New Store Subscription Fees

[gec2002]

Just got the email that come 14th February our store subscription fees are going up.

Basic $24.95  Offset by 600 Free listings

Featured $54.95 Offset by 1500 Free listings

Anchor (Make sure you are sitting down before reading) $549.95

However all tiers and stores will have slightly higher FVF fees at all levels and tiers

As per usual the devil is in the detail

The cap on Final Value Fees per item will increase from $250 to $400

Auction Insertion Fees (not within the collectibles category) will be $3 regardless of the start price for store subscribers.

They definitely don't want store holders doing auctions.

Off to do my sums and see what it all really means, there will be a sweet spot there somewhere, just need to work it out.  But overall my guess is if listing items with normal listing fee you may in some cases be slightly better off, but for media @ 5c not so much.

[brerrabbit585]

gec, she's saying that unless you sell more than $1K a month, the reduced selling fee percentage for a featured store will mean you'll save less than the $10 you save by subscribing to a basic store.

[davewil1964]

I suspect very few book sellers with 1000 listings are getting $20 for them.

List 600 with old system. Sell 50 @ $15 with postage.

Basic store: $19.95 + (400 x .05) $20 + FVF $71.25 = $111.20

Featured store: $49.95 + (100 x .05) $5 + FVF $63.75 = $118.70

New system -

Basic store: $24.95 + FVF $71.25 = $96.20

Featured store: $54.95 + FVF $64.07 = $119.02

QED.

Pull their finger out and double their sales? I've increased my listings by about 50% over the last 18 months and my sales have probably increased 20%. So to double my sales I would need to at least quadruple my listings, with consequent additional listing fees. Not counting that eBay is unlikely to let me sell that many anyway. There certainly seems to be a lights on/lights off situation.

I, and I am not the only one, find my eBay fees to be around the same level every month, regardless of how many items I have listed.

[digital*ghost]

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@gec2002 wrote:

Sorry but I am struggling with your logic are you saying

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brerrabbit585 is correct, I was talking about the volume of turnover a seller would need in order for a featured store to save a media seller any fees, so not talking about profit margin at all, just purely looking at the fees paid to eBay, and pointing out the kinds of numbers required to make the additional subscription cost of a featured store actually worthwhile for media sellers, due largely in part to the fact that no matter what the subscription, insertion fees are only 5c. If - like in my categories - insertion fees dropped from 50c to 20c, then there would be immediate and significant benefit to any seller who has 60 or more listings above the free ones. 

@In  my previous scenario, 50 books @ $20 each (if it includes postage) would meet that $1000 threshold I referred to, in order to break even - as your maths has illustrated.

@50 books @ $15 per month would not, as dave has illustrated.  

The comparison is more stark if you take insertion fees out of the equation - eg if a media seller only has 500 listings on average, they would need to be turning over around $3000 every month just to break even on the featured store subscription. 

[thecatspjs]

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@brerrabbit585 wrote:

You're right there.  I suspect that they've set it up that way because they assume that if you're a business you must be making plenty of money, just like all the people who knock on business's doors and ask for hand-outs assume that people who run businesses must be making more than wage earners.  Mostly they would just do things the way they do because they know businesses rely on ebay heavily and have no alternative but to put up with it.

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I don't agree that most have no alternative but to put up with it.

Over the years I have seen most of my favorite sellers scale back signficantly and/or move onto other ventures and/or close down and disappear entirely.   Those that have remained seemed to have doubled their listings, but sell far far less than they have previously.

TBH I have not seen many small businesses take off and really experience signficant growth on eBay in the past three to four years, as they once used to.  Save off-shore el-cheapo lsiting spamming operations.

[chameleon54]

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@found-in-australia wrote:

What are the current listing packages and charges for people who do not have stores? Not really sure why that information would not be included when they are asking sellers to review how they are impacted, and consider what is the best option for their business.

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I am one of the "bad" sellers being discouraged because I had the audacity to establish an auction business on the world's largest auction site. I was rung a few years ago by Ebay and told that if I continued to list auctions on Ebay Australia I would be "punished financially", because auctions reflected poor customer service - I guess my star ratings reflect my poor customer service by not moving above 5.0 (50%?).

They relented a little a year or so later and conceded that auctions were relevant for collectables listings, but deemed that the following categorie groups are NOT collectables:

Vintage Cameras

Vintage Clothing Shoes and Accessories.

Vintage Electronics

Vintage Stationary Engines in the Industrial section - I have not worked out how to know in advance whether a stationary engine brochure will not sell at $9.00, or whether collectors will compete and take it over $600 (such as item 371772434803).

Vintage and Antique Jewellery.

Movie memorabilia

Television Memorabilia

Music memorabilia

Vintage musical instruments

All of the Sports Memorabilia categories.

Vintage and Antique Toys and Games

And of course "Books: Antiquarian & Collectable" are deemed not to be a collectable.

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I have made do with the $1.50 charge for listing items deemed not to be collectable, as punishment for having the audacity to establish and run a long term auction business on the world's largest auction site - doubling that charge will make it unviable to test the unknown values and saleability of many items. I am within a couple of days of the 19th anniversary of my first sale on Ebay (it was listed on either the 2nd or 3rd January 1998). I may still be selling on Ebay after 20 years, but the quantity I sell will be much smaller, probably within 2 months of now, as I change the course of my business and dramatically reduce my online selling.

Even though Ebay has upheld their promise to "financially punish" me for using their legitimate paid services, I still have never sold on any other internet site. Being increasingly punished for being a faithful customer for almost two decades reeks of being an abusive relationship, so it is probably a good time to mostly walk away from Ebay.

However I would like to confirm what the current auction listing offers are for not running a store.

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I,m very sorry to read your post. Found in australia is one of the most highly respected and proffesional sellers I have come across on ebay. He regularly offers interesting, rare and desirable items to a large following of loyal repeat buyers. His auctions are priced very affordably and his service and communication is immpecable. His feedback score and number of followers speaks for itself.

For ebay to be losing sellers of this callibre is a real tradgedy. It is sellers such as found in australia who keep ebay interesting and keep buyers coming back regularly to see whats on offer this week. Ebay will be poorer without them.

[gec2002]

Excellent Davevil you have illustrated small time sellers should have a Basic store and I have shown that larger sellers should consider a Featured store.   

Quod erat demonstrandum  Sorry, but yours was only a partial proof.

[gec2002]

Sorry but your maths is a little out.

The breakeven turnover between Basic and Featured stores under the fee structure is $1579.20 it doesn't matter if that is achieved by selling 1580 items @ $1 or 1 item @ $1580.  ( As Shown by Davevil 50@ $15 = $750.00 c.f. 100@$20 = $2000)

[digital*ghost]

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@gec2002 wrote:

Sorry but your maths is a little out.

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No, it's not.

Certainly not for media sellers, as we were discussing (the amount will vary depending on the categories a seller lists in, because insertion fees and FVF will be different).

If no insertion fees are paid under either store subscription, then the fees paid to eBay on $1579.20 worth of sales will be as follows:

@Basic store sub, $24.95, FVF @9.5% $150.02, total $174.97

@Featured store sub, $54.95, FVF @8.55%, $135.02, total $189.97

That is why I said the more listings a store has (my arbitrary number in my scenario was 1000), the less turnover a store needs to break even on eBay fees, because in a basic store they'll be paying $20 per month for the extra 400 listings, but in a featured store all listings will be free. 

[bobbinau]

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@brerrabbit585 wrote:

A lot of us can increase our listing numbers dramatically and increase our sales that way, so an extra $5 a month for the store isn't going to eat into our profit enough to matter.  As a percentage of the extra profit we'll make, it's lower than the current store as a percentage of our current profit.  For example, if a seller with 200 listings increased their listing numbers to the full 600, their profit (excluding shop fee) could potentially triple, but the extra $5 would only be a 25% increase on the current fee - peanuts compared to a potential 300% increase in profit!  

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Doesn't happen though. Doubling listings will not double sales, only effort. It tends to swamp the market and often dilutes the quality of your own items as you pad out your listings with less prime items. Slow selling lemons tend to accumulate unnoticed.

This is the pipedream that keeps ebay sellers hooked and overcapitalizing.

[gec2002]

My apologies you are correct the actual breakeven point if less than 600 listings is in fact, $3157.80 were the fees for both Basic and Featured are $324.94

"That is why I said the more listings a store has (my arbitrary number in my scenario was 1000), the less turnover a store needs to break even on eBay fees, because in a basic store they'll be paying $20 per month for the extra 400 listings, but in a featured store all listings will be free. "

By break even on eBay fees I assume you are referring to the difference between Basic and Feature because the above does not hold true between 600 and 1500 listings

eg If turnover was $1783.99 between 600 and 1500 listings the Featured Fees are $207.48

however
Basic Store 861 Listings @ $2.072  t/o $1783.99  Fees $207.48 (same as Featured)

Basic Store 1000 Listings @ $1.783  t/o $1783.99  Fees $214.43

Basic Store 1400 Listings @ $1.274  t/o $1783.99  Fees $234.43

Oh but you have changed the price.  OK

Basic Store 1400 Listings @ $2.072  t/o $2898  Fees $340.26 (Featured store only $302.73)