, I listed it right in my vehicle after I walked outta Goodwill or wherever they got it from. And I'm like, oh, I wish I could do that.

Griff: They list it when they're walking out of the store?

LaRee: Yes, I've, I've heard, well there was a YouTuber, I can't think of her name, but she's like, yeah, I followed this on. She was promoting the app, the eBay mobile app. And she said how she was able to take the pictures, sit right in your vehicle and, and had it listed. And I thought, well, why didn't I ever think of that?

Griff: She could be the patron saint of eBay sellers

LaRee: . Well, there you go.

Griff: Yeah. Your business is disrupted. That income stops. Is there something that you could have done to help mitigate that shock to your income that you would've done differently?

LaRee: Well, I am a very fortunate woman in that I have a husband who works full time, so I didn't feel that as much. My landlord was amazing. Know your people, who you rent from. If you do have to be out of the house, like in my situation, I had to be out of the house because legally I couldn't and still can't run a business out of my home. A lot of people run their eBay businesses out of their home. We weren't allowed to have that kind of business, people coming and going and in our neighborhood. So I had rental space and to sure that you can get your lease or if you're buying or whatever, have those safeguards there. Like I said, I was very fortunate. My landlord was amazing. She was more than helpful. And, and I don't think I ever shared this with you, but I actually had to pay off the lease when I got sick because I felt so bad. I told her, I can't leave you high and dry like this. And she said, well Lori, if you don't have to do this, I said, yeah, but I signed this lease. I agreed to this contract. And she was like, well if I rent to before, I'll just prorate it and give it back. And I was so taken back, I was like, oh my God, you're so amazing. Thank you so much for doing that. And I lucked out so bad, you know, to write that check was like, oh God, I hated the zeros. But I stuffed that money away. That was probably the only thing I did right. When I decided to do what I did, like starting and moving out of the house and all that stuff with the eBay business.

Griff: You're in a different location now then?

LaRee: Oh yeah. Yeah. I don't know. Do we have time for me to share my story about my landlord here? Y

Griff: Yeah Sure, why not?

LaRee: Okay, so I'll make it quick. So I have my first treatment done. We're feeling good. My girlfriend and I are driving around out in the industrial park, looking for maybe a place to rent. Now this is like the middle of October of 23 for the spring of 24. Just see what's out here, whatever. And as we are driving down the road, my girlfriend says, well that place is for lease. She's like, you should go in there. And I'm like, no. And as my vehicle starts to turn and I'm telling her no, but my steering wheel is turning or pulling in the driveway, there's two guys off the side of the building. And she's like, you should go talk to them. And I said, no, no. And my door opens and the vehicle gets turned off. And I'm like, what is going on? I'm like, I'm not doing this. I'm telling you no. And yet I'm opening the door and I walk up to these two young men and I said, do you guys know, like who has this place for lease? And the one guy looks at me and I had no idea who these two people were. He comes out, he's like, well, I'll show you around, you know, and long story short, he's showing me the office area, showroom area. And I'm like, well this is really good. And he's, and I can hear this like, not like God, but like I could hear a voice that seemed really familiar to me. And he says, well, let's go look at the warehouse. I walk out there and I see his truck and I'm like, I turn around. I'm like, Steve. He's like, LaRee. And I'm like, oh my gosh. It was my landlord from when I had one of my first jobs. I was probably 19 years old and he owned the building that the company I worked for rented. He remembered that. So we're staying there and he's like, I want to rent to you. I said, well, I really can't. But he is like, he was just amazing. And he has been my helper in this whole experience. He has come and helped me glue stuff together. He's just been amazing.

Griff: This is wonderful.

LaRee: So that was in the morning. And then afternoon my husband got done work early. We came out and my husband said to me, well, I know what you want. He's like, but it would be nice to have everything in one place. And I said, yeah, it would. It would. It really would. And Griff, you have to imagine when we shut everything down, we had five storage units, we had things in places. I remember shutting the door on one of the storage units going, I don't know if I'm ever gonna see this stuff that's in there again. And then I heard something fall and I just locked the lock. I was like, I don't even care. And that was where I was at in my state of mind. It was just, it's in there. I don't care.

Griff: Outta sight outta mind.

LaRee: Yep, exactly. That was like middle of October of last year. And we started moving in a week later. But yeah, so now we're in 4,000 square foot warehouse. We're out of all the storage units.

Griff: That's good. Those, those cost money.

LaRee: Oh, it was terrible.

Griff: Adds up fast.

LaRee: Yes it does. And you know those automatic withdrawals that they do out of your account?

Griff: The worst. I always figure if it's in storage, not for business purposes 'cause it's inventory. But if it's in storage and you're there for a year, you don't need it. Just get rid of it.

LaRee: You know, when you are moving gr I thought about you and all your, I remember you saying you had all your shirts and I thought, oh, I said, I hope that they didn't have to rent a storage unit when they moved.

Griff: No, we didn't.

LaRee: Good.

Griff: Well LaRee, thank you so much. It's great to talk to you. You look great. You sound great. And I think you're gonna have a great year.

LaRee: Yes. Yeah, 24 is gonna be amazing. I'm excited. We had a wonderful conversation with a, a gentleman, one of my consignment customers came in on Tuesday afternoon and he brought me a box of stuff. I'm open from 10 to four on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Fridays. And he always seems to sneak in on Tuesday with a box of stuff for me.

Griff: Oh great.

LaRee: He, it was cute. 'cause he's like, I said, what did you buy now? And he goes, oh no, I got you a new customer. So I'm waiting for them to call. So this is gonna be, it's gonna be great. I'm really excited.

Griff: I love that positive attitude. No adversity is too big for LaRee Peters, I'll tell you that.

LaRee: Nope. , nope. It's all in our attitude and our choices. Griff it really is.

Griff: That's a wise outlook. Thank you so much. Well thank you LaRee, I appreciate it.

LaRee: Yeah, thank you Griff.

Griff: LaRee Peters sells on eBay under the user id, Unique Valuables. We'll put a link to our eBay listings in the episode transcript for this episode 289.

Griff: You know, I feel really lucky, Kayomi because I've never had an unforeseen emergency that's disrupted either my selling or my work at eBay. Anything that's happened has been planned. I knew it was coming, so I was able to plan for it in advance. But listening to LaRees story, I thought, I don't know if I should push that luck anymore. So I've already started putting together a plan.

Kayomi: Good. It's weird that, not weird. I think it was almost like serendipitous that we're having LaRee on this week. And then we just took this personality assessment and the personality I got was the planner actually. And so I really resonated a lot with her story. I'm usually one of those people that always has like a plan, A, B, C, D, like all the way to Z

Griff: Really?

Kayomi: Yeah, I'm very like, I am a planner through and through. Thankfully I have never had to really implement these things. But I think a big takeaway of this that our listeners should take into account is that you should have these plans. Life is so unpredictable. We never know when we will need these to come into play. It's better to play it safe than sorry. You don't wanna regret not having these plans in place.

Griff: Absolutely. And one of the things I thought about while I was speaking to LaRee was a very interesting and simple first step that all sellers could take is to designate somebody to be their second in command, so to speak, by using the Multi-User Access tool or MUA as we've called it in the past couple years. And to set somebody up who's willing, not as a surprise to handle things like transactions. Rob will do my transactions for me, he set up with MUA and it's important to at least have that much done. I mean, I've also have other things set up so that personally and with the business, he can come in and clean out all my accounts if necessary, and not worry about paying bills and stuff. But there are so many different little aspects to running a business that you need to think about from the continuity end in case you're absent for a short or even a long period of time and you never know it could happen to anyone. So yeah, those plans are really important. I think in the coming months we'll visit different aspects of a continuity plan and talk about those in depth so that our audience can give them some consideration as tips. It won't come from me. We'll find experts.

Kayomi: So make sure you're listening.

Griff: Yes, exactly. And now without further ado, it's time for...

Kayomi: You got questions.

Griff: We've got answers. I'm hoping, uh, that you'll read this week's question. Kayomi.

Kayomi: It would be my pleasure. This week's question was sent to us by eBay seller, Steve, who asks, I hope to word this in a way that makes sense. If I have a multi quantity item that has the buy more and a get a discount feature, let's say a buy four and get 20% off, someone puts it on watch, I send an offer of 15%. Is that 15% off of only one? If they purchase four, do they get 15% off? And then an additional 20% off of that? The cent offer does boost sales, but we can't afford to do 35% if the quantity discounts also kick in. Thanks Steve.

Griff: Yeah, I love this question because I've heard it in the past and I think this is a great opportunity to kind of clear the air on this, how it works. So Steve, if a buyer accepts your SIO, we call them Seller Initiated Offer for a listing that is multi quantity and also has volume pricing, the buyer will only get the SIO discount, the offer discount. They don't get the volume pricing and they only get it for one. So if the buyer rejects the Seller Initiated Offer, they can then go on to purchase two or more items from that listing at your volume pricing discount levels. But keep in mind this is only for those offers that are seller initiated. These aren't for when a buyer sends an offer in. So you don't have to worry about which one they're gonna take. Because only one will play at a time.

Kayomi: And Steve, if you're curious to know how buyer sent offers work, in this case, the buyer can indicate both an offer price and a quantity. However, if the seller accepts that buyer's offer, the offer won't be subjected to the volume pricing discounts.

Griff: That's right. So they can't stack, and this is not only the case with these particular discounts, but they're for all promotional discounts, there's only one discount that's in play. The buyer can't stack a bunch of them and then get, like you said, 35% discount. So that won't happen. But it's important to know that the one they're gonna get is, in the case of the offers, is the one that's going to be the biggest discount. If your discount for the best offer is not as good as your volume pricing. The buyer's more often than not gonna say, well I'm gonna reject this and I'll just use the volume pricing offer. So you have to keep that in mind. But they do not stack discounts at eBay don't stack on top of each other.

Kayomi: Yeah. So don't worry about that 35%.

Griff: Yeah, exactly. . So thank you Steve, for sending that question in.

Kayomi: If you have a question about selling on eBay and you can't find the answer anywhere, why not? Let us have a stab at it. Call us in at (888) 723-4630. That's (888) 723-4630. Call that hotline at any time of the day, any day of the week, leave a question or comment and we might just put it on the air.

Griff: We might. And if you're not a call on the phone person and that describes me to a T, you can always email us at podcast@ebay.com. That's podcast@ebay.com. And now it's time for your weekly podcast checklist.

Kayomi: One. Check the announcement board at ebay.com/announcements for up-to-date seller news every day.

Griff: Two, it's better to be safe than sorry. Start creating a business continuity plan today and have it in place and ready to activate in case of any unforeseen emergency that might require the suspension of your business on eBay.

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

Griff: And on our next episode, we're gonna meet a very energetic seller that I sat next to at dinner last fall in Las Vegas when we were visiting the reseller remix event. His name is Ken and he's known everywhere online as the Commonwealth Picker and he is one of the most energetic entrepreneurs I've ever met. So we're gonna get a chance to talk to him about his business model and about trends that he sees in business and uh, also a few tips when you're outsourcing.

Kayomi: Very interesting. We'd like to again, thank our guest this week, LaRee Peters.

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

Kayomi: See you then. Bye Griff.

[melisssullenge0]

"Come on"....What kind of items could actually be appropriately photographed and accurately listed into EBAY from the front seat of a car.  This is an unrealistic expectation being promoted as "Easy Breezy" The quality of listings you could expect to achieve this way are a joke. Especially when listing Clothing items.  

[manylittle8h99]

     I have been selling on eBay for 27 years and had a wonderful business.   I was averaging from $3,000 to $4,000 a month.  I had over 3,000 items in my store.   I sell an eclectic line of collectibles including toys, glass, china,  pottery, books, ephemera, and anything else I can make a profit on.   

     Two years ago, I broke my wrist badly, slipping on the ice in January.    Because I was not able to do anything with my right hand, I had to close my store for 2 1/2 months.   That started a nightmare that lasted an entire year.   

     My number of sales for the year at the time that I broke my wrist was over 880, and in January I had sold 120 items.  I had just gotten a store suspension because I had been over the dreaded 2% in seller defects.  It was partly my fault, partially because I  was not familiar with the help that eBay representatives could give us and did not learn until it was too late, that I could have had most of those defects removed.   

      That October, I had had a break in at the place where I stored my sold items.  The thieves had virtually taken every inventory box and dumped it on the floor, breaking items and mixing everything up.  (The cops in my town were useless but that is another story.)   I had well over 100 boxes of listed inventory so you can guess the mess I had.   It took weeks to clean things up and try to restore some order and during that time, I had had to cancel many orders because I could not find the items, they were either stolen, still misplaced or had been broken.   Before, everything was in a numbered box and that box number was written in my inventory list.    Over the next few months I went through my entire inventory, getting it back in order so only things I knew I still had were listed in my eBay store.  

     Then I had another break in.  Same thing, same mess, and probably the same thieves.   My defect rate soared during that time and by the time I got my first warning, the majority of the defects had happened over 90 days previously so I could not have had any of them removed.   I was stuck with that high number of defects, but I felt I was OK because I had a high number of sales and felt I could increase those sales which would lower the percentage of the defect rate.   

     Then I broke my wrist and after closing my store, I watched my sales numbers for the year fall drastically, making the defect percentage rate rise, until by the time I was finally able to open up my store, I was at almost 4%.  (It was only me, and I had no one to help so had no choice but to close.) I was 'below standard' for the first time in my selling career.   

      Because I was 'below standard' and had had to increase my handling period from 3 days to 5 on advice from eBay,  my sales were slow.   I went from an average of over $3,000 a month to $300 a month, from selling 60 to over 100 items a month to under 20 a month.   There was no way, I could reduce that sales defect percentage.  I even tried listing good post cards at $1.95 each, thinking that they would sell quickly, but that 'below standard' rating is a death knell.  

     I was not going to give up.   I began calling eBay, insisting to speak to supervisors, telling anyone who would listen what had happened and asking for help to get my store back on track.   I did make some progress, and one supervisor did realize that it was unfair to keep my store in a 'below standard' rating because what had happened was beyond my control.  She raised my standard to 'above standard' and I had an increase in sales almost immediately, but it did not last, because the underlying numbers and percentages were still there and she had not put a time line on her change.   My only choice was to keep on listing and tightening my belt and waiting for the defect rates to time out.  That happened almost a year after I broke my wrist, in December.   Had it been one more month, my store would have been permanently closed, because you can not be sub standard for over a year at a time.    

      It is now a year and five months since my store was returned to an 'above standard' rating and I still have not gotten my sales up to where they were before all of this happened.   I now watch my numbers like a hawk and when I can't find an item I have sold, I first work with the buyer to try to find alternative solutions, and if I have to cancel the sale I work with the eBay representatives.   I have learned a lot because of what I went through.   I have learned that not all eBay representatives and supervisors are equal.  They may have guidelines, but they all interpret them differently, plus the language barrier can be difficult.  Sometimes you just have to be persisitent and find the 'right' person to talk to.    I have learned that inventory control is key, and if you don't have a great system to find an item once it has sold, you could be in deep trouble.   I could write a book about this experiece, but I think I have said enough.   

    Folks, don't take your life, or your eBay life for granted.  Things can change in an instant, and not everything is an easy fix.