SORRY BUT I HAVE TO CLOSE MY STORE 14 SEPT I CANT AFFORD IT

[beanishells]

I am closing down.... I wont get free listings on this ID but I can use my hubbys and my other ones. I will go to the other site...just made $30 on there and sent two 3 kg bags of books off. Its slower yes but its a good place to park my listings while I use the free ones.

I was going to close down at the end of the year anyway...my health is not good and I cant keep on. This way, it will slow down for me and I can relax a bit.

I dont buy my items wholesale...I am not a business...so I actually  make very little. Its always been a hobby for me, a way to pass the time because I cant ever go out to work again and I was bored with just reading, watching telly etc.

Now I havent the energy. I think the fee hike is an insult...sorry ebay but thats what I think..>You have raised the store fee twice since I opened my store but THIS TIME its a huge increase and we are going to all feel it.

Why are you not loyal to the hobby sellers too? I know I have made you and paypal a lot of money over the years off every single thing I have sold here.

I am sorry but I am going to the other site. I cannot take all this holding out your hand for my precious dollars anymore.

I have nothing against ebay, I just have something against all the fees... on the other site its FREE to list and you only pay 2 % FVF.

Ebay has millions of people paying fees and I dont beleive for one second that ebay cant afford to give us a break . Why get us all to open a store and then say, sorry, we want business people, not  YOU to own a store.

If you look at my feedback I have had barely a complaint, its all been good so its not like I and others like me are not delivering good service.

Sorry about the long ramble...I have just had it so in two weeks, I am closing. All my titles of all my items are going to say that too.

So goodbye to the good customers who have ebayed with me, it was fun while it lasted. Since I was made a powerseller, without even asking if I wanted to be one, i cant have the free listings...so.... I will not be using this one again it seems and its a shame when I have built up my feedback as i have. Another thing I am very sad about.

Some of you can afford to keep going, but I cant.

Beani

[ringinthedingding]

to digital .. back in 2006 many of us gave "the other site" a big push and got right behind it, they built the business into a viable operation and then it was sold twice in rapid succession .. there were numerous fee changes which destroyed most of their serious buyer and seller user base .. see sellers are buyers too as often wanted to restock inventory to resell .. eg buying in bulk or buying low and reselling individually it was the safety net that stoped the ass dropping out of the market as it now is in many categories as most all resellers I know of are backing out and not restocking inventory .. so why would we want to go back there and give them another push when they have already shown their hand as being ruthless and carping on the exact same people who helped grow their business so they can sell it again and again all rthe while adjusting fees and policies that decimate the efforts of people who are attempting to align their business with that auction site etc etc? .. it disgusts me the way us Aussies are being treated and constantly bait and switched every step of the way .. to the point it really is time to give up .. 12 years of this nonsense has taken its toll on many of us and many of us have watched many great Aussie online auction sites vanish and in the case of the "other site" they actually chased the majority of their user base away and made it unpalatable to list there .. each time ebay miraculously comes out as the victor even though their service is growing worse by the day ..

[digital*ghost]

to digital .. back in 2006 many of us gave "the other site" a big push and got right behind it, they built the business into a viable operation and then it was sold twice in rapid succession .. there were numerous fee changes which destroyed most of their serious buyer and seller user base .. see sellers are buyers too as often wanted to restock inventory to resell .. eg buying in bulk or buying low and reselling individually it was the safety net that stoped the ass dropping out of the market as it now is in many categories as most all resellers I know of are backing out and not restocking inventory .. so why would we want to go back there and give them another push when they have already shown their hand as being ruthless and carping on the exact same people who helped grow their business so they can sell it again and again all rthe while adjusting fees and policies that decimate the efforts of people who are attempting to align their business with that auction site etc etc? .. it disgusts me the way us Aussies are being treated and constantly bait and switched every step of the way .. to the point it really is time to give up .. 12 years of this nonsense has taken its toll on many of us and many of us have watched many great Aussie online auction sites vanish and in the case of the "other site" they actually chased the majority of their user base away and made it unpalatable to list there .. each time ebay miraculously comes out as the victor even though their service is growing worse by the day ..

It's unfortunate that there isn't more viable options for a small, independent seller that has as much consumer awareness as eBay, but when I think of eBay's competition, it isn't any of those sites, it's more the large, independent websites that focus on one area of retail (eg fashion, or electronics), advertise on TV, have things like "free express postage" and 30 day no questions asked money back guarantees... etc. Those are the kind of sites eBay are trying to make their sellers compete with.

Fashion is currently the top-selling category on eBay (or at leats it was the last two years), which is probably one of the reasons eBay created and continue to promote the flailing Fashion Gallery - its relative failure has perhaps helped prompt their new policies. The gallery has some big names, but anyone looking at the FB can tell there's been less than fantastic service by a number of the participating stores.

The problem (as I see it) is, these new policies and fee increases won't make high volume but sub-standard sellers lift their game, it won't stop buyers from purchasing and being disappointed, it'll just make it harder for smaller sellers to stay in the game. If buyers truly do have an expectation and preference for certain things like free express shipping and 30 day returns, it wouldn't be hard to simply make them filter options in the search results instead of quashing listings that don't offer those things and giving priority to something that neither euqals nor guarantees good customer service.

[izabsmiling]

I agree with a lot of what Frieghtcar said.

As a 'buyer' only now ...i am not buying much and I am really careful about what I do buy.If I can get it cheaper elsewhere I will.If not I will look at online sites and carefully consider my options .I need to have confidence in where I buy from and that becomes even  more important when money is tight.As a buyer ebay does give me confidence.

As far as books go,unless a book is rare and/or out of print and I really want it for my collection and/or to read AND have the money to spare at the moment I  buy at second hand shops (a couple of dollars,no postage) ,OS (no postage) or from the $5 for all new books stores or use the library.When we have more money I may buy more of those extra non-essential things.SH B&M bookstores in our area are having trouble at the moment .I don't think it's a problem restricted to booksellers here.IMO and that of a store owner I spoke to recently it's competition and affordabilty.

So I agree with what PJ said too.It may be a good thing if sales drop to introduce more variety of stock maybe add some things that are more essential ?

[izabsmiling]

DG, I think people always need clothes.Maybe that's why fashion does well ?

[izabsmiling]

I meant to add the other end of the scale would be  special things which I want to buy as gifts for other people .These would need to be fairly worth the item price plus the postage.

Just a buyers view.

Good luck Beanie and everyone 🙂

[izabsmiling]

put simply...I need as a buyer need to get smart.

If a seller buys retail,makes a little on the purchase price...however can't afford to do what they do.

It would stand to reason (especially if times are tight and more and more options are available..which necessitates smarter buying) that a buyer may not be able to afford or want to afford to pay that  retail price PLUS mark up PLUS postage fees which may equate (in $'s) to a fair whack of the sellers monthy fees just on their one purchase.If the seller can't afford that...it may be more than reasonable that a buyer may not be able to afford to buy into that either.The product and costs needs to be worth it from both sides.

[digital*ghost]

DG, I think people always need clothes.Maybe that's why fashion does well ?

I definitely think that's part of it, although I don't tend to find staple items (eg jeans, t-shirts, general casual wear) do all that well, and contrary to eBay's stats, the secondhand stock outsells the brand new stuff, at least for me - weird, interesting, unusual etc trumps BNWT almost all the time.

Curiously, clothing used to make up about 90% of my sales, that's dropped off by a fair amount and jewellery - a non-essential in a very saturated category - is now about 50% of sales. Admittedly, I have increased my range by a large amount and I cater to a fairly niche market, but it's definitely not cheap (when compared to the majority of other fashion jewellery prices, eg the <$5 stuff from China).

[beanishells]

Sorry have not replied up til today...

I am closing. I am determined. I have another ID and I will have my 30 free listings on that and I have 2 more I can use plus OH has one too. We will do fine this way.

I am also going to another site, where its free to list too.

Ebay informed me that it will take a year for THIS id to lose its powerseller status and get its own 30 free listings. I think that is so unfair. I never asked to be powerseller. I had a really good six months once and bam! I was made one. Big surprise to me!

Anyhow, I have had fun buying up a storm to get my new feedback up and running. I was going to buy some of these things locally but its cheaper to get it from china ,with free shipping. What has the world come to?

So on the 14th the store will be gone. I have had great sales in the last two weeks. I did what I said. Almost every titles bears that info that I am closing and there is a sale on and now I have customers scrambling to get some of the last minute bargains.

Ebay really forced my hand. I have no other viable choice. I have to count each cent now. MY medications alone are crippling us with my OH not working atm. I need to resolve the situation in a way that means less money going OUT and more coming IN< if thats possible.

Anyhow, thanks for the comments. I appreciate them all even if you dont agree with my decision.

🙂

[beanishells]

Don’t shut your shop.  Go back to basics and look at how to consolidate. Look at your competition and how they are doing and what improvements you can take from them to incorporate into your own business.  What can you do to attract more buyers? And so on.

Now if you are stopping because of bad health is one thing, but quitting because you are not running your business properly is not a smart choice.

YOu ha ve missed the point entirely.

I DO NOT RUN A BUSINESS. I sell as a hobby. I NEVER buy wholesale things to resell.

If I were a business I would stay.

I may or may not open again for two weeks prior to xmas if I still have some stock...but I wont stay on... thats it for me.

[the3coopers]

If you need money coming in, then it seems very silly to firstly be "buying heaps of stuff" to get feedback so you can set up new IDs and use free listings.

The Stores increase is $6.25 per week. That means just one extra sale per week.

Or spending 1/2 an hour doing something productive rather than faffing around with multiple IDs, working out ways to save a dollar (but taking an hour to do so).

And by closing down, you will lose you ALL your business, not just $6.25.

A lot of these kneejerk reactions seem to be falling into the category of "cutting off your nose to spite your face".