Has any else noticed this???

[diecastorbust]

Why is it every one of my sales goes to San Diego , Loredo texas , Spokan Washington or like Miami, sk there’s no eBay buyers in say Indiana illlinois Virginia. Oh I get it more for shipping so more for fees. This is not  a one time event since I have been on eBay 98 percent of all my sales come from places where  it’s expensive to ship the furthest away. I gon selll somewhere else I get orders from every where I the is but for some reason eBay expects me to believe only people  on the west coast buy??? I know I don’t pay the shipping. It I pay the fees on it and I wonder how many times my listings are not shown in the mid wes or east coast just for eBay to make a  a couple pennies 

[diecastorbust]

Population of New York City and suburbs  over 18 million =0 sales 

Boston 7 million =0 sales 

Northern  Virginia 7 million = 0 sales

you gave the whole population of Texas  the population of loredo 250,000 if it’s lucky but still outsell In  Laredo 3-1 over 32 million people math  doesn’ t add up. Thing is we sign agreements as sellers and nothing in those agreements states our items will only be shown in certain areas and only ones in a while in others. We sign these agreements with the understanding that we are being shown every where at all times. Every other platform I have been on I have sales from all over and a lot more sales.  Makes sense now. 

[diecastorbust]

I mean I guess you’re right except 80 percent of the population lives east of the Mississippi. And I named cities within states not the whole state go back and check. Laredo Texas is hardly the whole population of Texas 99  percent of the population of Texas doesn’t live in Laredo. When you try to make facts just don’t you can’t represent numbers in each city by using the whole state. I name these cities because from where I’m at I still have Chicago nyc Boston Detroit all these areas that are a lot closer and zero sales all the other cities I mentioned  Miami Spokane San Diego and such each one of these cities it the furthest city possible from me  and the highest  cost to ship. I don’t see sales in  Orlando San fransisco Dallas Mount Olympus. Before you mouth off for zero reason other than to be annoying make sure it’s fact an not opinion 

[inhawaii]

Just when you think you've heard it all.

[goodbrakes]

Please do not lump Michigan into the coasts.

No salt water here on our shores.

[soh.maryl]

Your complaint is about the location of your buyers?

When most complaints here are from sellers who have few sales or no sales at all? 

[movieman630]

Now that's weird!

[dbfolks166mt]

Please do not lump Michigan into the coasts.

No salt water here on our shores.

      Maybe no salt water but you have a couple of ponds with pretty good sized coast lines. 😁

[eburtonlab · Accepted solution]

98 percent of all my sales come from places where it’s expensive to ship the furthest away.

If you are using any kind of fixed shipping cost (which would include free shipping) and setting your total prices based on some "average" shipping cost you can expect, then pretty much by definition any buyer located closer to you than average is paying an inflated shipping cost, and any domestic buyer further away than average is getting a relative price break.

The further away your US customers are located, the better deal they are getting from you because of the way you have set your prices. Since you are apparently in Michigan, the customers getting the best deal are located on the coasts or the southern border, like "San Diego, Laredo Texas, Spokane Washington or Miami Florida".

[broto_64]

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@dbfolks166mt wrote:

Please do not lump Michigan into the coasts.

No salt water here on our shores.

      Maybe no salt water but you have a couple of ponds with pretty good sized coast lines. 😁

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Yeah it all has a lot to do with shipping (literally, as in ports and ships).

That's why people congregate near the coast lines, most everywhere in the world, and in the case of lakes it's the presence of fresh water (also big rivers). That is where you will find most of the world's population, near waterways, rivers, oceans, lakes, and so forth.

[broto_64]

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@eburtonlab wrote:

98 percent of all my sales come from places where it’s expensive to ship the furthest away.

If you are using any kind of fixed shipping cost (which would include free shipping) and setting your total prices based on some "average" shipping cost you can expect, then pretty much by definition any buyer located closer to you than average is paying an inflated shipping cost, and any domestic buyer further away than average is getting a relative price break.

The further away your US customers are located, the better deal they are getting from you because of the way you have set your prices. Since you are apparently in Michigan, the customers getting the best deal are located on the coasts or the southern border, like "San Diego, Laredo Texas, Spokane Washington or Miami Florida".

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That makes sense, buyers are simply hunting for the best price.

[squinkercat59]

Most of my sales go to California, Texas, New York, Florida and Illinois. Coincidentally all at the top in terms of population, so it seems the odds would favor those states to begin with, so I'm not sure if visibility is stifled or not.

[brightlightbookseller]

I was curious because of this thread, so I looked at our top five states for 2023's sales by percentage:

CA	10.48%
FL	6.92%
IL	6.50%
NY	6.08%
VA	4.61%

Similar to everyone else's, except VA instead of TX being up there, but none of those are crazy high percentages (though I'm surprised by CA being so high, we're in FL and use calculated shipping on most listings, although I guess since we use Media Mail most often it doesn't raise the price for the west coast buyers).  I don't care where people are asking us to ship to, generally, if we get an order we ship it.

[isaiah53-57]

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@broto_64 wrote:

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@eburtonlab wrote:

98 percent of all my sales come from places where it’s expensive to ship the furthest away.

If you are using any kind of fixed shipping cost (which would include free shipping) and setting your total prices based on some "average" shipping cost you can expect, then pretty much by definition any buyer located closer to you than average is paying an inflated shipping cost, and any domestic buyer further away than average is getting a relative price break.

The further away your US customers are located, the better deal they are getting from you because of the way you have set your prices. Since you are apparently in Michigan, the customers getting the best deal are located on the coasts or the southern border, like "San Diego, Laredo Texas, Spokane Washington or Miami Florida".

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That makes sense, buyers are simply hunting for the best price.

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If that was true, then its all the more reason to think buyers would  buying items in their locale:

a $25 item that costs $5 to ship from a CA Seller to a CA Buyer would be a $30 transaction.

a $25 item that cost $15 to ship from a CA Seller to a NY Buyer would be a $40 transaction

and it would net ebay $1.35 more in fees - Annualize that and once again, in our opinion, mystery solved.

But hey who would believe a conspiracy theory like that?...

Even with the extreme statistical improbabilities/impossibilities involved... even with living in NH (a state with NO sales tax) and virtually NEVER having NH sales.. even with living an hour north of the most populace region in the nation... even with customer concerns about 7 days shipping time as opposed to 2 days buying locally...

Nah who would believe a conspiracy theory like that?

[monroe67]

"Why is it every one of my sales goes to San Diego , Loredo texas , Spokan Washington or like Miami, sk there’s no eBay buyers in say Indiana illlinois Virginia."

You may be overthinking this.  

I am in San Diego, and my three most recent sales were sent to Oregon, Maine, and Michigan.  Before that, there was a another one with a delivery address in Oregon, a buyer in Georgia who bought three things (yay !!), and New Mexico.   I think my last sale with a California delivery address was more than a year ago.  

eBay's hub for their International Shipping program is in Illinois.  Do you think eBay is also not showing your listings to overseas buyers whose purchases would be funneled through that hub?  

BTW, you can be glad your California buyer was in San Diego rather than Los Angeles.  At least in my part of San Diego County, we pay "only" 7.75% sales tax, while much of the County and City of Los Angeles pays 10% or slightly more.  Because eBay's Final Value Fees (FVFs) include a percentage of the amount of sales tax your buyers pay, one might think eBay steers sales toward high sales tax areas.  

[sextons-sweet-deals]

Are you using a flat rate shipping cost for any location? If so, that is probably why you're getting those far distant buyers. 

You may want to get a small scale and also calculate box weight and any packing material cost in your listings.