Mercari changes really show eBays total algorithim manipulation
So well all know that eBay is dead for the most part for small sellers and has been for a while, but the recent Mercari zero fees update REALLY shows just how bad new management of eBay over the last 5 years has absolutely boned sellers into oblivion with their nonsense algorithms. For context I sell vintage clothes and sneakers.
Mercari changed their selling format to zero fees for sellers on sales, and at the same time must really be promoting an algorithm that targets sellers with more than 10 items. For a long time I've been triple posting my listings from eBay to Poshmark, and Mercari:
eBay:
sold most here, but is always slow, sometimes has a burst of orders randomly that seems very manipulated since it never happens around holidays / tax refund season.
Poshmark:
just about as slow as eBay and minority sale of shares, but often the things I sell there are listings that never sell on eBay, no discernible pattern to when sales happen or not
Mercari:
for a long time sold the least of any sites, but when I did it was almost always for item at higher price with no haggling or offers even made
Fast forward 6 ish years with Mercari's latest update - I've sold about 10 items within a span of two weeks, nearly immediately after they rolled out the zero fee policy, offers and straight buys left and right. What a breath of fresh air, eBay is STALE STALE STALE. Just goes to show how much eBay does NOT push your listings to your target demographic and instead inundates them with Amazon-esque nonsense (because obviously eBay really really wants the Amazon money for the last decade). eBay obviously manipulates their algorithm and does it very poorly at that.
Additionally, where as Mercari completely revamped to zero fees, Poshmark and eBay have done the opposite raising their fees higher and higher.
So, I doubt eBay management will take notice, and instead repeat the insanity they have always done as if that will finally lead to success. Either learn something from Mercari's model or just die already.
chapeau-noir
·2 years agoShifting fees onto buyers was a Hail Mary pass that would never work for a site like Mercari, and I'm surprised they even tried it. This isn't a specialist auction site or some sort of wholesaler where one pays a fee to do business, it's just another miscellaneous C2C sales platform, with a bargain-hunter's mindset. I've sold there for a while, and the biggest problem I could see was not enough advertising and engagement.
boyblue65
·2 years agoWe all know eBay has been around for a long time and made tons of money. At least Mercari took the chance and did something different to help their sellers (not so much for the buyers). Meanwhile, eBay sits like a bump on a log and keeps collecting selling fees. I’ve read comments about eBay would be foolish to change because it’s not enough time to see the results of Mercari’s new change. Well, eBay had plenty of time to make a change but instead they choose to keep raking in the dough.
fbusoni
·2 years agoeBay opts to make money?
Unbelievable! How dare they? 🤣
Meantime, you clearly are content, having signed on the dotted line.
I know I am, because thanks to eBay, I'm raking in the dough.
luckythewinner
·2 years agoIMHO a company that is making money and whose sales are increasing should probably not follow the lead of a company whose sales continue to fall and that continues to lose money.
"Casting a shadow on the robust results was the U.S. segment. Its adjusted operating loss came to $17 million, an improvement from a $48 million loss a year earlier. However, GMV slid 10% to $913 million for a third year of decline"
https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Retail/Japan-resale-app-Mercari-delivers-record-profit-amid-U.S.-troubles
mam98031
·2 years agoThink about what you wrote. While sellers may like this change many buyers do not. If the buyers don't like it, then who is going to buy the sellers items?? You see that as a viable plan?
Mercari was in a bad place when they made this change. The site is simply not doing well before this big change and not after either as just a couple months ago they had to lay off half their staff. The future is not looking bright for Mercari at this time. But of course that can change, especially if they have a good holiday season.
mordecai8614
·2 years ago@az37
You got me beat, I'm at about 3 a month on Mercari. eBay might be slow right now, but Mercari is dead
chapeau-noir
·2 years agoI stopped selling on Mercari when they changed the returns thing - they changed it back but I've just not gotten going on there. eBay and Poshmark generate enough sales, but I'm going to set up my clearance store on Mercari again - that's mostly what I had was clearance items, though I've sold some oddball things there - a didgeridoo and a vintage kilt pin, for instance. Oh, and a thick volume of 18th century Colonial naval documents.
az37
·2 years agoI have been with Ebay for 25 years and I too have tried Poshmark and Mercari with both being a total mess. The main issue with Mercari is the shipping. For small items a flat rate works but for larger items there is no way to enter size, weight and shipping service that will calculate the cost for a buyer in another state and display the cost to the buyer. The seller has to do the calculating upon request. I am a small seller of odds and ends, mostly NOS. Sales range from a few $ to hundreds of $’s with weight from a couple of ounces to 70 pounds all calculated and displayed to a potential buyer when viewing my listing. My sales amount to about three per week which is fine for a part time seller. I am also a buyer making about the same number purchases that I do in sales. At least when I look at an item on Ebay the total cost including shipping for a heavy item is shown in the listing automatically. On Mercari that does not happen. I found a vintage radio made in the 40’s on Mercari for $47.50 with the shipping listed at $7.99. The wood cabinet for the radio was about 3’ x 2’ x 1.5’ and likely weighed around 17 pounds. I questioned the seller and he said that he had to put a number in the listing because Mercari does not calculate shipping and he would do it at the time of purchase. I don’t buy anything without knowing the total cost.
reallynicestamps
·2 years agoSo Mercari dropped seller fees in favour of charging buyers fees to purchase on the site, and sales went up?
goodness
mam98031
·2 years agoWhere did you see that sales went up? What I've read is this is not being very well received by buyers.
bygri92
·1 year agoYeah as someone who has purchased quite a few thousands of dollars on Mercari, I can say that it now sucks big time! It used to be where you could find something that usually sells new for 20 bucks, and someone have it listed new for five bucks on Mercari. The way it used to be you would come out to the good with shipping and all at 10 bucks. The way it is now that $20 item at Walmart is just going to cost you 20 dollars on Mercari, due to fees and shipping being unbelievably overpriced almost every time! Like how the heck does it take $17 to mail me a dang phone case? It's absurd and I think they make more money off shipping than they do the dang fees!! Sorry for punctuation or spelling errors I did not have time to proofread.
bygri92
·1 year agoI realize this is an older post but these standards are still at play with mercari
tobaccocardyahoo
·2 years agoEbay is losing mass market sales to Amazon. The OP sells mass market clothing. Whether Mercari is raiding Amazon or Ebay, which knows it has an is issue with this, is not clear.
I do not care. As a seller of media and collectibles I see no reason to try Mercari. Ebay is now stronger than Amazon in media and collectibles. And anyone who thinks that the current downturn in sales is other than the effect of current events and an excess of Ebay sellers is welcome to continue to sell items which are seeing a drop in demand.
mam98031
·2 years ago@tobaccocardyahoo
I know many sellers here often compare Ebay to Amazon but they are really two completely different sites. There are many things that can be sold on Ebay that can't be sold on Amazon. For those that think Ebay's rules are strict, Amazon is worse.
Ebay doesn't compete with it's sellers, but Amazon clearly does. There are more differences between the site than there are similar things IMHO.
tobaccocardyahoo
·2 years ago@mam98031
Absolutely, but Amazon is the ecommerce leader and cannot be ignored.
And although the overlap between the sites is smaller every year, Ebay sellers seem to think that they can compete with Amazon and Amazon sellers where there has been overlap.
Ebay management is clearly working to grow the areas of Ebay's strengths but posters on this forum, commonly complain about the lack of advertising in the areas where Ebay is too weak, and the buyer friendly initiatives which are needed to grow, and avoid negative PR.
mam98031
·2 years agoSure they can. It isn't helpful to compare apples and oranges.
Ebay stopped comparing themselves to Amazon years ago, but sellers continue to do it for some reason.
I have sold on Ebay and Amazon for years. I do NOT "compete" with myself. I sell the same stuff here and there. I can sell my items for less money on Ebay but I must charge more on Amazon in order to survive the fees and their unforgiving rules.
Often times members think because they are not seeing TV ads that Ebay isn't advertising. Now days, TV ads are not likely the most cost effective way to advertise.
But there are likely many ideas that may help Ebay grow and thrive that haven't been tried yet. We will always have different opinions on what that might be no matter what Ebay does or doesn't do.
productreseller
·1 year agoIt is a screwed up market. they only look good as there are many seller than sell on ebay and buy on amazon. many from Pakistan and other areas use a site to fake a tba # into a usps # that shows up as tracking. This is just one among many things i have seen not taking into account the buy and get refunded for reviews schemes that float around
mam98031
·1 year ago@productreseller
Many sellers that sell on Ebay also sell on Amazon. And some of those sellers have Amazon store and ship their items as they notify them they have an order to be filled. The sellers pay Amazon for this service and the seller fully owns their inventory. Just a tidbit to keep in mind.
b86fiero
·2 years agoI am a long time eBay seller and I don't feel eBay has boned me into oblivion. eBay has provided me with an opportunity to operate a business from home and has had my back when dealing with not so honest buyers.
My inventory has changed over the years and while not getting rich, I am comfortable with selling on eBay. Sure, like everyone, I wish sales were more and competition was less.
Perhaps thousands of sellers will transition over to Mercari and then they can all complain about lack of sales and competition there too. Isn't that what is happening on other online selling venues?
Good luck to you in your future endeavors.
luckythewinner
·2 years agoSo well all know that eBay is dead for the most part for small sellers and has been for a while
I have been listing regularly since the beginning of the year (after slacking most of last year) and my sales are fine. So I have no idea what you mean by eBay being "dead for the lost part".
for a long time sold the least of any sites, but when I did it was almost always for item at higher price with no haggling or offers even made
I always sell at my asking price on eBay and there is no haggling. But perhaps that is because I do not invite haggling by putting Best Offer on my listings as you appear to do.
So, I doubt eBay management will take notice, and instead repeat the insanity they have always done as if that will finally lead to success.
Some would argue that attracting 230 million sellers, 1.5 billion listings, 135 million active buyers, $2.78 billion in net income, and having a GMV that is 1280% larger than Mercari is some measure of success. But then again, you did get 10 sales in two weeks.
ebaiysellslots19
OP2 years agoApples and oranges, try listing regularly for ten years and let me know. Mercari and Poshmark attract completely different demographics than eBay does for this category in 2024, and I think you're forgetting how it used to be. You don't "invite" said "haggling" because the low balls that do come in here on this site are usually just resellers also on eBay. The offers (if any) coming in from Mercari are usually only asking 10% below asking price, meaning these people are real customers wanting to buy and use, not flippers reselling. Mercari and Poshmark advertise themselves much more specifically to clothing and related apparel, that's a big reason why I think normal consumers get their apps.
So then ask yourself why eBay doesn't just do this? Why don't these "real" customers frequent eBay nearly as often as an equivalent?
The answer is they used to, but eBay nixed the small community appeal in favor of Amazon slop their algorithms push to their users. "Preowned" and "used" are in now considered bad words in the 2020's era of the nu-eBay, all you have to do is look to sales and which categories have dried up over the last decade. What made this site great from the start was the cheap and used nature of listings in an online community. Now eBay's algorithms take priority of new Amazon-esque inventory over used categories, simple as that.
catjewels9876
·2 years agoIs it true there is a $2 to $3 charge for payouts to sellers?
mam98031
·2 years ago@catjewels9876
It is a $2 charge for a Instant payout. There are other options.
sapphire_studio
·2 years agoThe March 27th change not only shifted the fees to the buyers, it also charges you $2 to withdraw your funds the slow method and $3 for the instant pay. There's no free way to get your money. They waive the payment processing fee for buyers who use their funds to purchase so they are trying to encourage people to leave their money on the platform and basically be a mercari bank.
The payment processing fee for buyers is 2.9% but the service fee can be anywhere between slightly less than that (I had one sale where the service fee was less than the payment processing fee) to close to 20%. People will use different accounts and have different fees based on the account they are using for the exact same item. I will also sell the exact same item the same day to two different people and they will pay different fees. It's kind of like Russian Roulette to know what service fees you're going to get as a buyer. Some people wonder if it's higher on weekends and drops as an item ages on the platform.
I have seen a increase in sales on mercari since the change and that might just be from all the attention they are getting. I did lower my prices by 10% on everything. But I was having to pay 13% before that so overall I'm making more money and more sales than before (eBay is still my work horse but I have 700 listings on eBay and only 50 or so on Mercari).
mam98031
·2 years ago@sapphire_studio
Yes thank you, I am aware. Mercari's total buying fees for purchasing an item on the site is so similar to Ebay's fees for most categories. Mercari is 10% FVF and 2.9% money processing fee plus a fixed per transaction fee of 50 cents. So that is a total of 12.9% plus the 50 cent fixed fee.
Ebay in most categories is 13.25% and a 40 cent per transaction fee.
I have no idea how this will turn out for Mercari overall. 3 weeks is no where near enough time to get a good feel for what is happening on the site.
sapphire_studio
·2 years agoI have no idea why those rules say 10%. Like I said they fluctuate quite a lot and many people have posted the different service fees on Reddit. Here are two different service fees for the same item that someone bought from me. One person just bought from me yesterday.
 
 
Here is the first item on my homepage that I just added to my cart just now to see what service fee it would charge me:
 
So these examples are definitely less than 10%, but like I said people will show other examples that are closer to 20%.
mam98031
·2 years agoI did read somewhere that the Service Fee fluctuates. I just can't seem to find it again. I found the following information on the subject.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Mercari/comments/1c5tmxn/the_service_fee_will_change_on_an_item_almost/
https://www.modernretail.co/technology/im-not-freaking-macys-sellers-react-to-mercaris-new-return-policy-and-fee-structure/
And there is likely many other sources.
chapeau-noir
·2 years ago@sapphire_studio Thanks for verifying that - I thought I was going nuts.
epowerbargains
·2 years agoThere is a $2 for each payout a seller makes.
mam98031
·2 years ago@epowerbargains and @catjewels9876
I went to the Mercari site and looked this up. I was incorrect in my previous post. This is from the Mercari site.
Fees on Mercari
Listing an item is always free on Mercari. Fees are charged when an item sells or when a service is used. The following charts explain fees on Mercari.
Service Fee
We work hard to make our marketplace a vibrant and secure shopping experience, learn more. Starting March 27, 2024, when you make a purchase, a service fee will be charged. The amount of the fee will be displayed as part of the final price of your item on the checkout page. This fee is charged to the buyer and may not be refunded, depending on the reason for a return.
Seller Fees
Effective March 27, 2024 at 8:30 AM ET, the selling fee for new listings will be 0%
Note: Listings created before 8:30 AM ET on March 27, 2024 will be subject to a selling fee of 10% of the item price when a sale is completed unless the listing has been updated on or after March 27, 2024.
Transaction and Payment Fees
Mercari incurs fees related to payment processing and balance withdraws out of our system by our financial services partners. Some of these service fees are charged to our users.
Payment Processing:
Effective March 27, 2024 at 8:30 AM ET, Mercari will charge buyers a payment processing fee at the time of purchase.
2.9% + $0.50 fee
A Payment Processing Fee of 2.9% plus $0.50 per sale is charged to the seller based on the completed sale plus shipping price of the item unless it has been updated after March 27, 2024. The payment processing fee is only charged on completed transactions.
This fee is not applied to declined or expired offers or canceled orders.
2.9% + $0.50 fee
A Payment Processing Fee of $0.50 plus 2.9% of the transaction price (which includes the item price, shipping, service fee and sales tax) will be charged to the buyer.
This fee may not be refunded for returned or canceled orders.
Balance Withdrawals:
There are two ways to cash out your earnings from your Mercari balance offered by Mercari.
Direct Deposit:
Once you’ve added your checking account and have a balance, you can request a cash-out request to your bank using direct deposit. This transaction is typically processed within 5 business days depending on your bank’s processing times. There is $2 non-refundable fee for each completed direct deposit request.Effective March 27, 2024 at 8:30 AM ET, there is a $2 non-refundable fee per cash-out.
Instant Pay:
Instant Pay is the fastest way to get paid when you need that extra cash. To do this, go to your balance, tap “Instant Pay,†complete your ID validation (if you haven’t already), and add a debit card. You can use Instant Pay for up to $600 per month, once per day on eligible debit cards. There is a $3 flat fee per cash-out. In some cases, depending on your bank’s processing time, it can take up to 30 minutes to see the balance in your bank account.
https://www.mercari.com/us/help_center/article/169/
714ricki
·2 years agoYes, Mercari charges the seller a fee to withdraw the funds from the platform.😎😱
robbie31415
·2 years agoI hate mercari.
Everyone wants so much more of a discount. That discount is more than the ad fee. I make more money on the same items on eBay with ad fees than I do on Mercari with 0 fees.
chapeau-noir
·2 years agoSo well all know that eBay is dead for the most part for small sellers and has been for a while,
Who is this "all" in "we all know"?
I've sold on Mercari for some years, too, and my sales also come in batches.
ebaiysellslots19
OP2 years agoWell "all" would really include the tens of thousands of sellers that left eBay not in this thread at the moment lol, you forget to compare the utilization of this site in 2024 compared to 2014 and act as if it's been static for over a decade. It clearly hasn't, just read the forums more frequently if you really are that clueless to the decline of quality here.
mam98031
·2 years agoWhile many sellers have left Ebay over the years, a whole lot of new ones have joined. A lack of sellers is NOT a problem Ebay has. There are almost 19 million of us worldwide.
itscalledapostingid
·2 years agoIt's easy to see how people with a certain mindset, like those who are always disgruntled about "corporate greed," will celebrate Mercari's move... but are those the people that any serious marketplace is really courting?
mam98031
·2 years agoWell some sellers maybe celebrating for now, as many buyers aren't taking to this change as well as was hoped. Of course that could change in time.
For sellers that are celebrating this change, IMHO it is really short sited of them because while they don't have to pay the selling fees anymore, they may not get as many sales as they had before this change either. So getting excited about no selling fees may not be all it is cracked up to be. Only time will tell how it will all work out. It certainly could go either way.
inhawaii
·2 years agoNo, we don't.
I'm a small seller.
My sales are up.
mam98031
·2 years ago@ebaiysellslots19
Exactly how does "...the recent Mercari zero fees update REALLY shows just how bad new management of eBay over the last 5 years..." show anything yet???? It isn't even a month old. Not enough time to collect any real stats yet. We / they don't know if this big change is going to work or not. Not enough time to prove it one way or another yet. And there are LOTS of buyers complaining. But only time will tell. We should visit this question in six months and see what is happening.
Ebay management would be foolish to take notice of about 3 weeks worth of data regarding such a big change and then running with it. There simply is not enough history yet. Maybe Mercari will be successful with this and maybe they won't.
ebaiysellslots19
OP2 years agoEntire point is that these corporations adjust their algorithims willy nilly. Absolutely, perhaps in six months Mercari retools their algos as all Silicon Valley companies try to fix what isn't broken and nobody will care about Mercari anymore. Perhaps eBay will one day after twenty years improve (LOL), could happen.
I'm not here to shill Mercari or jump and shout about how "green the grass is" on the other side - but I will point out how scorched and dead the grass is here on the eBay side of the fence. We could have it MUCH better with different management leadership that actually innovates.
mam98031
·2 years agoIt may be all that for you, but it isn't for others. I'm sorry Ebay isn't working well for you, for others it is fine. And for some it is great.
No one knows if Mercari's dramatic move is a good one or not yet and won't know for months. It is simply way too soon.
Yes absolutely corporations make changes, add stuff, delete stuff, etc. in an effort to stay current, viable and drive sales. That is EXACTLY what they are suppose to do. If Ebay were the same site, same rules as it was 20-30 years ago, Ebay would not exist today. Way too much has changed in the market over the years. Ebay simply would not be here.
714ricki
·2 years agoThe lawn isn't always greener on the other side of the fence. Congrats on the burst of sales.
Good luck!
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itscalledapostingid
·2 years agoShould any of that be dignified with a response?