I have been Selling on the Internet Since the Internet was on the Internet
Nothing really beats eBay, tried them all since the early days of Yahoo auctions. Amazon was ok but so much scam and believe is harder to list whatever you want than you can on eBay, Bonanza was the worst, one item a month, my own web site didn't do well either.
I remember my fist sale on Yahoo was a fax machine that I had in my shed, and when it sold, I was at a loss of what to do, had no box, no online label printing, almost no communications, and don't even remember if there was a tracking number, just made me nervous for a week or two before I shipped it, lol.
32 comments
femmefan1946
·3 years agoI miss having customer service reps who were in Canada, and understood how Canada Post worked, that we only have a dozen banks, why Caisse Desjardins was buying credit unions, where Tuktoyaktuk is, and why green USPS money orders were useless.
At least the Philippino reps are likely to have a cousin working as a practical nurse in Winnipeg .
postcardcountry
·3 years agoYes, it was called billpay.
Yes, I remember Bidville but I didn't have anything to do with it.
Yes, I remember checks....I went so far as to open a checking account at the bank on the corner near where I worked so I wouldn't have to wait for the weekend to deposit.
Yes, paypal. The buyer who brought it to my attention had a code and got $10 for my registration. I also remember getting $10 myself for signing up.
Sold my first item without a picture....the buyer did mention I probably would get more if I did pictures.
You could leave positive or negative feedback without even being involved in a transaction. If you liked someone from the forums, you could post positive feedback for them.
Internet did not exist in my area when I first moved here. I did everything on line via dial-up.
And sometimes, like when creativity was permitted, you would find listings like "eBay Barbie", telling the tale how one moves from buyer to seller, all done with Barbie and miniature priority boxes...or poems written to describe the item or tell it's history.
eBay grew up and so did we.
southern*sweet*tea
·3 years agoThe best sales I had were pre-internet. When I sold my handmade candles (I started in 1982) I ran an ad in the back of Southern Living magazine. It was not cheap, if I remember right it was 25 cents per word. Best sales ever, hands down, even better than when I sold on Etsy. A customer would write me what they wanted and include a check for the amount. I'd make what they wanted and mail the candles to them. Never a bad check, no non-payers, no issues whatsoever.
Had many, many repeat customers through the years, most gained through referrals and word of mouth.
Yes, it was slower, but it was soooo much easier than selling online. There was a lot more honesty and trust. In a lot of ways I wish we could go back to that. To me it seems for every good thing the internet brought it killed off three good things.
baantiques
·3 years agoI've been selling here since 1998. I remember going to the bank to deposit checks and sometimes cash, then hand writing all my labels and going to the PO to buy the postage for everything. I had to print out the sold list and keep track by hand of what had shipped.
stainlessenginecovers
·3 years agoBefore the internet was the internet, I'd buy/sell things on Autotrader, Pennysaver, local newspaper. Bought my 1972 Firebird, 1966 Chevelle, Refrigerator, Pool Table, Drum Set... all that way. Local pickup. Good times!
When I started on Ebay there were only 'auctions'
They charged a listing fee to list (no store, no freebies) and I think it was .25 for items under $10, .60 for items over. No reserves. Money order/checks in the mail.
But then again, there ads on the TV from McDonalds that you could get 2 burgers, fries, coke and change back from your buck.
ten_o_nine
OP3 years agoYes, I did that too, I put an ad on Pennysaver in 1985 stating that I will buy your house and give you 2k and assume your mortgage, was the best deal, I got a 2-unit house that I rented for $1100 a month and paid $386 a month mortgage, and that was in 1985 when mortgage rates averaged 13%.
I also remember at Kmart checkout had a free dial up connection to the internet, was good but the ads on the app showing "blue light specials" and 5 minutes to connect was bad.
cardxcraft
·3 years agoI know you were being nostalgic on the days of Ebay's past...just having fun. But, it is truth, don't sink with one, instead, thrive with many platforms.
Okay, back to reminiscing.
cardxcraft
·3 years agoOk, so what's the point of your post? Is it, no one ever really beats Ebay? Well, you can state that all you want but the writing is on the wall. If you're not cross-posting across all available platforms as of yesterday , then you my friend are a dead fish.
An e-commerce war is coming soon, and it's not for us to decide such things. We just sit back and take advantage of all platforms and let God sort out in the end, lol.
ten_o_nine
OP3 years agoNo point here buddy, just sharing my own experience with selling online, didn't mean to offend you.
chapeau-noir
·3 years agoI'm pretty sure that has been in progress for a while, called competition. eBay didn't have any for quite a while (or any worth mentioning) and until 2004 even beat Amazon. Hence, our nostalgia (I recall making a killing on rare bike parts - SO much better than selling off line).
buyselljack2016
·3 years agoBeing a late bloomer I missed all of the early fun that is describe in this thread.
I didn't need no stinkin computer until the new millennium. Even then, to start it was just fun and games. Playing games and finding out what email was.
Minimally punched some keyboard keys at work, but that was just work related, and not out on the interweb.
Then in 2001, (again a late bloomer) I heard about selling on eBay and started cleaning out some things.
The payments in the mail (money order(USPS only)/cash), and bill pay. (was that the name) Never have done "online selling" other than eBay.
I did a local buy of a small fridge found on Craigslist. Actually co-worker found it, but I did the contact, and buying. Gave away a fridge on Craigslist, but other than that............ eBay.
the_fancy_fox
·3 years agoYep same here. I used to sell on yahoo, I also used to take checks and money orders.
tabcu51
·3 years agoAh yes and when we called the customer service an actual human being answered or we could leave a message, there was no menu tree to "press one for english" and the person who answered spoke our language clearly. The worst was there could be long hold times or possibly a busy signal, also if they could not help that was usually also the end of the road, thou I do feel customer service was at their best during the 90's.
456mainstreetshopping
·3 years agoI too have tried everything but amazon. Nothing compares to the sales I get on ebay.
lloydsteventaylor
·3 years agomy first sale on ebay was 2002. i found an official wilson nfl football at a garage sale. they wanted $3 and i offered $2. came back home and did my first listing here. an auction which ended up at $35 on a saturday night. i was hooked and never looked back.
asset_liquidators
·3 years agoMy first ever sale was a 25MHz NEC Versa laptop. The ball mouse wasn't even on the top of the laptop but on was vertical on the front edge. I paid less than $10 for it and when it sold for $255 I about fell out of my chair. I too was hooked and never looked back.
bill.purvis2012
·3 years agoGreat post. Brought back memories. I do have a question I would like to throw out to you. You made a choice to not accept offers? It works for you?
Seems like all my sales are offer driven. Don't know the last time I sold something full price without offer, sale or coupon.
ten_o_nine
OP3 years agoThat's exactly what happens, no one will pay full price when they see the "Make Offer" big blue button, and also makes it look like you're over pricing your items.
bonjourami
·3 years agoI remember the days of Yahoo auctions, did well there. Bonanza was dead as a doornail.
simply-the-best-for-you
·3 years agoIn some ways it was easier, but in many ways it was harder. And more time consuming. Waiting 10 days for checks to clear, borrowing a digital camera from the library, having to scan items, going to the post office in person, lots of things were slower & harder.
I've been selling that long too & even w/the extra competition, I'd take today's technology & ease of selling over how it was in the early 90's.
slippinjimmy
·3 years agoI started doing mailorder in the late 1970's, an average transaction took at least 4 - 6 weeks to complete. My brother used to buy jazz records via mailorder auctions in the 60's, from start to finish it would take 3 - 6 months to complete a purchase. and you would not know until very end if you got your item or a substitute or a refund.
No internet/email and a phone call overseas cost $5 and up for THREE minutes (domestic not that much cheaper).
frugalmarketplace
·3 years agoIn the early 60’s I lived in Spain. My mother would put an order together from the Sears catalog..mail it off, and we would get our package in about 6 weeks. Life was simple and we were thrilled.
femmefan1946
·3 years agoAnd being charged for listing and for pictures.
We actually had an online auction before there was an eBay. Remember apanet? But at that time we got more bids by fax than from early adopters who were receiving our auction catalogues in the mail.
Do I dare to eat a peach?
simply-the-best-for-you
·3 years agoI forgot about being charged for pics LOL. So many auctions didn't have photos back then! What do you mean by "do I dare to eat a peach"? IDK what that means, well, other than it's a famous Allman Bros album.
femmefan1946
·3 years agoThe Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock.
"I grow old ... I grow old ...
chapeau-noir
·3 years agoThat poem made me want to bang my head against the wall in undergrad school.
asset_liquidators
·3 years agoI actually remember when most auctions (including my own) didn't even have photos. I think it was the early 2000's before I got a 1.2 megapixel camera that sucked down batteries like a group of frat boys at a kegger on a Saturday night.
lamber9347
·3 years agoYou've brought back many memories for me, thank you. Online selling was so much easier back then. So much trusting from everyone. A person's word was all it took. Life changes however....
asset_liquidators
·3 years agoYep it was certainly a different time. I still remember when someone emailed me about payment and said "what, no paypal?" My response was along the lines of "what the bleep is paypal?" It was so new I had not yet heard of it. Nope, money orders, personal checks, and bank cashiers checks.
Oh yeah, and WESTERN UNION! Going up to the grocery store where there was a Western Union counter and giving them a code to get a check. So much more trust back in those days (although you still had to be diligent).
I also remember buying something from a seller in Australia. I sent him CASH USD in the mail. A couple or few weeks later, item in my mailbox. (talk about trust).
Anyone remember Bidville? That was the first auction site that was rife with fraud. You had to be EXTRA diligent when selling on that site. Yahoo! and Ebay were legit but Bidville was the wild west with no sheriff in town. Good times, good times...😂
bonjourami
·3 years ago"Oh yeah, and WESTERN UNION! Going up to the grocery store where there was a Western Union counter and giving them a code to get a check"
I also remember receiving Western Union checks when I first started selling here, that was 1999. and strangely enough, everything I listed here sold. My first sale was a wide, sterling silver, cuff bracelet..started at a dollar..the bids were crazy, thru the roof,it sold for $300. I was hooked.
maxine*j
·3 years agoI am glad that was your experience on eBay. I'm sure it was the experience of many. But it certainly was not the universal experience. I started out as just a buyer but closed that account and didn't come back here for three years because, briefly:
One seller sent me nothing. Another seller sent me something was was rotten with mold and mildew. A third seller sent me something so mis-described as to laughable were it not so expensive. A fourth mixed up her orders and sent me junk and sent my costly item to someone else, and told me to work it out with the other person. (The other person never even acknowledged my message.)
In all four cases, the sellers got to keep my money because there was no such thing as the MBG and eBay insisted, then, that there would never be such a thing because eBay "is just a venue."
In the first three cases, I left a calm, factual negative feedback. (In the fourth case, I left no feedback, because I could accept that kind of human error.) Two of the sellers retaliated with flaming, vulgar negs because, again, eBay "is just a venue" so it didn't care what anyone wrote.
Try to imagine my dismay. I had been a catalogue shopper since the early 1960s, and bought a lot that way because of living in remote areas, so I was used to the mail-order standard established in the late 19th Century by Sears, et al: "Money cheerfully refunded if not completely satisfied with your purchase."
In the end, I became a seller, and eBay changed, and I did well here, as both a buyer and a seller. But I just cannot wax nostalgic about the Wild West Days of eBay.
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bluebolt7
·3 years agoI started selling on eBay in 1998 and I didn't even own a computer. For my first year of selling on eBay I used a WebTV. For those who are unfamiliar with a WebTV, it was a machine similar in size to a VCR or DVD player that hooked to your television and displayed the internet on your television screen. I sold a lot of items with that WebTV until I could afford to buy my first computer and those items had no photos on the listings either. It was exciting to come home from work and look in my mailbox and find a dozen envelopes with checks and money orders in them. It's nostalgic to think about it now but it was a lot of work! My co-workers who knew that I was selling on eBay would call me "easy money" because they didn't know how much work it took to make that money.