On November 28th, I purchased a 350 count lot of San Jose Sharks cards for $4.99 (+ $8 shipping). The seller immediately shipped out my package:
And spent $11.49 on the shipping.
Which means that the seller made exactly $1.50 off of the sale before PayPal & eBay fees.
I'm sure this is a pretty rare incident... but it's a healthy reminder of why I haven't sold anything on eBay in years. Happy Saturday everyone... and sayonara!
7 comments:
He would have been better off using one of those Priority Mail boxes. If it fits, it ships. I think there's one that size box will fit into that costs $8 or $9 to ship.
I got a Witchblade four figure set off of the bay once. Winning bid of $2.50 + $4 shipping, total $6.50 spent. The seller spent $8+ to ship it to me, costing him more in shipping and fees than he actually made off of it!!
I've done a lot of buying and selling on ebay. You really have to be aware of how much it costs to ship items.I used to keep a spread sheet so I knew exactly how much everything costed me and how much profit I made.
So how was the lot?
offy - great call... my guess is that he could have even used the $5.20 flat rate box (the one that fits 3 or 4 dvds).
dawgbones - congratulations... yeah, that seller should have figured it was going to cost more than $4 to ship that set.
baseball dad - i guess that's why i don't really sell on ebay. i have no clue what it costs to ship things outside a simple 1 to 10 card trade package.
1967ers - it was exactly what i expected. about 40% newer product, 60% older product. there were a few older inserts that i'll add to my pc, and i'll keep a few of the non glossy cards for in-person autographs. but most of the cards will go to my students.
I bit on lots of 1 to 10 cent listing on eBay, with free shipping usually. I assume these people just don't notice that they're losing money on the cheap ones compared to what must be a large number of listings for higher priced cards.
I listed a bunch of lots on eBay right before a shipping price change and got royally screwed, but this is a different situation. I've had several sellers ship for more than they get from me, even to the point of shipping fees being higher than my total price. I have to agree that flat-rate priority is the way to go for sending more than about 100 cards. The medium flat-rate box ($10.95) can hold a few 500+-count boxes.
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