A Little Advice....

[made-in-colorado!]

   We have a nice little wholesale biz here in Colorado USA.  You can see a few of our listings to see what we sell here...  We also produce many other customized souvenir type products for tourists.

   We are considering moving to Australia and would like to open a gift shop plus sell on Ebay down there.  We are curious about how popular Ebay is there. Are most sales to Australians or are most of you selling internationally?

   Thanks In Advance!!!!

[phorum_junkie*]

Lol, I think I am extremely lucky but I do not actually live in Australia as such, I live in the UK but am lucky enough to spend just short of six months a year in Australia, best of both worlds so to speak.

The UK economy is up the proverbial just like in the US and the Aus economy is strong, too strong some would say, so I see it from both sides.

10 years ago when things were the other way round we had a much higher standard of living while we were in Australia as most of out income is from UK pensions, now the $Au is so strong our buying power has effectively been cut in half so that no longer applies.

Mind you hot and humid as it is here at the moment the exchange rate does not make me want to go back to a cold and damp UK winter!

[digital*ghost]

Let me ask this question then....  If you could live anywhere in Australia, where would it be?  We are not keen on big cities and would not have any reason to live in one or even close to one.   We would have no problem traveling around to get our initial orders from retailers. We would then simply ship re-orders to them.  That's what we do now...

   My perfect plan would be to buy a nice boat and live on it. That's what we did in San Diego for a few years and it was incredible!  I doubt the wife would be "on board" to that idea.....  I might could sell her on the idea for a year or so!

I'm biased because I already live there, but Adelaide - I love it here. It's "quieter" than most other capital cities in Oz, and not necessarily the hub of anything, but it's not isolated from anything either, and it has a great artistic community vibe. There are a few tourist destinations, even those considered a little more rural, though still relatively close to the city - a half hour drive from Adelaide and you're in "the country" (eg Hahndorf - basically a street of gift shops, Barossa Valley - wine country). SA is also the cheapest mainland state to live in. 

[made-in-colorado!]

    We'll be coming from an elevation of over 3000m up in the Rocky Mountains.  We can get as cold as -50 and at these heights we are always short of breath!   So anything lower and warmer sounds like a welcome change!  

   Something tells me Alice Springs might be a bit too much of a shock to the system though...

[austeam]

From around $350,000 you could purchase something very basic in the Blue Mountains which is approx 100klm (62 miles) from the centre of Sydney.  Anything along the coast will cost considerably more but you might get lucky just north or south of Sydney. 

The Sunshine Coast Qld is beautiful and you might even be able to live on a house boat.

[austeam]

Forgot to mention, the Blue Mountains is very touristy http://www.bluemts.com.au/

[made-in-colorado!]

Blue Mountains area looks real nice!!!

[patchoo78]

and we don't have 'Cowboys' either !!

And Koalas need gum trees to eat the leaves off

[made-in-colorado!]

We only use dead wood, so no worries!  🙂

[austeam]

When you come to Australia and visit the Blue Mountains be sure to check out Jenolan Caves and the Three Sisters. Both would make good artwork for your lamps.

http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&sugexp=les%3B&gs_rn=1&gs_ri=hp&cp=4&gs_id=e&xhr=t&q=jenolan+ca... 

http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&q=three+sisters+blue+mountains&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&biw=1120...

[made-in-colorado!]

I gotta tell ya, these Blue Mts. will be on our short list for sure!   I like the proximity to everything and yet the remote look of the area.  Now if we could just find a nice Aussie family to adopt us so we could just slip right in, that would be grand....