If not eBay, where else can I sell my products?

[padraicpaul91]

Over the past few months,I have been checking out my product categories, my competitors' performance and the market in general, and I am concerned about my future on the eBay platform.

My primary niche is original limited edition prints, music oriented. This is a product caregory that has been part of eBay since day 1 and eBay remains its biggest market place. My own sales have been subdued but the performance for my competitors has been,by and large,dreadful. A number of rival established sellers have closed recently and others are dropping prices or accepting best offers for most of their stock. And still their sales (using their feedback) are falling.

I have been informed through sources that some sellers are abandoning ebay to return to using their own websites or Shopify. They have gone full circle.

I'm thinking there are three main reasons for this situation. Firstly people are cutting down on discretionary spending. Second, Ebay has allowed a flood of cheap, mostly unauthorized, reproductions. Non original prints now make up about 90% of items for sale in this category, up dramatically over the past couple of years. Thirdly, eBay,as a whole, is not attracting the proportion of customers it once did. 

The other big E and the A do not represent viable market places for my posters, so I am wondering what other platforms (eg own web site, Shopify) are working for sellers.

[collect247]

Unfortunately Ebay is the # 1 platform for selling,I can vouch for that as I've been every where and there is no comparison to ebay.

Maybe it's time to rethink about what you want to sell?

I sell what people want apparently,luckily I have an abundance of stock.

[brerrabbit585]

If you're selling a product that the Chinese can sell fakes of you're doomed so best to face reality and get out while you can. Most people aren't going to be too fussed about whether the prints are original or not so they're going to buy copies if they're cheaper.

[padraicpaul91]

I've done my best by alerting artists and producers to this and requesting they publish images with watermarks or at least low resolution images that are less attractive to the copyists.

Otherwise I will soldier on, accepting that my niche is diminishing. It is the previously easy selling, cheaper items that have suffered most.Not interested in investing in other product ranges at this stage. This was my hobby business that overtook my bricks and mortar shop, until recently. Will probably concentrate on the more highly prized originals that are acquired by collectors. They were supposed to be my retirement pin money.

But I remained concerned about where eBay is heading and what that means for me as a seller.

[padraicpaul91]

I was interested enough in your words to check what you sell. But there are no items under your user name.

[kopenhagen5]

crow has other accounts for selling.

[*tippy*toes*]

I know what Crow sells and like her, I sell items that the Chinese can't create fakes of. As soon as you start selling the kind of thing that the Chinese can knock off and sell cheap, you're doomed to lose. You will never win when it comes to the Chinese.

Crow's sales are good, as are mine. There is no shame in changing your product line. I've done it several times. I certainly couldn't give up my day job, but as a part time thing, I'm earning enough off eBay that takes a chunk out of the bills. That leaves more of my day job pay for me.

[padraicpaul91]

Hopefully my post does not come across as whinging about Chinese knock offs. It isn't, and the fakes are world wide, not just Chinese.I am doing OK, not well but better than most competitors.

Perhaps I should have used my other products to start this thread. These have also been trending down without being copied by our major trading partner. Just not as much as the prints A major selling point for these are the countries of origin: France, Morocco, Belgium. There may be more sellers of these products than previously but I wonder if this is sufficient explanation.

This post was created to canvas alternative strategies from sellers who may be experiencing similar downward trends in eBay sales.

[travelsizeme]

Paul, it may not be much consolation but I have your arctic monkeys poster on my watch list, hoping to purchase as soon as I have some cash to spare 🙂

[padraicpaul91]

Thanks.

No one has copied it thus far.