@jbwoodco wrote:
So if your item sells for $7.50 and your shipping is $7.50 and you pay 8% to promote your listing, you are now paying Ebay a whopping 28% of your $7.50 in fees. Amazon only charges 15% and has a much bigger customer base...
That's what kills me selling $20-$30 toys. By the time you push the fee on shipping into the item's margin (because shipping costs what it costs), eBay is jacking you for over 20%.
That said...Scamazon's fee structure isn't any better. Most items provide a meager $4 shipping voucher, which they take 49c from, or 10%. You then have to add a minimum of $4 to your item price to account for the voucher shortfall, which they tax at 15%. Don't forget the 99c flat fee as well. _Then_, if you want any shot at winning the inevitable A2Z case without using their labels, you have to pay _another_ $3 fee for signature confirmation (or wing it, as in the calculation below).
They get you coming and going.
For a $20 product with $8 shipping costs, to make as much as eBay ($4.21), you have to get the product for $11.58.
For a $20 product with $8 shipping costs, to make as much as Amazon ($5.08), you have to get the product for $9.84.
Distributors that I've managed to find don't even come close to that sort of margin. I was extremely lucky to see 20% now and then. God help you if, like what happened with toys, customers started waiting for Ollies/BigLots and expecting you to compete with those prices. The only way I was able to keep my shirt was to be super selective and, more often than not, sit on stuff until supply had dried up everywhere else and play hardball. Clearly, that was not sustainable and I've been winding down operations since I realized it.
Anyway...
I had a very poor response to both seller offers and promoted listings. I promoted something like two thirds of my items at a few percent. There was no effect for three months. Every monthly renewal, I remove another batch from promoted status, and next month should see the last of them gone. I've also sent those 10% or 20% offers to no avail.
I know the common refrain is to tell sellers their items are **bleep**, overpriced, or both but I don't have problems moving those items at those prices at toy shows. In fact, I often do something at shows that _never_ happens on eBay - sell two items to the same customer. The only reason I list on eBay these days is to generate (increasingly little) cash flow between shows.
eBay is just like everybody else these days, trying to charge sure thing prices for empty chances.
