Episode 142 || A Conversation with eBay Seller and Up & Running Grant Recipient, Sandra Gustard

[podcast_team]

This week, we focus on one guest with an unusual backstory. Sandra Gustard sells on eBay under the Store name Fountain Pimento Oil. We’ll discover how she started on eBay and what led her to create the product that she sells.

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Griff: Did you ever have an idea or a concept for a product that you wanted to create or build and then offer to the world through eBay? Well, this week we'll meet a seller who did just that. We're going to discover how she found her particular and quite unusual niche and how she supplied it and how she dealt with the challenges of starting and growing a business, selling a product that she was inspired to create in order to help with an injury she sustained in an accident, an injury that regular medicine was just not helping.

Griff: I'm Griff and this is the eBay For Business Podcast, your weekly source for the information and inspiration you need to start, run and grow a business on the world's most powerful marketplace. And this is episode 142. And I'm sure you've noticed that this week is a slightly different format to the podcast because this week I'm flying solo. I don't have a cohost, I don't have extra guests. Brian will be back next week to help man the console and help us answer some questions. And in future episodes, Rebecca will return as well. So don't worry. But for today, all you got is me. Now for the eBay news.

Griff: In the news this week, there is no eBay news to report, but we have received some really great questions from you. Thank you for sending them in. And I'm saving these for the next four episodes to air during the month of June. Again, thanks to everyone who sends in a question or comment and please continue to do so. Every seller who sends us a question, whether it's left on our voice line at (888) 723-4630 or our email address podcast@ebay.com will, if we use your question on an episode, receive an eBay For Business Podcast mug but if you don't leave your shipping address, we can't ship it to you. So don't forget to mention or type in your shipping address at the end of your question. Now, in this episode, we have one guest and she is an unusual and super guest. So without further delay, let's proceed.

Griff: Today we're joined by our fourth and final eBay Up & Running Grant recipient for the series. Like many sellers, Sandra Gustard has built a business on eBay based on the products that she creates and brands. Sandra welcome.

Sandra: Thank you for having me Griff. I appreciate it.

Griff: Can you tell us a little bit about the products that you sell on eBay?

Sandra: The products that I sell on eBay are basically traditional herbal remedies that emanate from Jamaica, where my parents are from. Obviously you can hear from my accent that I am not Jamaican, I'm from London. But my parents were teenage migrants to the UK before Jamaica got independence. So they both went there to continue their vocational training. I'm a product of that. So based on my experience, growing up in a Jamaican household, I'm used to traditional Jamaican herbal or Bush medicine as I like to call it. My products are based on those recipes and products that I grew up knowing about and the remedial benefits that I've come to know help so many people without harmful side effects.

Griff: A lot of folks are looking for eco-friendly and body friendly products when it comes to things like skin and hair care and just well-being in general, that's the focus of your product line.

Sandra: Yes, definitely. I mean, I came to be fully aware of commensal oil and the benefits after I was involved in a, I was rear ended basically coming home from work one evening and I had to do a course of therapy that didn't really help. And after a few weeks I was told that I should use cortisone shots, which is a steroid. So I had to take those in my left shoulder. It did numb the pain, but I was also aware of the side effects of steroids. I mean, I had family members, who've used steroids. They gained weight. It wasn't helpful. Do you know what I'm saying? It came up a lot of side effects. So although I enjoyed the numbness, it, you know, it got rid of the pain. I wasn't pleased about having to use it for the rest of my life. And I was always interested in finding what I could do to help myself. One of my school, friends from England, you know, her mom recently retired back from UK to Jamaica and she invited me to see her new home. So that's why I was going to Jamaica. That was in January of 2008. I had a friend here cause you know, I work in radio also. So the producer of the show that I was hosting at the time, he said, since you are going to St. Thomas, which is where my mom's from. He said you should visit Bath Fountain. And that's how I went to Bath Fountain cause he said, people go there for healing, like people who were sick with rheumatism, arthritis, nerve issues, they go there for healing because of the spa. The mineral waters that was discovered historically by runaway slave in Jamaica, he'd ran away and he'd gone there and he was healed and that's the story behind Bath Fountain. And so that's how I ended up there. So I went gladly. I had a bath in scalding hot water, but it's not the kind of water that will peel your skin. This water doesn't do that because of the sulfur. It's got so much sulfur in there. It won't hurt you. Do you know what I'm saying? So it is scalding hot, like I said, but it's a good hot. Do you know what I am saying? And You feel it penetrating your body and you feel it right to the bone. After you bathe under those boiling hot mineral waters, then they massage you with oil, which is Pimento oil. So that's how I discovered it. I had that and that night I slept like a baby. I felt like a whole new person. It was, I just felt so loose. So I just said, I'm going to go back there and see if I could get more of that oil to bring to New York to sell. Because I know a lot of older people have problems with arthritis and stuff. I knew that they would benefit. That was my goal. And I had a huge customer base because I was selling clothes from the UK. And I knew that I'd be able to tell them about this product. And they would be interested.

Griff: You said that you were already selling on eBay, but you were selling clothes?

Sandra: I wasn't selling on eBay, but I was selling outside. I had a store because when I moved to this country in 97, a lot of the people in America, they tend to wear a lot of sneakers, trainers. I never wore a pair of trainers. And as I was going to the gym in England, I always wore dresses. You know, with just smart, casual. When I came here, I would get stopped everywhere on the train. I would go in the tube, you know, going to Manhattan and people would just stop me and say, oh, I love your shoes. I love your dress. I love your jacket. And at the time I was doing an internship at Raucous Records in Manhattan. And like I said, a lot of people, even artists, hip hop artists, they would ask about my clothes. So, you know, i thought you know what, I'm going to the next time I go home, I'm going to bring some clothes. And that's how it started. I mean, I was nervous. I'm not a shy person. I'm an extrovert. I'm not shy. But I was just tired of people asking about my accent. So after I sold my clothes to the people who asked me for clothes, I realized there's so many salons. Nail salons, everywhere you go in New York, there's two, three stores on every block. And I'm like, this is brilliant. I probably won't even have to work for anybody, but I was afraid to talk. So when I moved to this country, I had a friend. Her name is Francois. She lives in Cuba now, but we both learned New York together and Francoise, she wasn't shy at all. She would just walk into the salons, you know and she's like my friends from London and she has clothes. Do you want to see some? And she would just yank out the clothes and just show people. And that's how I built my customer base. Starting with Francoise. She's a French business woman. She took me out of my box because like I said, I was just scared to open my mouth. Cause everyone was like, you know, you're black. How come you're from England? I thought it was just white people. And people say that all the time. I used to get that a lot. That's how the clothes started, you know, by 2008, I'd already had two stores and I had so many customers. So I knew that I would have a customer base who would be receptive to this new oil. And they were ultimately, when I got it together.

Griff: You had this growing successful apparel business and then your experience with the pimento oil, this all happened before eBay?

Sandra: All of this was going on before eBay. The pimento oil, It started off very slow. I had an experience with the people where I was buying the oil from, because I had, when I got back to New York, I wasn't aware of the import and export and all this stuff. So I knew that I had to find out if I could bring the product here legally, I did my research. I found out that you have to go through the Federal Drug Administration. Fortunately, they're not far from me. They're at JFK airport. So I'd gone there. I purchased a couple of bottles in Jamaica while I was there. When I showed them what it was. And I already knew what the ingredients were cause those guys told me. They said, oh, it's free trade. You know, there had been an agreement during the Clinton administration where there was free trade between certain countries. So Jamaica was one of those countries. Luckily there would be no cost associated with bringing the products here as far as customs and duties. But you had to bring the products here already bottled and packaged and labeled. I went about sending the money to Jamaica. I have cousins there and being the middleman for me with these peoples, it took about six weeks to get the bottles done, the labels and to purchase 15 gallons of oil. The product finally arrived in March, 2008. I had to wait a few days because it has to go through a broker and I excitedly picked up my oil. But when I got home and I smell it, it smells nothing like what I purchased. When I massage it into my skin, it left a residue and it was just awful. And it was darker. It, had a different color. I called down. I said, you know, what is this? This is not the same thing that I bought. I said, this doesn't feel like olive oil or Jamaican black caster oil. So they said, oh, we use vegetable oil. Using it on myself I mean, I realized it didn't have the same tingling. It was just was different. They told me that vegetable oil is just as good and you know, right away, I realized that I'd been jipped. They obviously bought the cheaper products and sent to me. And you know, I had 15 gallons of that stuff. You know what I'm saying? And I was like really annoyed. I couldn't use that oil to cut a long story short, but I just said, well, they've already told me what's in it, but I'm going to see if I can purchase that stuff. Obviously in America, they don't have pimento trees and they have fever, grass and peppermint I could get, but I wanted the same authentic Jamaican ingredients. I had to wait until a family member was going into summer and just give them a list and see if they could purchase this stuff for me in the markets. Things like castor oil and pimento leaves. They grow wild in Jamaica. They're just all over the place. That's how it started. Summer 2008, I got my first batch and went about fermenting myself. I waited about a month. In Jamaica it takes three weeks they said, but they have the sunshine. So I started in the summer and I blended the leaves. And it wasn't as strong as the original one was, but I had the aroma. I had the fragrance. So I knew I was getting there. And there's a store in Brooklyn that sells little perfume bottles. So I bought two dozen of those and I was just giving it to people who I know had issues. And my children's babysitter, she'd fallen down the stairs in her building. And she had screws and things in her ankle and she was always complaining about pain. So I was anxious for her to try it. She had a lawsuit going and she, she used the oil. She was like, Sandra, if I continue to use this stuff, I'm not going to get my lawsuit money. Basically. She was saying, if she continues to use this oil, she's not going to be sick anymore because she couldn't feel any pain. So she was worried about her lawsuit money. So when she said that, I was like, okay, I'm onto something. So I just continue to ferment it. When I had a new batch, I continued to bottle it, give it away on my radio show. I used to do a show Mondays at midnight with my friend Keelan. He was a producer and I would get 20 to 30 calls because I did my research. I talked about Bath Fountain. Many of the audience, the listeners were from Caribbean descent and they're interested in their own traditional remedies. And that's how it started. I was just giving it away.

Griff: Do you remember when it was that you decided to start selling on eBay?

Sandra: You met my daughter earlier. She was selling on eBay when she was in college. That's how I became aware of eBay.

Griff: That's how you get started, it was your daughter turning you on?

Sandra: Yeah. She opened the first eBay account and then I did my business to it. I don't think I got a sale for maybe the first year. And I think that was because I was being lazy about the description. And I realized that when you make a listing on eBay, your title has to be descriptive. I just used to have Fountain Pimento Oil. And of course that doesn't mean anything to anybody. It took a while to understand how to do a proper listing. And eBay, they're such a great platform because they do give you lots of training, lots of information on how to enhance your listing. Over time. I came to realize that I have to say that it's for pain and expand on that. And that's when the sales started to come. But, I wasn't originally on eBay. When I thought about eBay I thought of it as a huge flea market where people go to sell vintage clothing. And you know, if you're looking for a watch. I didn't have it in the same light as other major e-commerce places, you know, and then I realized that they have categories, they sell car stuff. It's great. It's a brilliant platform.

Griff: Do you sell any clothing?

Sandra: No, no. I don't sell clothes. It's strictly pain relief and hair and skincare products because the market is there. And you know, as you browse around and you see the other companies, you get a gist of what people are looking for. You can look at somebody else's business, you can see the amount of reviews they've got of the other different types of categories and you can move around and see what category best fits your particular product. Because I used to put stuff in pain relief, like holistic medicine, but I wasn't getting any sales, but as I played around with eBay. I discovered that there's a whole section for massage massage oils and massage accessories is a better placement for people who are into sports. People who jog or play soccer. Athletes, people who have tense muscles, so muscles, people who jog, work out. People have a sedentary lifestyle who sit down in the chair all day, they need it too.

Griff: Like most of us during the last year in the pandemic. I was going to ask you how the pandemic impacted your business. If it did it at all.

Sandra: The pandemic, when it was announced, it was a scary time for me because traditionally at the beginning of the year sales are slow after Christmas. And it was announced that New York was going to be on lockdown on March 22nd a Sunday. I think we had about four days before the lockdown was going to happen. Everything was going to be closed except for essential stores. You know, it was crazy. I had to run around to get accessories and try to place as many orders as I could. Aside from money running out, I found that a lot of places that I would order my caps and stuff from, cause I was trying to stock up. A lot of them had already ran out of products. And as April came, it got worse that I couldn't source my products. Instead of using four ounce plastic bottles, Boston rounds, I had to get glass bottles, which in turn impacted my shipping costs. And it was a horrible time I must say, but my sales for the first two months, I will say that my sales really went up a lot. I think because people were at home and I just experienced a huge explosion of sales on eBay. It was crazy. I was happy. But then at the same time, I had this supply chain issue. Calling around to all these places. Some of them weren't even open in some of the states and finds in the raw materials, like the Argan oil and some of the products that I use to blend with the leaves. The prices went up. Some of the companies, instead of your minimum order being $500, now it became a thousand dollars and the shipping timeline, there would be a backlog. Like usually you order something, it ships in two to three business days, but then because of social distance and it was taking two to three weeks and it messed up and I had to also refund a lot of money to customers because the shipping times, something that would take two to three days, first class shipping was taking two weeks. Things that were being shipped to Europe when it got to Europe, they were expected to pay a huge amount of customs. So they would be paying for the product twice. And some people were complaining that, you know, they didn't know about it. So I had to refund them their money or send them the money so that they could retrieve their package. And it was stressful.

Griff: Did you see that start to abate at any time during 2020, like say towards the end of the year, I know that there were a lot of sellers because of the Holiday times they were having those same issues with shipping because of the Holiday delays. What happened with you?

Sandra: My sales continue to grow, but I had to compromise because I didn't have the same packaging. And whereas I thought that I was doing better I was actually doing worse because as I said, I had to start using glass bottles. It affected my pictures, my images on eBay.

Griff: You have to do them all over again.

Sandra: Yeah. You have to do pictures again because people are complaining that it's not the same product. Some of the bottles that I had to use were long. They call it Cosmo. The shape of the bottle was Cosmo. And some people were saying, it's not the same product. Then I had an issue with my shampoo and conditioner bottles because nowhere in America had the 12 ounce bottles. And browsing on eBay in July I found a seller who had the Cosmo round bottles. He had a thousand bottles for $600, but he had them in amber, but I didn't care. It fit in the caps. And we met in Queens and I purchased the bottles and he was on eBay. He was a big eBay seller and that was a real God send. Everything worked out in the end, but it was, it was scary. And money was short and like I said, in some of the places that I purchased from, like, there's a place that I buy seals, the shrink-wrap to seal my bottles. Before there was no limit. You could buy what you wanted. You know, you didn't have to spend $500, but then when the pandemic was going on, they asked you to spend $500 minimum order. That would be like a hundred thousand seals. I mean, I wouldn't ordinarily be buying a hundred thousand seals. I had to compromise. Same thing with printing my labels. I had to start going to Staples. I had to start buying blank, Avery labels, because the printing place, they put up the minimum orders and the money wasn't there to be buying 2000 labels when I'm used to buying a hundred.

Griff: What's it like in 2021, have you been able to resume the same sort of packaging, same sort of supply chains or are there still lags?

Sandra: Everything is back to normal now and eBay is integral in that. It's very important to that growth for me, because a lot of the products came back into play, things that were on backorder for six months, they were available in October, November, but some of them, you had to spend a lot more money. And I applied for many grants throughout last year. They had the PPE loans, they had the Economic Injury, Disaster loans, and I was declined for all of those. I applied for Hennessy Business Grant. I got a PPE loan for $3,000. I think I got that in August and all the other grants that I applied for, I didn't get. There was the second round of the Hennessy grant. I didn't get it the first time, but the same day that I applied for that one, after I closed the application, there was an email and on eBay, right on the home page, talking about the eBay Up & Running Grant. I just clicked on it and applied right away because I just finished the Hennessy Grant and all the information was just fresh in my head. I just banged it out. I just applied the same night. I thought no more about it until, I think it was February a lady called to invite me for a Zoom meeting that following Monday. So I just assumed that I'd been shortlisted. Because when she called I prepared for the meet and I had my product with me and I was talking about how I'd been impacted and how it was the year before. And at the end of the meeting, they said, congratulations. And I was like, Get the F bomb! I was just running all over the house and I've got four daughters and I was banging on every door So I was banging on everybody's door. They are giving me Ten Grand. It was just, yeah. Cause it had been a struggle. And you know, aside from business, you know, you have your own personal utility bills. You have stuff that you need to pay for. And you're trying to juggle. You need help. You need to be able to pay your bills and manage your business. You know what I'm saying? And of course keep your family safe. So it becomes buy masks and sanitizer. You know, you do more, you wipe your bottles, double you do more because you're trying to protect your customer as well. And it's a lot. It was a lot.

Griff: At the time. Was it 10,000 or 8,000?

Sandra: I got 8,000 actually when I was in England. Right. Cause my mom, she got ill in February. So I went home on March the first. So while I was there, the money came, but obviously I was there so I couldn't do anything. But when I came back, I ordered a few things, but not too much because I had to go back to England. So it was all about preparing for her funeral. But since I've come back in the beginning of May, I mean, my house and garage is crazy. There's like 15,000 bottles and all those people love me now because I bought everything. On Friday the UPS man was so upset because he was there Thursday. He was there Friday. He brought four boxes Thursday, he came and delivered five on Friday. He was, you know, they're angry because they had big boxes. You know, there's like a thousand bottles and this guy he's like, what are you doing? Did you win the lottery? You know? But I just made sure I would not be in that situation again. You know, I just need customers now to buy all the stuff, but I made sure I stocked up.

Griff: We'll take a short break and return in a moment with part two of my conversation with eBay seller and Up & Running Grant Recipient, Sandra Gustard.

Griff: We're back with the second half of my conversation with Sandra Gustard who sells under the store name, fountain Pimento Oil. We'll put the link to our eBay store in our episode transcript for 142. Sandra, do you use social media to promote your business on eBay? And if so, how?

Sandra: Not too, too much, because I spend so much time in my basement making products. I don't do too much, but when I do go in there, I do do Facebook. I don't think I can reach the customer that I'm trying to reach on Twitter, but Facebook definitely. My radio presence. I mean, I get so many calls after I do a show on a Sunday when I had my 10th anniversary in 2018, I'd gone to Jamaica and I hired a popular actress to make a commercial and it really, really helped the business, that commercial, cause she's recognized. I think she's won shares in Fountain now because she's tired of being everybody sees her and that, you know, they see her hair and they keep talking about Fountain.

Griff: You didn't give her any residuals?

Sandra: No, no. And I think that's what she's after, you know, cause she was messaging me and you know, she was like, we need to talk business in capitals. And I'm like, but I've paid you. What do you want from me? (laughter) So there was a couple of products that I had in the background, but I wasn't able to bring to the table, but because of the eBay Up & Running Grant I can.

Griff: So I didn't ask you this Sandra, but it sounds like you do this alone. You're the only person?

Sandra: I'm the only person I have my daughters.

Griff: Sandra, what does your typical work week look like? Give us a picture.

Sandra: Weekends are very busy for me. This weekend on eBay, for example, I did a sale cause you always have watchers. So when I see I've got 90 people watching, I might just email them and say, you have the opportunity to get this product at a great price. So you can take a dollar off, 50 cents off and people respond because they like that you want them to purchase. So I did that on Friday. I have a bunch of orders to do today.

Griff: What other tasks take up your work time during the week?

Sandra: I spent a lot of time bottling stuff because I want the customer to get a fresh product because it's perishable and its leaves that I work with. So I don't bottle things and just have them sit in there. And that's the reason why I don't really sell in stores. And that's the beauty of eBay because every time somebody orders, they get in a custom bottle. I'm going to pour it out and wrap it at the same time.

Griff: A lot of people like you who have started their own hair, skin and healthcare products, using natural ingredients and doing all the work themselves have been approached by bigger companies and said, Hey, we want to buy you. If a bigger company tried to buy you out right now, what would you do?

Sandra: I wouldn't like that. I mean, I would be flattered of course, but I think when a bigger company takes over, I feel that they dilute what you're trying to do. Do you know what I'm saying? I think that the consumer, if they know and trust you, I think that they expect the same integrity and honesty and the same clean ingredients that you started off with. And what happens when the bigger companies get involved, they purchase in your name, but they don't have the same ethos, the same honesty about the product that you do. So they tend to dilute it. And I don't want to, you know what I'm saying?

Griff: I understand completely. And I, I have to say, that's very honorable to put your name behind something and then say, Hey, it's my integrity and my product and my passion. This is obviously a passion for you.

Sandra: Obviously we all have goals. We do want our business to be a global business and stuff, but at the end of the day, at what cost? Because if you travel in natural ingredients and you're trying to stop people from going to see the doctor for everything and perhaps taking medication that they're going to give you a repeat prescription for. And we don't want you to have repeat prescriptions with stuff with side effects. You know what I'm saying? It's better that you use a natural product. That's not going to harm you because it's natural, unless you are allergic.

Griff: You mentioned steroids before and the side effects to steroids, just go on and on and on. And some of them are actually more debilitating than the thing they're trying to cure.

Sandra: Exactly. I mean, it's not worth it for the temporary relief that it gives.

Griff: You've been wondering about Sandra's products. I will put a link up to Sandra's store Fountain Pimento Oil.

Sandra: Pimento wood is what they use to jerk chicken.

Griff: I didn't know that.

Sandra: The wood from the bark. Yeah, from the tree. And it's also an essential ingredient for Jamaican cooking, pimento berries. They use it to season the food. It is the main ingredient for Jerk seasoning. They crushed pimento berries and the wood that they use is pimento for authentic Jerk barbecue.

Griff: In San Jose, there's an incredibly good Jerk restaurant called Backyard. And I'm addicted to Jerk chicken and Jerk pork. Oh!

Sandra: I knew there was something a bit yardish about you, Jamaican. It's the Jerk!

Griff: Oh it is so good!

Sandra: Even though I'm immersed in the British culture. Cause I was born there, like I said my parents and my grandparents, they brought that traditional herbal or remedies to the UK. So I grew up knowing about white rum, Jamaicans love over proof, white rum. And they sold pimento berries and ginger, the whole ginger root. And when somebody is ill or they have a fever, you know, they use it as a salve and they massage it on your forehead, on your chest. It relieves congestion. They use it for everything.

Griff: If you had a word of encouragement for someone who's considering building a product they've either created or they're passionate about, what would be your word of encouragement to them? Because it's not easy. We've heard your story and I know there were a lot of challenges in getting started and growing that business. What would you say to a new seller who was a maker and who wanted to bring their product to eBay assistance?

Sandra: Persistence. I just think you have to keep pushing. You just have to keep pushing. It's not my logo, it's not my slogan, but just do it. That's the thing that always just springs to mind, just do it. Think twice and act once, because think about the product, what you need for yourself. Like what I needed with the Pimento for my nerve damage, that's what pushed me because it helped me. And I know that many people would need it. Not just because they had nerve damage, but because of all the benefits. When I learned about these particular ingredients, I knew that it would help people. So you just have to keep pushing because I mean, I had people saying to me, oh, it's a waste of time. It's not going to do anything and go get a job. Even now I have people even when I go home, I have a particular uncle and always saying to me, you still selling that stupid stuff. You know, it's like, you're not going to get a job? I'm like an uncle, this is how I make money. And he used to say the same thing when I had my clothes in stores. He was like, you know, why don't you just get a job? I'm like, what's wrong with you? People wear clothes. You know what I'm saying? So you can't listen to naysayers. You just have to keep pushing and just do it because it costs a lot of money. I mean, in the early days, just to put the labels together, $500 was a lot. But I just kept pushing.

Griff: Don't listen to the naysayers. I love that.

Sandra: Don't listen to people, not that people are malicious or that they don't want you to succeed, but I just think people want people to take the easy road, you know, the easy way. And the easy way is to get a job. But at the end of the day, you want that freedom. And during those days as well, I had, obviously I have four daughters, so they were young eight, nine, ten, those ages. And you need to be home to pick them up from school, homework. So based on the fact that you have to make it work because you need money, you need to be able to live. You need to be home with your children. Even if I do feel lazy about it, I have to do it. Because there's some evenings. I want to watch PBS 13 because they have a huge array of English programs on Sundays. I want to watch them, but I can't. I have to get on the computer. I have to change my listing. I have to make it work because you have to. So you just have to keep pushing.

Griff: We'll Sandra, I want to thank you so much for taking the time to tell us about your business and the journey you've gone from being injured to having a business based on that injury. And it's been very successful.

Sandra: It's crazy. Every time I tell the story, people don't believe it. And I also have a lot of people in Jamaica. They're quite mad at me. They're quite mad at me because it's so successful here. But you know, when it started, it was really about empowering those people and helping them to grow their micro-business. But they wasn't honest about what they sent. I mean, I'm happy about where it started because it was never my intention really to make the products. But I do have quite a few people, they reach out to me on social media or through my website. They're not really quite nice. You know what I'm saying? They tried to say, oh, you know, you're not selling the authentic products and I sell pimento oil, but you know, you got a bit of that.

Griff: You're always going to have the jealous people who are jealous of your success. And that's, I think it's to be expected. And it's probably a good sign that you're doing something right.

Sandra: Just, like I mentioned to you about the actress, you know, she's, she's just in my WhatsApp every other day. We need to talk business! We need to talk business! Lady, you know what I'm saying? I've paid you., Profit is not what's on your mind when you start these things, it's about sharing what you know and how you can help. And that's the most important thing, that people heal and that they heal well and healthily, with no side effects. And that's what I'm about.

Griff: Well, Sandra, thanks again. It's been a pleasure speaking to you.

Sandra: Thank you Griff. It is a pleasure. Don't eat too much Jerk, All right.

Griff: I'll try not to.

Sandra: Alright. Take care. Thank you so much.

Griff: Sandra Gustard sells on eBay under the user ID Fountain Pimento Oil, and we'll go put the link to that store. In our episode, transcripts, Sandra again was the fourth and the final seller featured in our four-part series of conversations with a sampling of this year's 50 selected eBay Up & Running Grant Recipients. You can hear those previous conversations with the other three sellers. We selected the podcast and episodes 130 to 139 and 140 at ebay.com/podcast.

Griff: I want to thank our guest seller this week. Sandra Gustard of Fountain Pimento Oil. In our next episode, we'll talk with long-time eBay sellers, John and Sharon Ware. Now the last time I talked with them was nearly 10 years ago on eBay radio. When they were selling out of their RV. Now a lot's changed for them in the last decade, and you're not going to want to miss an update to their story. Remember, if you have a question or a comment we'd love to help answer it, call it in at (888) 723-4630. Or email it to podcast@ebay.com.

Griff: I'm Griff. Thanks for listening. The eBay For Business Podcast is produced in part and distributed by Libsyn and podCast411.

Recurring Links:

eBay for Business Podcast	eBay for Business Podcast Discussion Group
The eBay Community	eBay for Business Podcast Listener Survey
eBay Seller News Announcements	eBay for Business Facebook
Community Chat with eBay Staff	eBay Seller Center
eBay Help	eBay Local Seller Events
Seller Hub	eBay Events

[theatricalhead2toe]

Time shows 34:14 but the program ended abruptly at 2:09. I did not get to hear anything today.

[brian_burke@ebay]

@theatricalhead2toe - I'm sorry you experienced an issue. I just listened and was able to listen to the entire episode. My hope is you were able to hear the show in its entirety, but let me know if you were not able to . 

THanks

Brian

[onlinedepot]

@theatricalhead2toe - This happens to me on occasion with this weekly podcast and I resolve it by refreshing the browser.  It seems to happen more often when I pause and restart it.