How do i profit with DVDs?

[booksnstuff_8]

Say I list at Buy it Now for $5.00 with free shipping, how much does ebay and PayPal charge from this?

[rpalma]

Volume and preferably multiple sales to a single purchaser.

You need to be really efficient, because even if you get your dvds for free, you are making $1 to $2 per dvd profit, so you better be able to list/sell/pack/ship one in 5 minutes which will net you $12 to $24 per hour.

If it takes you 15 minutes to sell a dvd, then you are making $4 to $8 per hour.

[drusalina]

I use this calculator.  But don't forget your envelope and printing postage costs if you print at home.

https://finalfeecalc.com/ 

[luckythewinner]

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@booksnstuff_8 wrote:

Say I list at Buy it Now for $5.00 with free shipping, how much does ebay and PayPal charge from this?

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There is no way we can tell you how to profit unless you tell us how much you are paying for these DVDs.

+ $5.00   Revenue

- $2.80   Media mail shipping

- $0.60   eBay fees

- $0.45   PayPal fees

- $0.20  shipping supplies

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+ $0.95   net after selling costs

So if you are paying 25 cents each for each DVD, you will make about 65 cents on each sale.

But remember, if a buyer is unhappy and files a Not As Described dispute, you will lose the cost of the DVD, the shipping cost, the packing cost, and the PayPal fees which comes to $3.70 each.

So if you list 50 DVDs each month and sell all 50 DVDs and have a 5% loss rate, you will make about $23 per month. 

[byrd69er]

You might make a slight profit if someone pays you to take the DVDs off their hands.

[chapeau-noir]

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@nobody*s_perfect wrote:

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@cynthealee2 wrote: ... 2.80 Shipping (media mail 5-7 oz which is what DVD's are with cardboard sandwiches and the envelope (thin and thick DVD cases I checked))... had the shipping weights from my DVD's.....

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The exact weight isn't crucial, because Media Mail is priced per pound.  Even a set with a couple of discs will cost $2.80 to ship, if it's not over a pound.

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Even if it's fairly heavy it's cheap - I shipped a 3.5 lb set of Star Trek Next Gen in its display box for only $4.  And it's not all that slow.

Edit for fatfingeritis.

[yuzuha]

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@chapeau-noir wrote:

I sell DVDs here as often as I can get them.  My advice is to either sell series (i.e., a year's worth of TV shows), or lot them up by genre.  If I sell a single DVD it's usually a hard to find one.  I do pretty well when I sell them.

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This has been my experience.  Full series/box sets tend to do pretty well, as do cult films/things that aren't available on streaming services, or collector's editions.  But regular old movies or single DVDs from series?  Those are hard to move.

[chapeau-noir]

I was doing well even with VHS until I ran out of them - they were all desired titles that hadn't been issued on DVD yet - old sci fi, Japanese films, etc.  It wasn't all that darned long ago in visual-media-land.

[inhawaii]

This thread reminds me.

I bought a DVD entitled "2012" from Amazon. It was about the end of the world.  I paid whatever the going rate was, 10 or 20 bucks. 

I watched it once.  Hated the movie.  Listed it on ebay fo $5 + $4 S&H. Lowered the price to $4. Lowered the price to $3. Lowered the price to $2. Lowered the price to $1.  It still did not sell. 

I ended up ending the listing and throwing the DVD  away. 

[mtgraves7984]

You barely can profit with DVDs.

When I first started selling (over a decade ago), I listed tons of CDs/DVDs that I'd gotten free when I worked on the fringes of Nashville's Country Music 'biz'.  The only reason I moved them was to increase my transaction number past the 250 requirement for new sellers. They were great items for that purpose, though!

Today, I'll still occasionally list 'out-of-production' DVDs or 'sets' of CDs... but for only a fair profit.

[faithandbutterflies]

I agree that it's hard to profit from DVDs. I use to post them often and did well but that was years ago. Two years ago I wanted to earn some money for our family to take a trip to Six Flags. I was sure I could clean out my DVD collection and make a profit like I use to. I even listed some rare hard to find DVD sets and had no luck what so ever. I was disappointed. The DVDs I've sold in the past few years have been ones used for homeschooling. I've been cleaning the house and DVDs we don't want are going to Goodwill.

[this*old*attic]

A good friend I made on the boards back in 2003 or so, and her husband, ran a music and video biz on EBay, supported their family with it, and bought a house, etc.

By 2008 they were starting to struggle as EBay changed, and within a year or 2 went belly up and got real world jobs.

[cynthealee2]

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@nobody*s_perfect wrote:

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@cynthealee2 wrote: ... 2.80 Shipping (media mail 5-7 oz which is what DVD's are with cardboard sandwiches and the envelope (thin and thick DVD cases I checked))... had the shipping weights from my DVD's.....

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The exact weight isn't crucial, because Media Mail is priced per pound.  Even a set with a couple of discs will cost $2.80 to ship, if it's not over a pound.

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Good to know, all I did was go over to USPS and plug in 5oz, then plug in 7oz from my house to 90210 (thank you 80's TV) ... cause the LONG pages of the rates make my eyes cross.

[nobody*s_perfect]

 Media Mail is priced by weight and not by zone. It's the same price to any ZIP Code.

[sodelight]

You really need to ship DVDs in a padded mailer. Too easy for the case to be broken in a plain envelope and the envelope to tear. Especially if shipping media mail. Weighty books will be thrown on top of them.

[cynthealee2]

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@sodelight wrote:
You really need to ship DVDs in a padded mailer. Too easy for the case to be broken in a plain envelope and the envelope to tear. Especially if shipping media mail. Weighty books will be thrown on top of them.

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That's what the cardboard sandwich is for.