My Goodwill Isn't So Bad After All!

Turns out I've just been looking in all the wrong places at my Goodwill! I've been looking on the shelves. The real goods are hidden in the clothing racks! I bought 35 items last night, for a total of $95. And I got some GREAT stuff!

Some 100% cashmere sweaters

• Charter Club, NWT (red)
• Lands End plus size (black)

Several long denim skirts. Apparently someone donated her entire collection of long denim skirts, because there were 8 or 10 of them, all similar styles, same size. All in one chunk on the skirt rack. These are French Cuff (x2), J.Crew, and DKNY. Any that haven't sold by this summer are mine! :)

A bunch of dresses (and a skirt that I missed in my skirt collage)

• Rue 21, NWT (purple)
• Worthington, NWT (skirt)
• Oh Mamma! maternity gown, NWT (black)
• Maggie London, NWT (gown)
• Talbots, NWT (plaid)
• Lois Snyder, NWT (beige)

Some jeans - I don't usually go through the jeans, because there are rarely any NWT ones, but these caught my eye without my even having to sift through them.

• Apostrophe, NWT
• B.Moss, NWT

Some Nike stuff (neither is NWT)

I've been avoiding Ralph Lauren, because I didn't know much about it. I still don't, but thought I'd take a chance on these. The women's sweater is gorgeous. The 3 men's shirts are larger sizes (and how about that last hideous one?!)

Shorts are quick and easy to list, and this is the ideal time to be listing them!

• Just My Size, NWT (dark)
• B.Moss capris, NWT (turquoise - I know you can't tell, but they've got green seahorses embroidered on them - very spiffy...)
• American Outfitters, NWT

Skirts are quick and easy to list too!

• Charlotte Russe, NWT (black/white)
• Sag Harbor, NWT (red paisley)
• Sag Harbor wool, NWT (black)
• Tweeds, NWT (pink)

Several tops:

• Apt. 9, NWT (purple sheer)
• Ely Plains ruffled western shirt (black - not new)
• Maurices cardigan, NWT (white)
• Worthington, NWT (purple blouse - this was actually from a small local shop the day before yesterday)
• CJ Banks, NWT (yellow)
• St. John's Bay, NWT (orange)

And 2 more western shirts, from the small local shop where I got the purple Worthington blouse.

My Goodwill emailed me a coupon for 20% off ALL clothing the last Wednesday of every month. It doesn't expire until December 2012, and there is no wording on the coupon to indicate that it's a one-time-use only coupon. Hooray! That 20% off even applies to the half-off color. Several of the items I found last night were the half-off tag, so I got 70% off those items!!

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Otherwise, I've had nothing of interest happen today, eBay-related. I had one sale in the wee hours this morning, but that's it. No offers, no messages, no nothing. I do believe my high sales wave may have crashed today...

Zzzzzzzz......

Too tired to write much today. My husband gave me a cold pill last night that kicked my butt. I slept so deeply that it took me most of the day today to get awake.

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All my sales today except one were international. That's odd, now that I think about it. I was excited to accept an offer on this today:

I found it at a yard sale this past June. It was only 50 cents, so I snatched it up. I thought I remembered someone saying they sell well. I was hoping for $50, but it's been listed for 7 months with nary a bite, so I accepted a $30 offer. It's going to France, and it's heavy, so my buyer paid an additional $54 shipping! I sure hope he saw (and understood!) the part of the listing where I said that it's basically useless. I'm pretty sure there's not a cell phone provider in the world that still supports analog...

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I have a box of outgrown toys in the eBay room that I'd like to get to someday. I'll either eBay them or yard sale them. My 4-year-old was in there the other day. She saw that box and said, "Hey! Why did you steal all of Aaron's toys?!" Wow. I pointed out that they were toys that he didn't play with anymore. Like this one:

I guess it was Phone Day in my store today. This one's going to the UK. I've had pretty good luck selling pre-owned VTech toys. I think I've listed 3 and all three sold within 2 weeks. The trick is to include video in your listing. One of these days, I'll write a tutorial for how to do that...

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Falling asleep at the keyboard. Hopefully I feel better tomorrow. I have 35 garments washed and photographed from tonight's trip to Goodwill. I'll fill you in on that tomorrow too - found some exciting stuff!!

Wigs and Worthington

Last Christmas, my store wasn't quite as well-stocked as it was this Christmas, so my sales didn't really spike last Christmas. I had heard so many sellers talking about getting prepared for the onslaught of Christmas shoppers. I was so excited to experience this wild sales spike! But you know what? I actually saw a DROP in my sales in the two months leading up to Christmas. I was so discouraged until I realized WHY my sales dropped.  Used shoes and clothing just aren't at the top of most people's Christmas lists. People were spending their money on Christmas gifts - toys, NEW shoes, NEW clothing. Sure, I was still getting pretty steady sales, but it just wasn't the craziness that I was expecting.

And now ... the same sellers who were talking about their busy Christmas sales are now talking about how much their sales have slowed down now that the holiday buying season is over. And mine? Mine have spiked! I am riding a very high sales wave right now. I am honestly having a hard time getting all my packages ready in time to catch my mail carrier!

I'm not telling you this to brag about my sales. I'm pointing out what a difference your stock can make in your sales activity. I sell everyday items - things that people need or want all year long. If you focus on new toys, new clothing, Christmas decorations, whatever ... your sales probably WILL spike at Christmastime and taper off during the rest of the year.  When choosing your niche, think long and hard about it. Do you want steady sales ALL year long? Then buy everyday items that people will want to buy all year long. Do you want the extra stress of a super-busy selling/shipping season during the already-busy Christmas season? Then focus on those items that will make ideal Christmas gifts.

Looking back, yes, I was disappointed that my Christmas sales weren't higher. But looking forward, I'm excited to know that my everyday items will probably continue to sell consistently, long after the Christmas shopping dust settles.

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My buyers have continued to keep me hopping this week! I think my sales this month have been more steady and consistent than they have ever been. It has reached the point where I have no choice but to keep up with my packaging throughout the day, or I'd have to stay up too late or wake up too early in order to get it done. I love it!

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A couple weeks ago, my hairdresser asked me if I would be willing to sell some wigs and clip on hair things for her. She had tried to sell them in her salon for quite some time and just wanted to dump them and attempt to recover her initial investment. She gave me 2 wigs (along with the model heads, which I'll sell separately) and 18 clip on hair things. She had $100 invested in them and was hoping to get that much back out of them. I know nothing about these things, so I just listed them and hoped for the best. So far, 3 of the clip on hair things have sold, and one of the wigs just sold tonight! Total sales for those 4 pieces: $61.96! After fees, I owe her right around $50. And I still have another wig and 10 more hair pieces to sell. I'm sure she'll get her $100 back out of it. When she handed them over to me, she said, "I'll make it worth your while!"  We didn't discuss what that meant, but I'd be happy if she just let me keep one of her wig heads and call it even! Isn't she pretty?

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I know very little about women's clothing brands, but I am trying to learn. I have already learned that Worthington is a definite BOLO brand. It's just JCPenney, but so far, every Worthington item that I have listed has sold within a week. I have a black size 24 W Worthington skirt to list tonight. It's a basic skirt, but I'm hoping the size will help it sell quickly. I picked this Worthington cardigan up at the last second last week at Goodwill, and it sold today.

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I tried really hard to avoid all the germs that were flying around my house last week, but alas ....

Early to bed tonight!

Links to My Tax Series from We Sell on eBay

I wanted to gather my entire tax series from We Sell on eBay into one place. Putting all the links into one post will make it much easier to find what you're looking for, so here you go!

• Getting Ready for Tax Time
• A Sample Dome Day
• Printing Reports from Paypal
• Reconciling Our Monthly Paperwork
• Putting It All Together On Your Schedule C
• Movin' Right Along on the Schedule C
• Home Office Expense
• Depreciation of Your Home
• Schedule SE (Self-Employment)
• Schedule C, page 2 - Cost of Goods Sold
• Schedule C, page 2 - Information About Your Vehicle

As always, please remember that I am NOT a tax accountant. During the writing of this tax series, I consulted the IRS instructions for each form. I urge you to do the same. If you still have questions, please consult your tax accountant.

Goals (Week of 1/23)

Last week's goals were:

• Sales Goal: $800. I am happy to report that I PASSED this goal! Hooray!
• Listing Goal: List at least 20 new items. I actually got 33 new items listed! Another Hooray!

This week's goals are:

• Sales Goal: I'm going to bump this up just a bit to $850.
• Listing Goal: List at least 20 new items again. I have 2 laundry baskets of stuff to get listed this week, and I plan to shop on Wednesday, because I have a 20% off clothing coupon for Goodwill that's good the last Wednesday of every month. I am very confident that I'll reach my 20 new listings and probably more!

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I have an unpaid item case open right now. I had someone offer me $20 for a $29.99 microwave turntable. I accepted the offer and haven't heard from them since. Doesn't it drive you bonkers when THEY offer to buy it and then never bother paying? When/if they pay, I'll just drop it into one of my new "cute" turntable boxes (wrapped safely, of course), and send it on its way.

Those turntable boxes cost me about $2 a piece with shipping. I sell a LOT of turntables, and at a very high profit margin, so I don't mind spending that $2 on a box. But if you are only selling one or two, do you want to place an order for 25 boxes? No, probably not. Before I started buying boxes, I was making them myself. I used other large boxes, redesigned them, and cut them to the size and shape I needed.

I have a new document available under the "Products and Services" tab at the top of my blog. This document includes the template that I use for turntables. I have sent this template out to people in the past, but this document includes the template for 4 different-sized turntables, as well as a step-by-step tutorial on how to build them. This tutorial will save you the cost of having to buy the boxes. It will also save you the time waiting for your shipment of boxes to arrive. If you sold a turntable this morning and you need to ship it tomorrow, do you have time to wait for your order of boxes? No. This tutorial will help you get your turntable shipped out on time! Check it out under the "Products and Services" tab at the top of my blog.

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I had a buyer from Alberta over the weekend. She bought a board game. She paid for it this morning, choosing First Class International shipping. A couple minutes later, I got this note from her:

please ship out today as i am hoping to receive it before saturday for an 80's party i am hosting!!! thanks again

Now, geography was never my strongest subject in school, so let's consult a map, shall we?

 

The red dot is me, in Pennsylvania. The green dot is my buyer, in Alberta. The yellow line is the long, long path that this package needs to travel between now and Saturday. Alberta is roughly two light years away from Pennsylvania, so I'm pretty sure it's not going to arrive on time. I sent my buyer a message saying, "I'd be happy to ship today, but I really doubt it will arrive on time!" I then waited several hours to hear back from her. The time came when I had to ship it, or I'd be too late for the post office, so I went ahead and shipped it first class. After I sent it off, I wrote her this note:

Hello! Your package is on its way! I hope it arrives on time - your party sounds like a lot of fun!

Notice I ended that message on a happy note. I didn't end it with: "I don't think your package is gonna make it on time."  The "your party sounds like a lot of fun!" took the focus off the bad news. I've got my fingers crossed, but I'm not expecting anything good to come of this transaction....

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My husband's off to class again tonight, so the kids and I are headed out for some pizza!

Oops! I Did It Again!

(You're welcome for the ear worm, by the way ... )

Remember just a couple days ago, when I said I was going to keep up with my packaging over the weekend? Yeah well ... here it is Sunday night .... I had 14 packages to get together. They were all poly mailer orders except one, so it was pretty quick and easy. But that one that needs to go in a box isn't done yet. I'm super-excited about that sale (more on that later), but not so super-excited about the packaging. I'll put it off until morning. Maybe my magical packaging fairies will take care of that for me overnight.

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I got an order today from one of those China-connection buyers. I don't really understand what they do. I haven't been able to tell if they order things from people and put them in their own stores, or if people come to them and ask them to buy something specific, or what. But in all the time I've been selling on eBay, this was only my second order from one of them. And it was a very exciting, extra-special item, let me tell you:

But hey - a sale is a sale. I'm happy with it. They asked me to write the item number on the outside of the package. If I hadn't already heard of these people, I've have laughed and said, "Pssht. Don't be lazy. Look the item number up yourself." But these companies order SO many items, they have to have some way to keep them straight. Some of them can be pretty demanding and pushy, but otherwise, they're great buyers. They leave feedback, and sometimes they come back for more, so it's in our best interests to take that extra moment to make their jobs easier for them.

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Here's the sale I was excited about until it came time to package it:

I have had these for a LONG time! I was just about to give up on them when I got an offer on them last night. This is another thing I'd have probably taken any offer for, just to get rid of them. But she offered me just $5 less than my sale price (I had them 15% off this weekend), so I jumped on it. She paid $55 for them. And they're going to Canada. Because the package is more than 4 pounds, it has to go priority mail, so she paid an additional $33 shipping! Wow! So the least I can do is take care of them and package them nicely...

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My 11-year-old had an Equine Nutrition seminar toda.....zzzzz...z......zzz....  Wha--??  Oh, I'm sorry. Just typing that made me fall asleep. So as I was saying, her Pony Club had a meeting today about feeding horses. It was over 2 hours long! I dropped her off. I'm not the horsey person in the family. I wasn't about to stay and sit through that! But she loved it. She's completely obsessed with horses. It's nice to see her branching out and actually learning how to care for them, rather than just drawing pictures of them and reading about them. Hopefully someday my eBay income can support buying and maintaining a horse for her...

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That's pretty much it. Quiet day today. My husband starts nursing school full-swing this week. He'll be away ALL evening (as in 8 hours), 4 nights a week, so I anticipate getting a lot of eBay work done in the evenings the next couple months. In reality, I'll probably fritter those hours away on the boards. Like I usually do....

You Snooze, You Lose

You may remember me talking about the huge yard sale I went to this past fall that had nothing but new-with-tags brand name clothing. I'm doing quite well with the inventory I bought there. A brief summary: I spent a little over $700 on 120 items. To date, I have had over $1600 in gross sales, and I still have 52 items left to sell. I should end up pretty much tripling my initial investment on those items.

I received an offer yesterday on one of the Columbia shirts I had listed from that sale. It had a retail price of $50. On most of these items, I have been aiming for a minimum of half of retail, so I had this one listed for $37.99 (free shipping), or best offer. I would accept any offers of around $27 or more, $25 if I've had a slow sales day. I received a $15 offer for this shirt yesterday:

(That picture was from my pre-Nelly days ...)

I counter-offered with $30, hoping for a counter-offer of $25. They countered with $20, so I came back with $25. I'll never know if they would have accepted that offer, because shortly after I sent that counteroffer, someone else came along and bought it for my full asking price! Not only that, but they bought the white one I had listed, also for full price! Just like that, I made $75 on two shirts! It's always nice to get full-price sales on items like this, because that assures me that my pricing isn't as far out of line as some of my prospective buyers would have me believe.

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Speaking of low offers, there's been some discussion on eBay Underground about this very topic. I used to use the auto-decline feature on my Best Offer listings. It was nice for awhile to not have to deal with stupidly low offers. But then it occurred to me - what if I have my auto-decline set to auto-decline anything lower than $25 and someone offers me $24.99? Or what if I have had this item laying around for 6 months or even a year and I just want to dump it? So I don't use that feature anymore.

Here's a good example of why:  Over the summer, I bought a board game that I was really excited about. I paid a whopping $2 for it, and once I looked at completeds, I was glad I didn't spend much more than that, because there weren't many that sold. But I held out hope - I priced it for $49.99 or best offer. Up until today, I have not received one single offer for that game. I started a 15% off clearance sale last night, and this was one of the listings in that sale, which brought it down to $42.49 or best offer. I got an offer today for $24.00. Normally, I'd have just declined that offer, because it was less than half my original asking price. But I double-checked completeds to see how well the game was selling. The highest listing in completeds was only $29.99. I could have countered, hoping for another $5, but because I had only paid $2 for it and it had been listed for quite some time with zero interest, I decided to accept the offer. If I had been using auto-decline, I'd have never known about an offer that I would have ultimately been okay with accepting.

Who else read the Sweet Valley High books obsessively?

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I got a pair of shoes back in the mail today. Shoes are my niche, so returns pretty much come with the territory. Considering how many pairs of shoes I've sold, I've gotten a surprisingly low number of returns for fit. In fact, I think I've had to process more refunds for broken shoes than I have for shoes that didn't fit. I include a lot of measurements in all of my shoe listings. I really think that has helped cut down on returns. It takes a couple extra minutes when I'm writing up the listings, but it's worth the extra effort if it cuts down on the hassle of returns.

This woman was very nice. She was disappointed because she really loved the shoes, but they were too wide for her and they kept falling off her feet. I wrote her back right away to let her know that I do accept returns. I gave her my address and let her know ahead of time that I would only be refunding her purchase price. In this particular case, she didn't pay any initial shipping, so there was no debating whether I would be refunding her original shipping or not. But telling her her refund amount up front let her know that I wouldn't be reimbursing her for her return shipping. She shipped them back promptly, I received them today and immediately issued her refund. The shoes have already been relisted and will hopefully re-sell quickly.

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In other, very important news: our bathroom has been under construction for over three years. (Life just gets in the way sometimes.) I am a big fan of hot bubble baths, and I've been missing them for several years now. My husband got the tub put in and hooked up this week, so I got to have a nice, scalding hot bubble bath today!! Ahhhhh....

Of course, I dragged my new buddy along with me to keep my company:

Kindle Fire, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways ... Of course, I wasn't able to fully relax, because I was afraid I would drop it into the water, so maybe I'll stick with traditional paper books in the tub from now on.