Mystery Solved? The $2.99 or so eBay/Amazon Item Free Shipping Conundrum
Summary: svcheck opened a discussion questioning how sellers manage to profit from selling $2 items with free shipping on platforms like eBay, considering the costs of shipping, fees, and labor. Various participants speculated on potential strategies including getting items at minimal cost, using stolen money, or employing loss-leader techniques to gain long-term customers. Some suggest these sales might involve drop-shipping from regions with lower shipping costs or leveraging special deals with shipping carriers. svcheck engaged with these ideas, challenging some theories and sharing personal experiences with the platform costs and fee structures.
After 20 years in online sales and moving around $5 million annually, I’ve seen just about every business model in the book, but this one still defies logic.
How are sellers turning a profit on a $2.99 item sale with free shipping when postage alone cost MORE than that, plus eBay/payment fees, packaging, and labor? Even with zero inventory cost, the math breaks down instantly.
Is this some advanced volume-arbitrage strategy, high-tier feedback farming, or just massive stupidity providing it cost you at least over 7$ to do it right - with tracking and fees? Drop your theories below on how anyone actually survives selling items for pocket change after shipping and platform cuts.
backwoods00trader
·3 weeks agoi see hats selling for 5 bucks shipping is 5 bucks doesn't make sense
svcheck
OP3 weeks agowould love to have 5$ .. some time it is like 7 , plus ebay fee - close to $1
stainlessenginecovers
·3 weeks ago@svcheck a. Use of a name/address can be sold.
no, you can buy database of all us population for few hundred and hardly worth it since you do not have an email
The email address is hidden and can be easily found by a seller, used and sold, along with real name/physical address etc.
Buying 'databases' of 'emails' does NOTHING without a Real Name/Physical Address to go with it.
c.) Business card in the package where buyer will be enticed to buy more.
Never seen even one such in items i bought and i doubt that it is valuable ideas on 3$ items. i for example never buy from the same place - just search what is needed , not by seller , but by item and price/condition. seldom need two of the same
Has NOTHING to do with 'what' you bought the first time. I'm talking consumables that I may have on a flyer that you would purchase over & over again.
For someone with 'all that experience' seems you are quite close minded.
svcheck
OP3 weeks ago"The email address is hidden and can be easily found by a seller"
really?? i never seen it. would you share to how to do it?
And about real names - you just got to be kidding me.. people put all kind of names there
stainlessenginecovers
·3 weeks agoAnd about real names - you just got to be kidding me.. people put all kind of names there
Boy you just keep reaching and reaching to try to make your point; failing miserably I might add.
Not when buying on ebay or amazon as 99% are accurate as they need to 'match' the name on the credit card and almost NOBODY bothers 'changing their name' when buying. I've had to 'search' a few homes, names, get info from City/County Property tax records (all public) and match name to home.
NEVER has it NOT matched.
really?? i never seen it. would you share to how to do it?
Not on your life am I 'posting' a picture but it is quite easy. Take a look at an order, almost any order and look where you can 'click' for a drop down.
Doesn't really matter. I just told you why they do it many posts back
One other reason, 400 transactions in 3 months changes the way metrics etc.
svcheck
OP3 weeks ago"Boy you just keep reaching and reaching to try to make your point; failing miserably I might add."
LOL
"Not when buying on ebay or amazon as 99% are accurate as they need to 'match' the name on the credit card and almost NOBODY bothers 'changing their name' when buying. I've had to 'search' a few homes, names, get info from City/County Property tax records (all public) and match name to home."
I have it on at least 10% of orders. buyer is one name , recipient is another and some is like UPS Store and etc
>NEVER has it NOT matched.
What can i say - good for y.
really?? i never seen it. would you share to how to do it?
"Not on your life am I 'posting' a picture but it is quite easy. Take a look at an order, almost any order and look where you can 'click' for a drop down."
Share where you get you mojo.. Need to buy from same source, got tyo be good! there is no such a thing ever here or on PayPal. Quit drinking, may help...
svcheck
OP3 weeks ago · Editedps, about close minded. we use Salesforce and Appolo to prospect B2B.. and cost us close to 80K per year, so i think i know a bit more than you thinking and most likely way more than y
You can buy VERIFIED databases names with titles and etc for way less than $4 per lead (amount of the loss on 2.99 ebay sales )
warrenshobbies
·3 weeks agoebay changed email contact to an at members at ebay address quite awhile back. if you know a work around please let us know. And, once they went to managed payment you can't get it from paypal anymore either.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agocorrect, was a while ago, like 2 years or so
svcheck
OP3 weeks agocheck my reply to hi9m - his coolaid is real good, he need to share the source
warrenshobbies
·3 weeks agoYou have at least a few items listed for under $6 with free USPS Ground Advantage shipping. How do you make that work?
svcheck
OP3 weeks ago · Editedold listings, wasn't sold for 10 years.. at the time usps and ebay was 1/2
warrenshobbies
·3 weeks agoI thought you might have had the secret voodoo. :)
svcheck
OP3 weeks agolol..
dbmm-media
·3 weeks agobulk
svcheck
OP3 weeks agohow?
dbmm-media
·3 weeks agolower negotiated shipping costs
lower negotiated ebay fees
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoebay fees are not negotiable or at least at my level. perhaps if you doing 100M per year - may be. same with SH rates
funfactorychannel
·3 weeks agousing someone else corporate mailing account. The company has so much packages that makes it hard to catch.
small amount money laundering
A companies tax write off - report retail postage cost as the cost and using discount cost to make the purchase
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoagree to first two, 3rd is questionable - what is the point to make losses? You can have loss flying first class around the world and write it off...
funfactorychannel
·3 weeks agoThey must have made a lot of money else where and need more money to offset the profit. I place this as 3 as its still not an idea way to save on taxes. but still plausable.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agowell , there are way better tax expense idea - go to business conference in Hawaii or Europe and write off as business expense - legitime 110%
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoor buy over 6000lbs car, like Range Rover and write it off first year
eburtonlab
·3 weeks agoYou are assuming that those sellers are paying for retail shipping. That may not be the case.
Some sellers are clearly retail drop shipping or triangulation scamming, so the cost of shipping is being paid for by the retailer doing the delivery, or by other buyers paying yearly fees for Prime accounts or similar memberships, not by the seller using the postal service.
Someone selling individual USB cables for $2.99 is likely doing one of the following: retail drop-shipping, shipping from the Far East using subsidized shipping rates, putting stamps on an envelope and barely breaking even, or else losing money on each sale.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agowould be very interesting to find a drop shipper willing to drop ship items for 2.99. i would pay for such info
eburtonlab
·3 weeks agoIf you have an account, Orange Connex will drop-ship cheap items, I believe. It is a favorite of false tracking scammers and brushing scammers for generating a tracking label very inexpensively.
Most US retailers don't want to ship individual $2.99 items to your customers for you for free, but some unscrupulous eBay sellers are abusing the equivalent of a personal Prime account for commercial purposes to cheat the retailer.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoi know that prime delivers too.. question is HOW?
eburtonlab
·3 weeks agoWhat do you mean, "HOW?"
How does Amazon do it?
Amazon is 2.77 trillion dollar company with robotic warehouses in every state and almost every country, with fleets of trucks and planes, funded by 220 million people paying about $140 per year for Prime accounts. That buys a lot of "free shipping".
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoi am not talkimng about Amazon corporate cost, but for sure it is way more than 3$ delivered in single quantities to most places for the total - box, packing, truck. i am curious is how much Amazon charge the SELLER , we sell on amazon but do not see any such offers
eburtonlab
·3 weeks agoAmazon fees are searchable online but are complicated by subscription costs and variable percentages. I doubt many Amazon sellers are making money selling single $3 items. And FBA costs start around $3 per unit and go up from there, so that is not profitable for single item sales at that price range.
gloryglorygifts
·3 weeks agoIf you are turning over $5 million annually why do you care?
funfactorychannel
·3 weeks agocause there are times there are things you just want answers regardless of wealth, status, or power.
christworks
·3 weeks ago@gloryglorygifts That's what I don't understand. People come here and brag about how well they are doing, but then want to be in someone else's business. ...wanting to know how they do something or wanting to tattle on them because they don't 100% follow policy.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agolol
svcheck
OP3 weeks agolol, it is an interesting subject.. i accidently stumble on this renewed user experience chats and first topic was about postal rates. so i decided to add one myself
svcheck
OP3 weeks ago5M is not that much as a revenue , do not forget like 12% ebay fee, shipping cost, employee , building and etc
you can google us - we are multimillion dollar company
gloryglorygifts
·3 weeks ago · Editedyou can google us too, and it's not revenue from ebay. It was from before we shut down the website last month.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agovolume is nothing.. y can have 100m selling intel cpu or memory and loosing money
marnotom!
·3 weeks agoPerhaps these sellers are following Jeff Bezos' strategy with Amazon, not realizing that it may not work very well on the micro level. Amazon didn't become profitable for nine years, but in the meantime it amassed a large customer base and chunk of market share.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agointeresting though..
fabrics24
·3 weeks ago · EditedOP, if you don't actually want people to leave their theories or opinions about why people do this, why did you tell us to??
theteamsetguy
·3 weeks ago@svcheck ,
You can negotiate special rates if you ship enough.
Custom/Enterprise Contracts: If you are a massive high-volume shipper (thousands of parcels a day), custom negotiated service agreements (NSAs) or enterprise shipping contracts with USPS focus heavily on Ground Advantage or Priority services rather than Media Mail, because Media Mail is already deeply discounted at a flat public tier.
svcheck
OP3 weeks ago · Editedincorrect.. ebay is already as low with them as possible
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoin theory, but ebay already did and they have NSA rates
theteamsetguy
·3 weeks ago@svcheck ,
No eBay just has the USPS Commercial Base rates that are the same if you used Pirateship, Stamps.com and etc. NSA rates can be lower depending on volume.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoperhaps.. but i can't imagine fulfillment operation costing less than few dollars as well
redlinear
·3 weeks ago1) Attempting to drum up sales, multiple quantity orders, repeat buyers for other items.
2) Many businesses use gross sales as a worth valuation.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoperhaps.. but i personally never shopped again same place since shopping on the ebay is new search each time, not focus on previous stores
stainlessenginecovers
·3 weeks agoSimple.
a.) Use of a name/address can be sold.
b.) Feedback used for advertising on their 'website'
c.) Business card in the package where buyer will be enticed to buy more.
All written off a 'advertising'.
If I can sell 500 somethings a month at a $5 loss costing $2500 out of pocket, after write offs (Fed 20%, State 10% SS 15%) would really cost me $1375 month but if it nets even 10% of those 500 somethings into a $100 avg sale would be/could be $5000 and maybe those 10% become repeat buyers because of what i am selling/including in my package (flyer, bus card etc).
Many more scenarios but the bottom line (and I guess you missed this one in your fantastic know everything about business experiences):
It is NOT being done to 'make a profit'- there is a long game to it.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agointerestying thought...
here is my 2c about it
a. Use of a name/address can be sold.
no, you can buy database of all us population for few hundred and hardly worth it since you do not have an email
b.) Feedback used for advertising on their 'website'
perhaps
c.) Business card in the package where buyer will be enticed to buy more.
Never seen even one such in items i bought and i doubt that it is valuable ideas on 3$ items. i for example never buy from the same place - just search what is needed , not by seller , but by item and price/condition. seldom need two of the same
wstoler
·3 weeks agoI didn't include that info in my original response because I assumed the poster was talking about small sellers. But you are correct. A name is worth a lot, especially if you can upsell on other items.
And if you have a product that can be sold over and over again with regular shipping, you have a business model that would work to sell the original item as as loss-leader.
It's nice to be surrounded on these posts with people who think even more than I do about these things.
Wayne Stoler
svcheck
OP3 weeks agodoubt you can upsell from 2.99 item.. at least i never thought to return to same store again
"And if you have a product that can be sold over and over again with regular shipping, you have a business model that would work to sell the original item as as loss-leader."
didn't get your point - what is a reason to loose 4$ or so on each sale continuously?
wstoler
·3 weeks agoI didn't word it correctly. You have the $2.99 sale as a loss leader to get someone interested, then direct them to your store where you sell everything at a higher price. Sort of like the grocery store selling Oreos at $3/box (instead of $6/box), and you'll probably buy half a dozen other boxes of cookies at the same time at a much higher profit margin.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoi hear you , but i buy stuff too and never start with the seller.. i always start to search what i need and select from what is available.. unless it is i guess some sort of very niche type item - likely collectables and such
stainlessenginecovers
·3 weeks ago@svcheck a. Use of a name/address can be sold.
no, you can buy database of all us population for few hundred and hardly worth it since you do not have an email
The email address is hidden and can be easily found by a seller, used and sold, along with real name/physical address etc.
Buying 'databases' of 'emails' does NOTHING without a Real Name/Physical Address to go with it.
c.) Business card in the package where buyer will be enticed to buy more.
Never seen even one such in items i bought and i doubt that it is valuable ideas on 3$ items. i for example never buy from the same place - just search what is needed , not by seller , but by item and price/condition. seldom need two of the same
Has NOTHING to do with 'what' you bought the first time. I'm talking consumables that I may have on a flyer that you would purchase over & over again.
For someone with 'all that experience' seems you are quite close minded.
wstoler
·3 weeks agoIf you are selling in the postcard, greeting card, ephemera or trading card category, and probably other categories, you can ship, without tracking, for first class postage, which is currently 78 cents. Add in the cost of the envelope, label, ink, etc. and you are up to about 85 cents. eBay fees on $2.99 would be about 36 cents, and maybe a bit of promotion to add another 20 cents.
So it is possible to sell profitably and legitimately at the $2.99 or $3.99 range, but it's got to be tiring to work your rear end off for next to nothing.
Oh, and postcards, ephemera, etc. can be had for about .02/ea., give or take a bit, if you're buying in bulk.
Tracking is a preference on eBay, but it is not mandatory.
I have been selling postcards and other items (about 450 cards and about 850 other items) at first class rates. The rest of my items are shipped out at Ground Advantage with tracking, and of course sell for higher rates.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoThanks for the info. I wasn't referring to these. i bought like USB cables. phone case and etc with that type of prices
and to my knowledge ebay fees are far from 0.36
If you offer Free Shipping ($3.00 Total Buyer Cost):
Percentage fee: $3.00 × 13.6% = $0.41
Fixed fee: $0.30
Total Fee: $0.71
and items from Amazon and eBay came with tracking
wstoler
·3 weeks agoOh yeah. I forgot about the .30 fixed fee for accepting payment. It is still do-able without tracking.
If you are using the eBay first class envelope option, there is a minimal amount of tracking associated with the barcode, but not the full tracking with the package code.
In this case, I have to agree with others that someone else is paying for the shipping and they're sliding under the radar at their companies. Probably.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoebay first class envelope is only for like 1 or 2 categories , like trading cards. not for anything else
turtles-trading-post
·3 weeks agoI sell first day covers and postal history to stamp collectors. As a stamp dealer, I'm connected in with other dealers who buy large collections and I buy my postage at 50% of face. So my cost for postage is only 42 cents an order. My shipping supplies are no 10 envelopes and a filler card, which I get with Staples gift cards from the credit card I use for business.
As another response said, "In it for the long haul". I send out my "Send Offers" every day at a small discount to find new customers. They buy they offer and I'm hoping they look at my store and become regulars. Right now 40% of my sales are to regular customers who order repeatedly
svcheck
OP3 weeks ago · Editedi am not sure how you manage to get top rated with no tracking. any suggestions how to do it?
also i am puzzled by 2.39 total item sale.. i guess 0.7 or so in ebay fees, plus 0.40 c for sh, plus supplies and time tio do it. what6 is a pint to make a $1... even if you sell 100 a day it is only $100. We pay 250 per day to employees to start.. perhaps come over, i will pay y more. I am serous. Would give y 6K per month start. that is like selling 6000 units
bennotbill
·3 weeks agoA couple of items I bought at impossible prices had business postal labels on them so I assumed that postage wasn't personally costing this seller anything.
And it's just as likely that the new office items they were selling also came from the same business where they were working.
So they may only be making a few pounds on each item but it would be all profit.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agowell, that is employee theft and doubt that too many people would do it risking the job, moreover, it is kind of difficult to ship such low value items without using ebay sh system, too time consuming
mordecai8614
·3 weeks agoLet's be real, you just wanted an excuse to throw that "$5 million annually" out there.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoLOL, it wasn't bragging. i pointed that we have experince and now cost of doing business. if you think that it was not real - can check our accounts on ebay along about 3.5M. svcheck/svcheck2/svcheck3/svsurplus
tobaccocardyahoo
·3 weeks ago · EditedThings you can do to make money on a $2 item are include shipping it from China, in a tyvek bag.
svcheck
OP3 weeks ago · Editednot sure how y can ship from China for $2 , but i was referring to the items listed from USA
lacemaker3
·3 weeks agoThey are paying for the items and postage with stolen money. So everything they receive in payment is profit. It's a kind of money laundering, using stolen money to get income that looks clean.
When it is done with stolen credit card numbers, it's a triangulation scam.
It can also be done with stolen gift cards. This is why gift cards are being tampered with in stores. As soon as the card is sold and activated, they can skim the money away, and whoever purchased the card is out of luck.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoif you have "stolen money" what is the point to take 50-70% loss? i would just keep it
if you think you can use stolen CC number on ebay to buy sh you are gravely wrong - will be closed and shut down very fast
lacemaker3
·3 weeks ago · EditedYour stolen money is worth nothing if you can't spend it. This is how money laundering works. Like fencing stolen goods, the thieves may only get ten cents on the dollar.
Yes, using a stolen CC or gift card will get an account shut down fast, on eBay, Amazon, Walmart or anywhere. But they will get away with it the first few times. Then they move on to a new account and do it again.
fabrics24
·3 weeks agoMy running theory is that they're getting these items for literal pennies, while either getting paid hourly or living off some other means of income. Who knows? Maybe there's a black market for established eBay stores.
No clue if I'm onto something or just scribbling crazy theories on the wall 😂
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoPerhaps you missed my point - considering you have NO COST item, how can you sell it for 2.99 or 3.999 if sh and ebay fee already going to be around $7. i am not even mentioning cost the someone doing it - order processing, label printing pack and pouch/supplies cost
svcheck
OP3 weeks agops, in other word - you will pay out of pocket 4-5$ and do free labor. if you sell lets say 100 items a month it would be 400-500 loss. what is the point doing it?
fabrics24
·3 weeks ago · EditedRereading your post and I guess I did not pick up on the free shipping.
They're literally just bad at budgeting and don't realize they're selling at a loss.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agowell, 100,000 such items.. got to be some reason why...
fabrics24
·3 weeks agoIdk man maybe they get a free pony if they sell enough items????
svcheck
OP3 weeks agolol
powell-collectibles
·3 weeks agoWe’re not looking at the listing so it is hard to say. But plenty of sellers just put an item into an envelope – put on some stamps, and that is how they do it. It doesn’t cost seven dollars to send an envelope with a stamp on it. Plenty of sellers can do just fine with items that are a few dollars.
svcheck
OP3 weeks agoebay require tracking to be top rated.. moreover ebay cost and "few stamps: is about that amount