Lacking motivation, need a bit of a boost tonight...

[sin-n-dex]

So I haven't listed much in the past two weeks. Been working on a massive stamp collection that's both full of good stuff, and costing the B&M store a mint so that they want a bunch of money from the sales when I get around to listing stuff. (Basically no commission until we reach X dollars in sales, that's the way it works with all collections, but this collection is worth thousands...)

I managed to spend lots of time putting together lots and picking out stuff to get ready to list. So now I have some 2000 items to list, photos are done, all I have to do is get my keister into the SixBit app and start pulling templates and filling them out.

I am lacking motivation and don't feel like it. I did get two items up tonight, but that seemed like a whole lot of effort for today.

C.

[sfau]

2,000 items - wow!  I would need motivation too - maybe ice cream?

[inhawaii]

List!  List!  List!  List!  List!  List!

[chapeau-noir]

@sin-n-dex  Take a couple of days off since you've had a concentrated spell and are probably a little jaded - so something completely different, don't think about the collections.  Then set out five items to list - just set them out so they stare at you when it comes time. Just do those. Then set five more items out for the next day. Just do those. In a few days you'll be on a roll.

It's like that old joke about how you eat an elephant - one bite at a time.

[elsgun23]

great post. i was attempting to watch it until it stopped...but then i finally got it. boz scaggs...lowdown, yes.

[sin-n-dex]

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@chapeau-noir wrote:

@sin-n-dex  Take a couple of days off since you've had a concentrated spell and are probably a little jaded - so something completely different, don't think about the collections.  Then set out five items to list - just set them out so they stare at you when it comes time. Just do those. Then set five more items out for the next day. Just do those. In a few days you'll be on a roll.

It's like that old joke about how you eat an elephant - one bite at a time.

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I did manage to get two items up (yesterday think... or was that the day before? this week is a blur).

What I have managed to work on, there's some bookkeeping stuff done needed for year end that I ignore all year, and now it's time to get started. So I figure if I do that, I can get on a roll, but it doesn't help motivate me to list new stuff.

I told the coin shop giving me more stuff isn't going to help at this point, what I need is some time in the right mindset.

I guess if I take today off, I can work on the bookkeeping task (I've logged January sales so far, that's about it), which has to get done by the end of the year anyway so I can do my business taxes. All year I log coin shop sales in a workbook, but only their stuff, and I log the gross total on all sales for my monthly sales tax returns. But I never log my own stuff until the end of the year... I'm a little late this year, last year it was July when I started working on that. It's important to determine the cogs and how much of the associated fees apply to my sales, because I do one tax return for the store's stuff, and one for mine. I registered them under separate entities to see how we are doing independently of the other.

C.

[sin-n-dex]

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@inhawaii wrote:

List!  List!  List!  List!  List!  List!

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That's the problem, I just don't feel like doing listings! I did feel like processing stamps and making lots to put up, but once the lots are made, I don't really feel like listing.

I think one problem I have is that I have no idea what to put as a price on a lot of this stuff. I'm using stampworld as a guide (to ferret out what's more valuable), but there's a bit of pressure to make sales for a good price, so I'm a little hesitant.

Perhaps I should start with listing my own stuff... what's the worst that can happen there? At least I'm used to listing my own things and know what most of it should list for.

C.

[12345jamesstamps]

I hear your pain...but you have a lot listed already!

I have books with stamps in them waiting to be posted.

One thought I might add...but it means more work of course....LOL

Chinese stamps unused as issued without gum....soaking the stamps in water to remove the hinge marks and those stamps become never hinged. Trick is to make sure which stamps were issued without gum...Will have a better sale with them...especially with a certain group of people who buy them if you know what I mean.

Don't you hate buyers who buy only one item a week?...my repeat buyers who keep me going of course.

Or the buyer who buys 5 items and pays for each one separately. .30 fee X 5 instead of a .30 fee. ?

I saw the "we'' in a statement...alas...I am just a one kid operation.LOL

[sin-n-dex]

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@12345jamesstamps wrote:

I hear your pain...but you have a lot listed already!

I have books with stamps in them waiting to be posted.

One thought I might add...but it means more work of course....LOL

Chinese stamps unused as issued without gum....soaking the stamps in water to remove the hinge marks and those stamps become never hinged. Trick is to make sure which stamps were issued without gum...Will have a better sale with them...especially with a certain group of people who buy them if you know what I mean.

Don't you hate buyers who buy only one item a week?...my repeat buyers who keep me going of course.

Or the buyer who buys 5 items and pays for each one separately. .30 fee X 5 instead of a .30 fee. ?

I saw the "we'' in a statement...alas...I am just a one kid operation.LOL

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I'm a one person operation, but I'm backed by the B&M store. Basically they bankroll anything I want to sell on here (with a contract for each collection). I have my own stuff up though too because I wanted to do some of this on my own and not always share the sale with someone else.

This crazy big collection came in five boxes (two of them were very large, bigger than a box of photocopier paper with 5 albums in each box), two of the smaller boxes were mostly loose stamps. I had to sort through it to ferret out the stamps on paper (to return to the B&M store, I won't touch those), and see if there's anything good. At the bottom of one box I found a $1-$5 used complete set of 1897 QV Jubilee stamps. (I'm not aware of the catalogue value, but I think they should sell for at least $1000 USD).  Those stamps were so mixed in with all sorts of junk I doubt anyone knew they were there until I went through this collection.

I've appraised a few more collections since getting "the big one" but I haven't kept very much of what was in the other collections. One was almost all covers from USA or stamps on paper (the covers were too modern for my interest), and the other had all sorts of specialty things that would be sold as a complete album. I'm leaving those for the B&M store, I don't have room on my shelf or in my house for any albums that aren't being taken apart.

What I did manage to get up in the last day or so... a couple penny blacks (one with red cancel one with black cancel), and a QV Jubilee stamp (I picked the lowest price one to start, I'll do a high priced one in the next day or so, but they are going up with gaps in between to avoid the risk of someone coming along and buying all of them at once making my package over $750).

Once I get my eBay emails answered I think I'm going to work on one of the albums. I do feel a sense of calm sorting out stamps and turning random album pages into nice looking collections on Anchor sheets.

C.

[wastingtime101]

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@chapeau-noir wrote:

It's like that old joke about how you eat an elephant - one bite at a time.

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Remember that Shel Silverstein poem about the girl that ate the whale @chapeau-noir ? That always creeped me out. I think it was the drawings that did it.

[chapeau-noir]

I love Shel Silverstein - those illustrations are definitely done by someone who has gone beyond where the sidewalk ends!

[chapeau-noir]

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@sin-n-dex wrote:

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@inhawaii wrote:

List!  List!  List!  List!  List!  List!

---

That's the problem, I just don't feel like doing listings! I did feel like processing stamps and making lots to put up, but once the lots are made, I don't really feel like listing.

I think one problem I have is that I have no idea what to put as a price on a lot of this stuff. I'm using stampworld as a guide (to ferret out what's more valuable), but there's a bit of pressure to make sales for a good price, so I'm a little hesitant.

Perhaps I should start with listing my own stuff... what's the worst that can happen there? At least I'm used to listing my own things and know what most of it should list for.

C.

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A way forward may be to give yourself permission to make a few mistakes while you're feeling your way through this. Human nature decrees that no one is perfect, so you can only do your educated best.

[wastingtime101]

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@chapeau-noir wrote:

I love Shel Silverstein - those illustrations are definitely done by someone who has gone beyond where the sidewalk ends!

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Haha me too. But that one I always thought was kinda creepy. 😁

[femmefan1946]

I'm using stampworld as a guide

DH just uses Scott (plus Gibbons if necessary) and works on a percentage of catalog.

With Best Offer and parameters pre-set for accept/reject.

Most collectors know Scott and because everyone is back to discounting from there, the "I got a bargain!" mindset works for the seller.

[sin-n-dex]

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@chapeau-noir wrote:

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A way forward may be to give yourself permission to make a few mistakes while you're feeling your way through this. Human nature decrees that no one is perfect, so you can only do your educated best.

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I keep a list of mistakes, kind of a learning experience... mistakes on buying collections and paying too much, mistakes in buying collections that aren't that good, and then the mistake of selling my stuff for less than I paid for it (in one case it was totally accidental, I made a typo in the price).

All these mistakes make great entertainment for my co-workers at work. And it's how I tell the story, "I can't believe what I just did". I try to share some entertaining tales here in the forum too.

C.