Has anyone here sold stuff through Ebay? What kind of fees are associated with selling something? I went to Ebay's site and saw a listing fee, a final fee and a reserve auction fee if you use a reserve price. That seems like a lot of fees!
Before you complain too much, check out the cost of newspaper classified ads, then factor in the coverage. A lot of people run virtual businesses using eBay. For them it's certainly cheaper than having a real store, and they get nationwide coverage for what are often niche products without a huge local market demand. Aphie, you can get some great bargains on golf clubs there. I doubt I'll ever buy another club in a store or pro shop.
And you can get the latest clubs at factory prices before they hit any of the pro shops. Definitely take a look.
I sell snowboard product using e-bay during the season. The fees are a bit tough to handle sometimes. I sell bindings in the $120 range all the time. The fees associated with the sale are about $6-7 before paypal take their chunk $4-5. Basically 10% of my sales price is eaten up by fees. On the plus side, as AAA pointed out, I have $0 in advertising and sell coast to coast. My way of recouping some of the fees is to build them into my shipping and handling fees charged to the buyer. It cost me about $7 to ship anywhere in the lower 48. I charge a flat fee of $15 for shipping. Takes some of the sting out of the fees. My customers still get an awesome deal, I make some extra scratch, and E-bay has two happy users. I also buy all my golf equipment on E-bay and have scored some excellent deals. I go to the local shops to try on shoes and swing clubs, then head to E-bay and buy at sometimes half the price or less than the shops are charging. Aphie, send me a PM if you like. I can assist you in some ideas and do's and don't regarding selling using e-bay. Later, Cracked
I sold a car on Ebay. Worked great. Got $6k more than my best offer anywhere else. Definitely worth the $30 or so listing fee. The buyer was from Ohio and I'm in CA. I don't think this sale would have happened through any other place.
Aphie, Ebay is one of the best places to sell just about anything. I have bought a lot of stuff there. All sorts of odds and ends. The more you sell, the cheaper your fees are. So if you have an Ebay store the amount is really small. When I have time on my hands I am always there browsing through the treasure trove. I have found some of the most fun things for sale there....like a 500 piece collection of miniature toilets.....
I have never used Ebay myself, but sounds like most people think it works well. My brother sold a Harley on Ebay and got a good price. He sells a lot of stuff on it. He told me he sold a radar detector that was fairly old for almost what he paid for it. I have a Cannondale road bike I will try to sell on Ebay. Bicycles stores will only give me a small fraction of what it's worth, and I don't see many road bikes advertised in the local papers here in fla. (anyone want a virtually new Cannondale R900 with Ultegra components?...polished aluminum...no paint, Made in '95, but less than 20 miles. Look pedals. SIS) Peace, RS
Aphster, strange questions from an EBay vetern like yourself, no? Saw this Aphie post over in Trading about a monthy ago: "My friend and I browse the local penny saver which is a local magazine for people trying to get rid of shit. Well, we'll take the free stuff and cheap stuff occasionally and then buy it and clean it up (make it look pretty) and put it on ebay. We easily make 50-100% on most things through ebay."