Dick Barton's Selling Megathread!

Andrew

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Slow for me as well. I find if I list every day I get sales through. But if I slack off for a day or two the tap turns off.
 

katykicker

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Slow for me too work wise. Just spend your time doing productive things that your future, hopefully busy, self will thank you for :)
 

Dick Barton

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A few fivers here and there, but best two items were tools. Two items costing less than a pound sold for £56. Bought another specialist set of boat building tools for £4 (5 tools in the set). Sold for £120. So, with the bits and pieces cleared £200. Of course, not always this good, but by keep pushing it good weeks do come along and even a fiver adds to the coffers. Keep reselling people!
 

Jon

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A few fivers here and there, but best two items were tools. Two items costing less than a pound sold for £56. Bought another specialist set of boat building tools for £4 (5 tools in the set). Sold for £120. So, with the bits and pieces cleared £200. Of course, not always this good, but by keep pushing it good weeks do come along and even a fiver adds to the coffers. Keep reselling people!
by contrast

Seen some eBay resellers this week go on about how they are doing a good thing taking their items back to charity shops when in reality all that means is that the stuff they’ve been forking out for to turn a profit on isn’t selling and they don’t want it cluttering up their house!
 
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Dick Barton

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by contrast

Seen some eBay resellers this week go on about how they are doing a good thing taking their items back to charity shops when in reality all that means is that the stuff they’ve been forking out for to turn a profit on isn’t selling and they don’t want it cluttering up their house!

Something I have never done! If I do make a mistake it's down to me. If you know your stuff you should never have to do that. I always have a 'rescue' plan. As I write this I notice a couple of hammers have been sold, one for £14 and one for £19.99! Outlay was £2.
 

Karonher

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Well done if they were purchases from anywhere other than charity shops. If they were I hope some of the money goes back to the charity.
 

homie

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A few fivers here and there, but best two items were tools. Two items costing less than a pound sold for £56. Bought another specialist set of boat building tools for £4 (5 tools in the set). Sold for £120. So, with the bits and pieces cleared £200. Of course, not always this good, but by keep pushing it good weeks do come along and even a fiver adds to the coffers. Keep reselling people!

Do you find you do better with Buy it now or Auctions, Dick?
 

David Says...

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Well done if they were purchases from anywhere other than charity shops. If they were I hope some of the money goes back to the charity.

If bought something from a charity shop and resold it then by definition some of the money went to the charity!

The charity shop, reseller, end buyer and person donating the item all get value from such transactions. It really is a win-win situation.
 

Karonher

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If bought something from a charity shop and resold it then by definition some of the money went to the charity!

The charity shop, reseller, end buyer and person donating the item all get value from such transactions. It really is a win-win situation.

Not sure that I agree with that. As I said if something goes back to the charity fair enough but if not it just does not sit right with me.
 

homie

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Not sure that I agree with that. As I said if something goes back to the charity fair enough but if not it just does not sit right with me.

Jon had this debate on his blog a while ago too. My take on it is this.

A Charity shop gets donated, 2 identical items, A and B. They price them at what they believe to be the most they can sensibly expect to get for such items. One person buys item A for £5 and keeps it in their display cabinet forever because they love it. Another person buys item B for £5 but knows it is actually a rare special edition and worth a lot more. They list it on on ebay for £100.

The charity shop's part in this ends once it sold the items and they made their £10. They have no more right to expect person B to donate a percentage of their profit to them than they have to turn up at person A's house and request the same amount from him.

In truth most charity shops are now ahead of the game anyway and checking ebay/amazon/Dickinson's Real Deal for the latest prices at the start.

I am harsh but fair.
 
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David Says...

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Not sure that I agree with that. As I said if something goes back to the charity fair enough but if not it just does not sit right with me.

Which part do you disagree with?

Those donating items get a warm fuzzy feeling of doing something something good.

Charities get cash they wouldn't otherwise have.

Resellers make profit.

End buyers get items at prices they're happy with (or they wouldn't buy).

Who is the loser here? How on earth can this be seen as unethical?

Resellers increase competition for items sold by charity shops, thus pushing up the price that shops are able to sell for. Arguably resellers sourcing from charity shops is more ethical.
 
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Jon

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Charity has item A
Charity has item B

They are both the same item

The aim of the charity shop is to raise as much money as they can for charity.

They sell Item A to Doris. She pays £5
They sell Item B to Tony. He pays £5

Tony then takes that item and sells it for £25 making £20 profit that the Charity shop has effectively missed out on IF THEY KNEW HOW TO PRICE THESE ITEMS CORRECTLY...

So the only people who are missing out here are the charity
 
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David Says...

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Charity has item A
Charity has item B

They are both the same item

The aim of the charity shop is to raise as much money as they can for charity.

They sell Item A to Doris. She pays £5
They sell Item B to Tony. He pays £5

Tony then takes that item and sells it for £25 making £20 profit that the Charity shop has effectively missed out on IF THEY KNEW HOW TO PRICE THESE ITEMS CORRECTLY...

So the only people who are missing out here are the charity

No - the charity gained £10. The charity didn't 'lose' anything. The local market might have borne a £25 price tag, but it's likely that it would bear a lower price than a national, online, or niche market would bear.

If Tony hadn't bought the item then it might not have sold, or might have been reduced further still (to, say, £3).

Tony has the know-how and time to market the item nationally or to a specific niche which he has knowledge of. He's added value by putting it to that market and is rewarded accordingly. The charity might have a policy of only putting things on ebay if they value it at £35 or more, because of the hassle factor. Its staff and volunteers might be able to sell £70 worth of items in the time it takes to list the item on eBay, reconcile the payment with the order and in the accounts system, and go to the local post office in the next village along to post it.

Knowing that Tony was so ready to pay £5 for the item, the charity shop might decide to price the next similar at at, say £10.
 
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Jon

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No - the charity gained £10. The charity didn't 'lose' anything. The local market might have borne a £25 price tag, but it's likely that it would bear a lower price than a national, online, or niche market would bear.

If Tony hadn't bought the item then it might not have sold, or might have been reduced further still (to, say, £3).

Tony has the know-how and time to market the item nationally or to a specific niche which he has knowledge of. He's added value by putting it to that market and is rewarded accordingly. The charity might have a policy of only putting things on ebay if they value it at £35 or more, because of the hassle factor. Its staff and volunteers might be able to sell £70 worth of items in the time it takes to list the item on eBay, reconcile the payment with the order and in the accounts system, and go to the local post office in the next village along to post it.

Knowing that Tony was so ready to pay £5 for the item, the charity shop might decide to price the next similar at at, say £10.
So as charity shops become more 'savvy' to ebay resellers and just list the items themselves is this going to make sourcing from charity shops harder do you think?
 

Karonher

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Charity has item A
Charity has item B

They are both the same item

The aim of the charity shop is to raise as much money as they can for charity.

They sell Item A to Doris. She pays £5
They sell Item B to Tony. He pays £5

Tony then takes that item and sells it for £25 making £20 profit that the Charity shop has effectively missed out on IF THEY KNEW HOW TO PRICE THESE ITEMS CORRECTLY...

So the only people who are missing out here are the charity


I agree with all of that. As most of the charity shops I have been to have elderly people working there as volunteers, they are not going to know what an item is worth. The person who donates feels good I agree, the person who has made the profit seems to be feeling good even though a charity shop has lost out. If I bought something for a lot more than a person gave a charity shop and they did not give anything back, if I found out I would NOT feel good. So basically it could be just the seller who made a profit from the charity who feels good. I also doubt that the volunteer who priced the item up is going to feel good either.
 

David Says...

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So as charity shops become more 'savvy' to ebay resellers and just list the items themselves is this going to make sourcing from charity shops harder do you think?

Nah. Charity shops are 'generalists', and (good) resellers are 'experts'.

Resellers who know their stuff will always be able to add value.

It probably isn't worth their time researching, training etc.

The person who donates feels good I agree, the person who has made the profit seems to be feeling good even though a charity shop has lost out.

But they haven't lost out. If they have an item which cost them £0 and sold it for £5 they they are quids-in. They've got the cash for whatever they sold the item for.

Charity shops largely work with donations. Even if something is sold for less that market value there's still a profit involved.

As above, a shop might actually lose out if they spend too much time researching and agonising about pricing, or spending time processing an online order. There's nothing for volunteers who might've under-priced an item to feel bad about.
 

Dick Barton

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Do you find you do better with Buy it now or Auctions, Dick?
I use both. If I'm not sure what I can get I use the auction. If I am pretty sure what something will bring I use buy it now.
 

Dick Barton

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Not all charity shops are as squeaky clean as you might imagine. I KNOW this!
 

Andrew

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A lot of charity shops employ people these days to go through their stock and sift out anything that has value on eBay (even the ones that appear to have old dears working in them!). The paid employees tend to not be at the front of the charity shop dealing with customers though. But basically in the majority of the shops anything in the front of the store has already been pre-sifted and pre-valued by the charity shop and they've decided to sell it in store because they need to raise some quick cash to improve their cashflow rather than having to store items and wait for them to sell on eBay.

Thus there isn't really a moral grey area here. By buying something from the shop you're helping them meet their cash flow needs and get rid of stock that would otherwise be taking up valuable space for them. My local charity shops love it when I come in and often invite me out back to have a look at what they've just had in as they're happy for me to take it off their hands and sell it on because they're getting money, freeing up space and they know that most of the profit I make will be spent back in that charity shop again next week.

For me therefore it becomes much the same as buying a product from a wholesaler, they sell it to you knowing you're going to sell it on and make more money but they're happy as long as they get paid.

P.S. I volunteer for a charity as well so am fully aware of what @Dick Barton refers to in terms of not all of them being squeaky clean!

Anyway back to the point - well done @Dick Barton on your sales!
 
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