14-04-2014 10:02 AM
Don't you find it really, really frustrating when, trying to sell an item in pristine condition you are undercut by a company with hundreds of thousands of sales behind them offerin exactly the same item as you for just 40% of what you are prepared to part with yours, with FREE POSTAGE thrown in!
In my case, I've got a new book on walks with an ISBN price of £30.00. I cannot give it away! And yet there is the same book being offered POST FREE for a FIVER! These massive concerns are obviously able to more or less GIVE their stuff away which I think is grossly unfair! OK, so it's a free world but what chance have I, at £12.00 got against people like that! They MUST be able to give stuff away if it would cost me £8.50 in pstage alone and they're selling it for a fiver including postage. That's my Monday moan over and done with!
14-04-2014 10:07 AM
I hope you feel better now! lol I sell books on Amazon with much more sucsess than on here. You can sell puzzles over there too.
14-04-2014 10:25 AM
Why is it unfair?
It's business and any item is only worth what someone is prepared to pay for it.
14-04-2014 2:11 PM
Hope I'm feeling better? You should have seen my cat - it shot out the room! OK, I've calmed down - a bit, anyway.
I had a look at Amazon - slightly more than Ebay but comparable in other ways. More suitable though if you're up and running your own business which I'm not at the moment, as you know. I don't think there'd be an awful lot in it. The fees at "sell a lot" work out roughly to what my fees come to now anyway - about a pony a month. I think I'll stick to eBay. I think it's a case of better the devil you know than the one you don't. I think, too, people generally are more likely to browse an eBay page with a Liquorice Allsort than they are on Amazon. I'll stay - for the time being anyway.
A few years ago I was trying to sell a toy train and advertised it at a reasonable price only to find there was just one other advertiser with the same product a lot cheaper than mine. You won't believe just how close I came to retracting mine from sale, buying his to get rid of the opposition and then putting mine back up at my price! Lol! Boils down to greed!
14-04-2014 10:54 PM
It's tough competition at the moment for most things. People are being more careful how they spend their money.
I had an email from the BBC shop on Friday offering a book (just released from a TV programme) which I was interested in for £12 + P&P. I went straight to Amazon and found it for £9 with Free P&P. It's a no brainer.
You might want to include Free P&P in your listings if you don't already, as I understand you now pay FVF's on postage so there's nothing to be gained by not offering it free. Just build into your selling price. I think the Free P&P is a big pull as P&P varies so much from seller to seller and other web sites too.