Lynn’s eBay Ezine Volume IV, Issue Number 5

Grand total sold from my $20 investment was $191.34 and I still have six items that were listed in my store at higher than the original auction starting price. When they sell, I will gross another $87.00. Gotta love dinnerware!

Also, this week in my tiny pile of merchandise, I picked up six odd pieces of illy espresso items. Turns out that illy pieces are made in Italy, designed by famous people, and can sell for more than Starbucks items!!!

Click here to see what this cup and saucer is up to and learn more.

76 people have already viewed it and when I was doing my research on PriceMiner, an early illy espresso cup, and saucer sold for $2,000!!! Unbelievable….

Speaking of Unbelievable, that is what the Live Boot Camp experience will be for those lucky enough to attend. Please read the Special Announcement section to learn more. We are ready to accept reservations!!! How exciting!

In the Lynn Recommends section, I am very happy to announce that after two years, I have completely rewritten my original basic ecourse. You must read more about this.

Finally, I get emails from many of you that want to buy my full Boot Camp in a Box but just can’t afford it. So, I listed one on eBay this week starting at 99 cents. It ends 1/31/08 (today) at around 2:30 pm Pacific so click here to place your bid.

Now, let’s take a look at one part of the eBay announcement from Tuesday, 1/29/08. At first glance, I was not happy about the fee changes. So, I decided to do my due diligence and actually run the numbers. Always a smart move!

Thank goodness I have been using the eBay Sales Reports since November of 2007. They come free with Selling Manager Pro and you must go in and download the reports periodically or your subscription will expire.

So, I had two good months’ worth of data to analyze. I wouldn’t normally share my actual sales figures but I thought that in this case, it was extremely important. From my Excel spreadsheet shown below, here is what I learned.

My sell-through at auction is about 30%. On average, I sell about 50% from my eBay store and 50% at auction. That is much higher than I thought I was selling from my eBay store (check out my eBay Store Report here). In November I sold much more at auction (still plenty of time to get it shipped before Christmas) and in December I sold much more from my eBay store, over $6,700. Instant gratification, shipping, and arrival in time for gift giving!

Let me tell you that for the purposes of this analysis, I made some assumptions. I took out all the buy-it-now auction items (fixed price) listings and just focused on actual true auctions and store items. I also assumed that every auction item was listed at a starting bid price of $9.99 (true in 98% of all my listings). This made the listing fees 75 cents for each auction because I always use gallery. I listed 2011 items in that two-month period at auction. Remember, I was shooting for 200+ items per week. I did it!!!

I also assumed that every store item was listed at $9.99. I found that my average sales price (in my eBay store) for those two months was $10.80–right on the money!

You can see that this new fee structure definitely encourages us to list more at auction and in our stores. Fine with me because that has always been my strategy. You can’t sell it if it isn’t listed.

Notice how I would have saved over $800 in auction listing fees for those two months with the new fee schedule. Of course, I realize that eBay had a lot of sales in November and December for listing fees–and they must have realized that they were working–but for this analysis–I am going to assume no sales were happening. It has got to be apples to apples.

This $800 more makes up for the increase in final value fees. You can see that overall–my auction savings would have been $449 for those two months!!! This new schedule is going to be wonderful for encouraging us to list at auction.

Now, I wasn’t so sure about the new fee schedule and how it would affect our eBay stores. Because I have soooo many things listed in my store–I immediately save about $342.00 each month. This does cover the $290 increase in final value fees–netting me a $124 windfall in my store. If you don’t have as many things listed in your store as I do, the savings may not outweigh the costs. But, I think that if you combine the store loss that you may have with the gain from your auction listings–you will still come out ahead.

I did read today that Ina Steiner said that some eBay sellers’ fees will increase by 33%. That was definitely not the case for me. In fact, my overall fees will decrease by 15% and I would have saved $572 for November and December. Now that is not pocket change–that is serious money. AND this is without the extra incentive 5 to 15% discount on final listing fees for power sellers.

I can’t wait to see how this is going to affect my bottom line. I was paying eBay about 18% in listing and selling fees. This will drop to about 15% as you can see in the chart, and I am thrilled with that. Do keep in mind that I will pay another 3% or so to PayPal. However, 21% versus 18%. I will take the 18% and be very happy.

When I started out on eBay in 1999, I only paid eBay 7% in fees (there was no PayPal). So it would really have been closer to 10%. It has increased–but in almost ten years–not too much! AND When I think about having an open shop that along with that came theft, overhead, having to keep an open store, slow turnover (it could take 20 years for an item to sell), breakage, employee costs, time wasted chit-chatting, etc., etc. 18% sounds like a wonderful price to pay.

Our antique store.