How long do you keep items listed?

[rockthetouritinerary_7]

how long do you keep items listed on Ebay, and do you think it lessens the value if it is listed for over 2 years?

[bashort]

I have listings over 10 years old that still sell occasionally, the pandemic cleaned out most of my 10+ year old stock

[rockyroadtradingpost]

For me it depends on how much storage space I have and if I need to free up space. I always reduce prices before making the decision to take a listing down and donate it. 

[broto_64]

Until my store's "free listings" is all full, which so far has never happened.

If it ever does I will lower prices little by little until something sells.

Normally however I don't have to lower prices, inflation kind of does that automatically.

[bashort]

I have plenty of storage space and I have listed items that I thought may never sell  because I think that I may need it at some point and if I do I will be able to easily find it and if it sells that is great also.

The thing is in the age of massive supply chain issues you never know if that item that you could not give away 2 years ago suddenly becomes unavailable

[worldcoinauctions]

Periodically I'll go through old listings and raise the prices, oddly enough that is often what it takes to sell them! Depends what it is. I don't have any issue with an item that has been listed for several years selling. 

[continentalcollectibles]

Thats a Great question that all eBay sellers Should Ask, nothing worse than looking at an online store and seeing items that are two years old. after all, you have to assume the buyers are Questioning if No one Else Wants it after One Year what is Wrong with it? Even though the reality is you need to find that one person who wants it or needs it. When eBay used to have their yearly Conventions at the eBay Opens in Las Vegas, One of the main things that were taught was to never let any item go past one year. Delist and sell similar. after one year look at the price point and adjust them if necessary to be Competitive. Good Luck in your online adventure.

[gloryglorygifts]

I keep them up until they sell, or I get sick of looking at them. LOL. I have had 4 cross items sell in the last month and I have a watcher on the last one and all of them have been in my inventory since I opened the ebay store in 2016. Personally, the value of it has gone up since I listed it, but I haven't adjusted the price. My distributor still sells them, and another communion cross that I have in my inventory, but they are now close to the retail price that I'm selling them for. Good value for the customer.

[simply-the-best-for-you]

I keep items until they sell.  I've only in 27 years, removed a handful of items.  My oldest items right now are close to 10 years old, but there's very few of them.  Clothing can take a long time, so I often sell items 3-4 yo.  Ofc I keep them all relisted, so no one can tell how old they are.  

I sell old items almost as frequently as new items.  Yes, some buyers who have Saved Searches or visit your store often might get sick of seeing the same items, but there are new buyers every day on eBay, plus occasional buyers, plus buyers looking for something different this month than last month.  I've never had problems selling items in old listings, just as easily as items in new listings.  If I had to break it down, I'd estimate 30% listed within the few months, 40% within the prior 2 years, 20% 2-4 years old, 10% older than 4 years.  

[turtles-trading-post]

Since we've been talking about ending and Sell Similar on fixed price items, I'll add in my strategy for auctions.

Since I get 250 free auctions a month with my store, I use them all.  And since adding a Buy It Now to those is now free, I always list them at a start price, say $1.99 with a BIN of $2.99-4.99.  It seems most of them sell on the BIN, but I'm appealing to those who want to bid at a low price and wait, and those who want it now at a higher price.  I set them for the 8 week free relist.

After 9 weeks those end and they wind up in the "Unsold" folder.  I try to keep a few 100 expired listings there.  All month I will list new things as I may, but every Friday or Saturday evenings, I will relist 50 from the unsold folder.  As those get relisted for an additional 9 weeks,  I reduce the start price from $1.99 to 1.98 and so on every time it takes a trip thru the cycle.  Sometimes items that have are down to $1.96 sell immediately on the BIN. It's all a matter of who's watching when.

Note that the items in the Unsold folder I listed this week ended early January.  That gave them a pause so they look brand new to my regular customers.

And towards the end of the month if I have a surplus of available auctions, I will use them all up with items from my Unsold folder.  And every so often when things pile up in the Unsold folder, I'll convert some to Fixed price.

[mr_lincoln]

@rockthetouritinerary_7 

I think a lot depends on a Seller's circumstance with the venue that determines how long they keep stuff active for sale. 

If the Sell through rate doubles and triples like it has on my account in the last 2 years, resulting in a slow steady decline in eBay sales, I move things to other venues several times a year now.  If sales ever recover naturally, opposed to using Promoted Listings (which contributed to the slow steady decline in sales for 2 years) then I will be able to have more listed for sale on eBay again.  

I took down 55 listings about a week ago and sent them elsewhere to sell.  While I prefer having 400-500 items for sale each month the decline sales have cut in to that.  I am currently below 300 listings.  

While I love Selling on eBay the operative word is "Selling" ... the trend right now seems to be the first weekend of each month (around the time the Store Subscription is due) sales are decent, then they drop off for the remainder of the month.  

To put this in perspective, in the last 22 months only 2 have set high sales dollar totals ... 

-No growth, it has gone backwards

-No sustainable sales

-Sell through rate has doubled and tripled

-Most sales come from Auctions or the Send offers eligible feature

-Bin listings get buried, hidden, etc and thus BIN sales are few and far between

I am in year 9 of Selling, the last 2 have been horrible.  

[toomuchstuffagain35]

Right now I'm still working at a FT jobby job so I don't have the time or the energy for all the tweaking and relisting I'd likely be doing otherwise, so for now, I just list and forget it for the most part, unless I run across a listing that's been poofed, then I rework that and relist.

I also have a bunch of stuff that I can still find stuff to restock so do them as well. Then I list new stuff as I have the time/energy/motivation.

Pretty sure some of my 'collectibles', glass/china etc are years old on the site by now. Luckily I avoid clothing and like items like the plague so don't have to worry too much about fads/fashions etc.

[chapeau-noir]

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@simply-the-best-for-you wrote:

I keep items until they sell.  I've only in 27 years, removed a handful of items.  My oldest items right now are close to 10 years old, but there's very few of them.  Clothing can take a long time, so I often sell items 3-4 yo.  Ofc I keep them all relisted, so no one can tell how old they are.  

I sell old items almost as frequently as new items.  Yes, some buyers who have Saved Searches or visit your store often might get sick of seeing the same items, but there are new buyers every day on eBay, plus occasional buyers, plus buyers looking for something different this month than last month.  I've never had problems selling items in old listings, just as easily as items in new listings.  If I had to break it down, I'd estimate 30% listed within the few months, 40% within the prior 2 years, 20% 2-4 years old, 10% older than 4 years.  

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Yeah, my bugaboo is not enough storage - I have a little space in the basement, but beyond that things are stuffed in a bit of spare closet space and some cubby holes in another room. Outside of the mart clothing and low-end stuff (which is probably best sent off for ragging and recycling), I know just about everything sells sooner or later, but keeping it for long enough is impossible for me. It's really frustrating, because sometimes sales of new items will prompt older items in that same cohort to float up to the surface and also sell.

[toomuchstuffagain35]

I am desperately trying to remember NOT to purchase larger items because of storage space (not to mention higher ship costs). Also trying to get a few takers on markdowns of said larger space hogs with little success. Probably because it appears that every man and his dog on here are running continual "sales".

[laststopgeneralstore]

I start marking my items down as early as 45 days and continue to do so until they hit the $.99 cent section in my store which usually is about an 8-10 month process. Then they live their for the remainder of their lives.

[toomuchstuffagain35]

Hopefully you charge enough in shipping to get that back plus your fees? (at the .99cent mark).