Down 70% in sales compared to last year

[*therightdeal*]

Hi everyone,

Hope you are all well 🙂 I don't know about everyone else but my sales are practically non existent. I have been selling full time on eBay for the last 5 years, I have another store which is my main store but sales are non existent. I don't watch the news (don't like hearing negative things) is there some major crisis in Australia??? Because that's the only thing I can think of. I have double the stock compared to last year, I have mobile friendly template on my main store and my prices are very competitive. What's going on? Does anyone know?

I received an email a few days ago which started with "We have just switched your store on....." What do they mean? Do they just switch it on and off whenever they feel like it?

Any feedback will be appreciated, thanks 🙂

[*tippy*toes*]

There's quite a few people here who have had a plummet in sales. There are numerous threads about it on here, possibly still on the first page. Have a read through some of them and you'll see it's not just you.

[clarry100]

Like you we have been trading for five years with two basic stores.
October and November have traditionally been our two biggest months of the year. This year we have been down about 65% on sales volume as compared to the same months last year. Despite having more listings and greater variety of products.
I think eBay does not get the traffic volume it once did. However, our website and etsy are also both down too.
Speaking with others in our area we are hearing that other businesses are also doing it tough this year.
In particular some friends who have had a Chinese restaurant in our area for the past 20 years. This year is by far the worst on record. It's barely worth them opening their doors and they say they are close to walking away from it. Performance is so low that it's not even worth anything to sell.
I don't understand economics but to me it just seems like a lack of confidence for people to spend their money. Perhaps with the historically low interest rated people are cramming every spare dollar off their mortgages leaving nothing for the non essential extras, which our stuff is.
I don't know really but our confidence is shot to bits and we are trying a different venture in the hope of finding some other areas there is some spending. We are getting ever closer to closing our two eBay stores. We are now running down our stock levels and probably by the end of the current financial year we may turn off the lights unless that light at the end of the tunnel gets brighter.
Good luck with your selling but somehow I think our lucky days selling on eBay ate long gone now.

[bess15]

I think a number of things are affecting sales at the moment.  Our local economy is not looking that great according to the news and I think the US election has also had a effect as we don't know what US policy will be going forward in terms of trade.  Whether this ends up making any difference to the average person on the street makes no difference, it has a psychological effect and people just hold off buying.   Also eBay seems to be going out of its way to promote the big department store sellers so this has to be knocking the smaller sellers around, but I agree, it's not just eBay, I don't think I've seen so many 50% off sales prior to Christmas in the B&M shops before!

[knewdoors]

100% agreed on your post..E-Bay has gotten worse..it's a sellers nightmare..

[rocket2retro]

November has always been my best month over 13 years of selling. The November just gone was my best month for the year, however, it was equivalent to my worst months in previous years. The decline in in eBay sales dramatic.

I'm hesitant to blame world events/politics. I can't see how Trump becoming president of a country half a world away can stop someone buying a $15.00 second-hand Tupperware beetrrot from me in Australia.

I can only conclude that eBay either does not have the traffic that it had in the past and/or there are more sellers (thus more competition).

There is also a lot more online competition from sites that did not exist a few years ago.

From being a member of many Facebook Buy Swap & Sell groups I have a feeling that they have captured a significanly large share of the second-hand market (which is what I deal in).

[*tippy*toes*]

Yeah, I'm always skeptical about how something occurring in another country could affect what people spend here. Maybe if I sold internationally I might be affected, but I don't. I also can't understand how an election could stop someone from buying a $10 collectable. I believe what has affected the small sellers sales is the constant flood of discount offers from the large sellers. I am not in competition with any of them, but if buyers are taking advantage of these constant sales, then they don't have much left to buy other things.

I'll probably be another one that just lets my stock run out and call it a day. I've still got a heap of stuff here to sell, but I'm not going to buy anything else, regardless of how cheap I can get it. This was only ever a hobby to make a few bucks to pay the bills, it was never my intention to make it a full time business. For a long time it did pay the bills, but not lately! I even thought about opening a store at one point so I could have more listings up, but when my last invoice was $1.50, I can't justify paying out $20 for nothing in return.

I've still got about 2 years worth of stock, so I'll see how things go. If it doesn't pick up in the next 6 months or so I might hit Facebook and flog off some of my stuff in bulk. There's a few vintage/antique sites that I used to belong to. There are some very avid collectors on them.

[collect247]

Yep 1 sale a month won't pay the bills 

[stylesilver]

What did the REST of the email say!! That's very odd!! (And yes sales down for my store too- but has a little bit of Xmas pick up in the last week etc)

[*therightdeal*]

'We have just switched your store on so your Click & Collect eligible listings are now visible to your buyers." 

So that means they were NOT visible to buyers before? Most of my items ARE Click and Collect. I find that I make 4-5 sales one day then the light goes off and I make 0-1 sale per day for days on end.

I agree with you guys they are promoting the big stores. Every time I search for something it's all the big sellers that come up or the chinese sellers. How can we compete on prices, it's impossible. 

I will definitely be looking into Amazon FBA for 2017, can't put all my eggs in one basket but in the meantime I am looking for a job (which has not been easy either). I was making a full time income (not a large one) but it got me through. I can no longer live on what I make on eBay, it has definitely gone down hill and who knows when the economy will pick up 😞

Good luck to everyone 🙂 Hope some good news comes in 2017!