Who Has Left Ebay?

[insidethewrapper]

I usually only list when the initial listing fees are free. EBay now charges 10% of the selling price as a final value fee and paypal is under 3%. You should get around $87 for a $100 item. You also get 20% off the final value fee if you sell a lot. Not many options available.

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by insidethewrapper

I usually only list when the initial listing fees are free. EBay now charges 10% of the selling price as a final value fee and paypal is under 3%. You should get around $87 for a $100 item. You also get 20% off the final value fee if you sell a lot. Not many options available.

Mike, that's all true, but I can assure you - there are plenty of collectors out there who will pay the extra 13% for stuff that Net54 folks won't touch at much less.

We bitch about ebay, but we are barely a drop in their pre-war bucket.

[tschock]

Ebay has its place. For me it's with oddball items. While it might be nickel and dime to some, where else can I reach such a wide audience to be able to sell Frank Pitts AFL benefits package, a 1960s Detroit Lions championship glass, a 1924-25 Spalding Woman's Basketball rulebook, a set of 9 NFL metal coasters, and the 1969 ALFPA Progress Report that details the meetings with the NFLPA regarding the merger (all of which came as part of a baseball/football card auction lot). It's not auction house grade material by itself, but it gets me some cash that I can then funnel back into the B/S/T here for what I really want.

[Exhibitman]

Originally Posted by Runscott

... there are plenty of collectors out there who will pay the extra 13% for stuff that Net54 folks won't touch at much less.

We bitch about ebay, but we are barely a drop in their pre-war bucket.

Absolutely true. There are so many collectors who never heard of N54 but who cruise eBay daily.

I tend to divide my selling depending on what I am offering. If I am selling baseball cards, I definitely go elsewhere than eBay first. The BST here is a great resource, but not my go-to on lesser cards because I still have to set the price and fulfill the orders. For items under $200 it isn't really worth my time to do the listings, fulfill orders, etc., if there is a low cost outlet I can use readily. I have been very pleased with the job Lee Behrens has done and the results Lee has gotten me with consignments to Sterling. It costs me 2% above eBay for slabbed cards, 12% more than the BST here [I simply will not do PayPal gift deals, so I pay the 3% if I sell here], which is well worth it to me to avoid the time and headaches. However, for the more esoteric stuff, eBay still has the customer base, so I still sell there. Like it or not, feebay remains the best retail venue for much of what I deal in. I've been busting up vintage boxing sets and accumulations and got next to nothing done here but everything I've offered thus far has sold through eBay.

That said, eBay is a particularly problematic venue in terms of seller security and fairness. I realize that there were sellers committing fraud but the pendulum has swung way too far the other way. eBay has a $hitty set of rules for selling. Yeah, I said it. I try to limit my risks by avoiding overseas transactions except through the eBay overseas shipping program, by using eBay postage to generate their mandated tracking, etc. The buyer bias eBay has makes retail dealing more costly, difficult and risky, but still beats wholesaling or letting a bigger AH lump my stuff into dealer lots. Plus, it is fast cash flow if that is a consideration. I sold stuff that closed last weekend and already have the money in hand.

[4scuda]

Ebay recently held funds for a $150 item a buyer opened a case on. I told the buyer I would refund the money, just send it back. The jerk had already resold the item so he sent me a box of just newspapers. I had to talk to two different customer service people for a half hour before I got them to unfreeze my money.

That being said, 13 percent is still cheaper than other venues I sell at. I'd like to sell more on net54 but people are sometimes too cheap. I had a guy offer $60 for a 57 topps wrapper that sold on ebay for over $200.