eBay

fashionandform · ‎09-11-2019

Our sales are very slow, the summer was slow ( actually slower) as usual but now? I wonder if they have put us on a poop list since we have not opted into managed payments.

On the plus side, we are getting tons done around the house, stuff we've put off for years.

Would rather have the sales though. Anyone else?

axiombody · ‎10-14-2019

Thanks for the response. I started in Ebay playing around selling things for fun. When I found selling clothing it was much time ago and I could make much money in auctions starting all at 99 cents and selling 99% of what I listed in 7 days time. I found as much as I could and made much money. After the recession people stopped bidding. I averaged $12 an item in early 2008 and $6 an item in late 2008 on the auctions. After much folley I finally accepted fate to sell what people bought in BIN. Best decision I ever made and began selling items for a much higher profit margin. Supporting my family as my wife couldn't find a job as a teacher after the recession for much time. As sales fell I did try other items and have always been open to it but I find it is quite slow and time consuming to do so especially thinking full time. Research and listings take much longer. I can find much clothing living where I live near L.A. and can list quickly with sell similar. Listing different types of items can be a huge time constraint maybe with higher profit margins, but sometimes long waits to sell and larger investment. Think of a full time jobs pay check. I live in Southern California so it is hard to make a living anyway. Even a 40 hour a week job at minimum wage is just about 2300 dollars a month and you can't live on that. I compete with people who don't need to make that amount of money each month on Ebay, but I NEED to. 2 years ago I made 192,00 revenue about 60K profit which is a good job in California, about what my wife makes now as a Teacher here after she finally got a full time teaching job 3 years ago. In the last 2 years it has gone from that to what maybe is about 90K revenue this year or about 25K profit or a kin to minimum wage. It's very frustrating when I can't see why after 12 years of ups and down, including the recession, but always near maybe 10-20% difference in revenue that now it has fallen

@goldrushfinds wrote:
Checked your listings out of curiosity (I always check everyone's listings in the hope of learning something). You are selling quite a bit, but man your profit margins are really tight. Can you search your area for any other odds and ends outside of clothing that might give an occasional big boost to your daily/monthly profits. I just know for myself, without a few bigger sales, profits are really slim. I am not trying to say that I am any kind of expert or know more than you, I just hate to hear when a person's finances are so tight. Oh, and I guess it is pretty obvious, I do not sell full time.

50-60%. I bought a house 2 years ago and it has been a tightrope. It sucks but I'm down for it. I have the best clothing and best prices and if you don't know you better Axiombody!

janacia · ‎10-15-2019

It's the same for me. It's very disappointing. I, too, depend on ebay sales to live. It seems of heartless of them to cut us off. Sure, they say that's not the case but I think it is. But, why????

fmwsells · ‎10-15-2019

This is not related to Managed Payments. I know someone that is having this same issue that uses that service.

525arle · ‎10-18-2019

Are you saying promote sales as opposed to running a discount?

4wheelgreg · ‎10-18-2019

Ebay is allways wanting me to off discounts and promotions ... My sales are just selling off inventory Ihad from businesses that have closed to recoupe some lose .
People are shoping eles where , Ebay is not what it was 5yrs ago . Now losing Paypal in the up coming year is making it harder on the seller in my opinion .
My sales have have dramatically slowed , good thing I don't depend on Ebay for a living I would be homeless ... LOL
I don't see my self continuing to sell once my inventory has been sold off .

leavesofmemory · ‎10-23-2019

Reading these comments does one thing... reinforces my concern that eBay

has pulled the rug on many sellers. Having had 2 sites on eBay - we dropped one

thinking it was just better to have a store.

We sell antiques, vintage and collectibles - with occasional new items. It does not seem to matter what we list or what we do - NO SALES - IS STILL NO SALES. This month [October] is the worst month we have ever had in 17 years of selling. Any search opens to items from CHINA OR INDIA OR WHEREVER... even with promoted listings we can't always find our listings. Paying for a monthly basic store at $22.00 plus the final value fees and the ridiculous fee for shipping - we are at this time, in the negative. eBay does virtually NO ADVERTISING or promotional incentives and it seems has absolutely no concern whatsoever in whether a seller stays or quits. It has become so discouraging and it continues to appear that eBay is just squeezing small sellers off of their site.

Does anyone believe that eBay cares anything at all about small stores when they have volumes of repetitive '**bleep**' from China et.al. They used to stop sellers doing duplication of listings... but apparently that also no longer matters. We have followed all of their rules since the very beginning. Now, at this point - nothing seems to matter and perhaps that is ... the writing on the wall.

What a sad commentary on something that used to be so great.

needfulthings217 · ‎10-27-2019

I am part of several for sales groups on Facebook and do pretty good there. Everyone has Paypal and expects shipping, plus you cut out the feebay fees. Works great! There's a for sales group for just about anything.

ghost-star · ‎10-28-2019

Not only do I rarely ever use PROMOTED LISTINGS, I never buy items that are PROMOTED. As a buyer, if you see an item you like that happens to be PROMOTED, just type in the title of that listing, and you should have two identical listings, one that says PROMOTED, and another that doesn't. Buy from the one that doesn't have that word, and that way we continue to send the message to eBay that their tactic of pitting us eBay sellers against each other in order for them to make more from our sales is not a good long-term idea.

needfulthings217 · ‎10-28-2019

My husband and I have talked about this several times. Unless you sell something killer, then you are put way down the list to the volume sellers from China, etc. I sell jewelry, and every few months I put up a lot of sterling, gold filled, or solid gold lots. That's the only time my auctions do anything really. Now I just use buy it now options and I also sell on Facebook, which is so much better than eBay. I love it.

525arle · ‎11-07-2019

Ebay is in the business to generate a profit and if that means squeezing you in terms of seller fees, promoted listings, etc. then that's what they will do. What do you do as seller? You use them to maximize your profit and if it means selling on other platforms besides Ebay then do so. You will be happier, make more money and be less impacted by the dysfunction and bad management practices which continue to exist on Ebay.

patriot_bearing_supply · ‎12-09-2019

I'm wondering the same thing.... I have resisted the change to Managed Payments.... and I have noticed that when I buy things, probably 80% are on managed payments now. I have my Paypal debit card saved as the payment method.... they are VERY good if there is a problem. My sales were fairly consistent and strong through October, November and December have been poor. I looked at last year, November and December were amoung the best months of the year. However a few sales can make a big difference in my dollar amount..... my sales can vary from $5 to $500 on a normal day. Because of what I deal in, some of my buyers tend to be new or infrequent users of eBay... so I try to make things as easy and comfortable as possible. And landing on a page demanding your credit card information when you are used to paypal.... is not comforting.

patriot_bearing_supply · ‎12-09-2019

@wowdealsfast wrote:
My sales the last couple of months has fell off a cliff. I have tried everything, resetting, going to eBay Managed Payments, and lowering prices but nothing is helping. The only thing I can think of that might be causing this is the new implementation of eBay charging everyone sales tax and thinking maybe buyers are now going elsewhere since sales tax is being charged. Thoughts anyone?

That's a real good point..... Sales tax can add 7 - 9% to the cost.... add in shipping (I don't care if it's "free" shipping, it's part of the price) and maybe it works out better to pay a little more and buy it locally and have it today. Or buy it on Amazon and have it tomorrow or the next day. I've found there isn't a lot of consistancy in shipping by eBay vendors... a lot of stuff I get within 5 days, but there are things that 10 days later are finally shipping. Not all of these are home sellers, some are what are represented to be businesses.