[rhettyeakley]

The answer is that it literally costs them next to nothing. I have an eBay store and pay the monthly fee to have an anchor store and with that fee I get 10,000 listings that are included as part of that subscription. If I was to ever go OVER 10,000 listings I will then get charged $.05 per listing. With the 10,000 listings I think the math works out that for the subscription fee you are basically paying $.03 or so for each listing.

I have never had over 6,000 listings (less alone 10,000) in my store at any given point. I just don't have time to list that many things but may end up there at some point as it is steadily growing. I do strictly BIN at this point with some occasional auctions and I have been able to build a pretty strong inventory over the past 5 years or so with just some work done in my spare time (it allows me to buy new things and heaven knows I'd be collecting anyways so I may as well allow my hobby to make me some money at the same time). For the most part my store is populated with duplicate items or items that just don't fit my current collecting focus so it is a great way for me to refocus my money to items that are currently interesting to me, it is fun.