@baviebee wrote:
Re your mention: "grandiose expectations of making money while they sleep."
Hi - do you think that somebody trying to sell their own estate/vintage items/collection has necessarily "delusions of grandeur" asking for a price that gives them like measly $30/hr for their work: photoing, measuring, listing, packaging, shipping. etc.? when all is done.
My situation is the following:
Person with a nice vintage clothing & accessories collection going to the 1930s. Takes personal pleasure in ownership but realizes selling is in order.
Person is a tad peeved seeing the prices in the gutter. Still lists with much effort and detail. Ebay shingles and doesn't care. Ebay wants money for store and ensures for itself final value fees are collected. Ebay is a tad greedy in my view, there as it is not helpful to make sales happen/successful. Ebay can be picky/**bleep**y, as it has nothing to write off, really.
Subscriber does all the work. Not much loss for eBay in essence.
Please educate me and tell me I am just too stupid to put it all together intelligently:)
@baviebee
Hello, thanks for your reply, which got me thinking.
(Please note that I wrote about "grandiose expectations of making money" in one's sleep. Not "delusions of grandeur." The two have nothing to do with one another, yet -- through a slip of the pen perhaps? -- you conflated them.)
Which segues into the question you pose. As I see it, the answer (about what is a fair price to expect) is: it all depends on whether you think you are entitled to something in exchange for your store subscription and your efforts, which you undertake voluntarily (presumably). Everyone who sells here has a highly subjective experience.
As far as I know eBay merely provides a space for sellers. It makes no promises to push / accelerate sales (although in my own experience, it will most certainly do so if you ship same day and offer 30 day paid returns) or otherwise do us any particular favors.
eBay also makes crystal clear that its first allegiance is to its bottom line. (That's normal corporate behavior.) And only a naif would take seriously eBay's propaganda about how it wants to help sellers "succeed."
I do not feel entitled to anything from, and I have zero expectations of eBay, with two exceptions: for my monthly store subscription, I demand that my storefront be available 24/7. And it is. I also expect my financial particulars to be properly attended to, and they are.
The way I see it, everything else that happens is up to me.
For my part, I too sell old and mostly one of a kind things (estate antiques, porcelain, glass, ceramics, some books and LPs). I do all the same chores that you do.
But I am retired and do eBay (especially in the last 6 years since I left the workforce) strictly for pleasure.
I neither think that I am entitled to any thing in return for my efforts, nor view my eBay activity as a burden.
As for the things that I sell... I regard them as investments to be sold at a price that I determine (subject to obvious and reasonable constraints). They generally appreciate in value with the passage of time. My buyers are older, wealthier and generally well-educated and they are not afraid of spending money. But if they opt to not spend their money, that's ok with me, because I am not in a hurry to sell.
My inventory also is completely paid for -- if for some reason I had to toss it into a dumpster tomorrow, I could do so. I have no attachment to inanimate objects.
The net result is that I sidestep a lot of the frustration that other sellers experience. I realize that I am in a very, very tiny minority.
eBay seller since 1999. This is a posting ID.
