New Ebay clothing size policy
Summary: The discussion revolves around eBay's new clothing size listing instructions, which have caused confusion and frustration among sellers. vero_5848 highlights the difficulty in listing vintage clothing accurately due to sizing discrepancies and concerns about reduced visibility and potential buyer dissatisfaction. Other participants, such as bravergrace and knickersboxersglory, share similar frustrations with ambiguous and inadequate sizing options for different clothing items, leading to potential misleading listings. Concerns are also raised about inaccuracies and the negative impact these policies could have on both sellers' and buyers' experiences. Some participants express intentions to possibly move to other platforms if the issues are not resolved.
Just had a couple of interesting webchats with eBay over these new size listing instructions.
I sell some vintage clothing items and wanted to know what sizing to use in the dropdown as a vintage women's item is normally 1-2 sizes smaller than current sizing - e.g vintage 16 today is often closer to a 12. I would have previously created '16 (fit 12)' in the dropdown box.
An AI chatbot appeared to be telling me that I MUST use the size closest to the manufacturer's original - ie Vintage size 16 must be listed as a size 16 even if the current size would be a 12. This would mean that when people are searching for a size 12 garment the search will not bring back the vintage size 16, therefore less chance of views/sale, also creating the potential for disappointed buyers when they purchase a 16 and find it far too small (not all buyers read all the details).
Chatted with a human who seemed to think that there wasn't an issue and initially seemed to struggle to comprehend the link between searching for a size and resulting views/sales. Eventually appeared to tell me to list it as the size I thought it was eg Vintage 16 to be listed as a 12 and then add an explanation in either the title, additional details (not enought room) or in the item description. Total contradiction.
I did try to go further and ask what to do about differences in brand sizing -e.g a Zara XL is different to an M&S XL, I would normally list 'M&S XL (fit 20-22)' . Also with regular sizes, a Roman 16 is often closer to a 14 so I would normally list as '16 (fit 14-16)'. I gave up on the chat because we weren't getting anywhere.
Looks like there are going to be a lot of frustrated buyers and sellers - not everybody checks the garment measurements in the description or additional details before they purchase.
I will have to monitor the expected drop in views and sales and see whether it is still worth selling on eBay
knickersboxersglory
·1 week agoOnly had a brief look, but fairly certain some kids' sizes can't be listed any more as well. For example, we have items in these sizes,
7-8 years - CAN BE LISTED
9-10 years - CAN BE LISTED
6-8 years - CANNOT BE LISTED
7-13 years - CANNOT BE LISTED
2 years - CANNOT BE LISTED
3 years - CANNOT BE LISTED
4 years - CANNOT BE LISTED
5 years - CANNOT BE LISTED
6 years - CANNOT BE LISTED
Whoever came up with this policy should be embarrassed. Some basic research would tell you there are millions of items that cannot be listed with these set values.
You need a 'Size Map' value not visible to customers to apply to your filters
You need a 'Size' value visible to customers where sellers can add the relevant sizing information that buyers need
The only workaround that we can think of at the moment is to enter any value into the 'Size' attribute which will show in the item specifics, so still not ideal as misleading for customers (e.g. if you have a variation listing with sizes 8-10, 12-14, 16-18, 20-22 you would need to add '8' into the size attribute). So the 'Size' value is shown as an item specific only.
Then you would need to create a new attribute for the dropdown in the listing (e.g. Garment Size, Clothing Size, UK Size etc) where you could show the buyer the information that they need and the correct sizes for the items being listed. This would be the dropdown that they would select to place the order.
The downside is that all of the variations would probably be excluded from the filters by eBay except the one value included in the item specifics.
OR
Have 2 dropdowns in the listing. One with size, the other with 'Clothing Size' for your actual values, but this is just going to create confusion for buyers if they have to choose '8' from the Size dropdown, then '8-10' from the Clothing Size dropdown.
This update needs to be rolled back until eBay have a proper fix. Imagine having a retail marketplace where you can't list things!
knickersboxersglory
·1 week agoNo way to list garments in these sizes,
8-10
10-12
12-14
14-16
16-18
18-20
20-22
22-24
24-26
26-28
28-30
30-32
One Size
S/M
M/L
L/XL
XL/XXL
What a nightmare.
eBay fail here. The single most important piece of information when buying an item of clothing is size. Maybe eBay can explain who this is supposed to benefit
Not the seller - we can't list items correctly
Not the buyer - who will buy the size shown in the listing, even through this isn't the actual size of the garment. If you buy a size 8 and get an 8-10 is this misleading? If you buy a size 14 and get a size 12-14 is that misleading.
Not eBay - we'll be forced to move items to other platforms if we can't list them on eBay properly.
Clothing is the one area where eBay are ahead of Amazon, until now. Looks like we'll be forced to move these items to other platforms now.
It's like if you have a green car and eBay give you the choice of listing as black, white or red, and tell you to 'choose the best colour'
Can you imagine if Next started listing size 8 and sending 8-10, or listing 'L' and sending L/XL.
Wait for the huge increase in returns and negative feedback.
*vyolla*
·2 weeks agoIt's bonkers, looks to me like the same programme that Vinted are using now, where you can't tell what size a piece of clothing is unless a photo of the size label and the actual measurements have been added by the seller.
bravergrace
·2 weeks agoI sell (amongst other things) vintage children's and baby socks.
The new size options for these are:
2XS, XS, S, M, L, XL, 2XL, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, One Size.
This is worse than unhelpful. What size is a "MEDIUM Child Sock"? What size is a "size 5".
It was bad enough before, trying to explain to customers that Sock size 5 was not the same as Age 5, or Shoe size 5.
But for heavens' sake!