You HAVE to try this!! EBAY your way to DISNEY!!

[nelle]

KayeandJim00.
if you ship things via priorty mail you can get free boxes and tape at the USPS website. Otherwise local gift shops are good places to hit. My DH brings boxes and sometimes air pocket things home from work they are for medical supplies so I just turn them inside out. So try your work or ask family members to check for you. I'm not sure on the media mail ? so I will let someone else answer that one.
I know a few of you use stamps.com and I was wondering how you like it. Do you divide up the $18.99 monthly fee into handeling fees? Also do you buy labels or do you use regular paper? Can you get DC and how does that work if you stick the package in your mail box or have your mail person pick it up? Do they scan it when it gets to the PO?
I hate going to our PO it's too small and there is no parking. The people that work there are wonderful but dragging two small kids and an arm load of boxes is not fun .
Does anyone have a cutoff as to when it's cheaper to ship UPS vs USPS?
Thanks for the help and I hope everyone had/has a safe and happy New Year.

 

[issa]

Delurking!!

Hiya wow what a lot of reading here

your success wih ebay is amazing and your posts really inspiring

so much that I want to try too!!!

As a SHAM I would love to be able to contribute some money for disney and extras and ebay sounds like a great way to do it.

We have recently moved to Florida from MA and I threw out or gave away all my "stuff" so i have nothing to sell...sigh

So I have been brainstorming and I have an idea but I am not sure how well it would sell, if there is a market. So I am posting hoping that you'll share some of your wisdom with a lurker.

I hand paint infant/toddler balloon romper (a 1 peice kinda poofy outfit) The romper has a scene or picture painted on the chest area...with possible accent paint on bottom of legs or on back bottom.

I make them in a set that includes a mushroom style hat with a design on band and matching socks with design on them as well.

the rompers and hats are made from
100% cotton jersey with ribbed knit neck, cuffs and leg bands, gripper bottom. Snaps on inside of legs. completly non toxic, and washable.

The designs include things like (but only limited to my imagination) balloons, gireaffs, polar bears, unicorns, and toons such as the rainbow fish, big nutbrown and little nut brown hare from Guess how much I love you books, birds , flowers, trucks and so on..

I can paint classic pooh chars but dont know if I am "allowed" to or would get into trouble selling them.

these outfits are really cute...

I have read your posts about looking on ebay to find similar items and prices...but there are none listed...to make a worth while profit I would need to sell these sets at about 23-25 dollers for the complete set. The baby clothes I see on ebay are generally under $10..most under $5 and a very very rare $15-20 item..and many are sold in lots

SOOO ..being that these would be more expensive then whats generally posted...do you think people would actually bid? I have made them for friends and they have loved them but I have never really sold anything... and I dont know what people would deem "worth it" for a hand painted item.

in fact is hand painted a good or a bad thing..oh .. I just dont know lol


So....if you could offer any advice or insight I would greatly apprciate it. thanks bunches

 

[wdwpluto]

Originally posted by issa
Delurking!!

Hiya wow what a lot of reading here

your success wih ebay is amazing and your posts really inspiring

so much that I want to try too!!!

As a SHAM I would love to be able to contribute some money for disney and extras and ebay sounds like a great way to do it.

We have recently moved to Florida from MA and I threw out or gave away all my "stuff" so i have nothing to sell...sigh

So I have been brainstorming and I have an idea but I am not sure how well it would sell, if there is a market. So I am posting hoping that you'll share some of your wisdom with a lurker.

I hand paint infant/toddler balloon romper (a 1 peice kinda poofy outfit) The romper has a scene or picture painted on the chest area...with possible accent paint on bottom of legs or on back bottom.

I make them in a set that includes a mushroom style hat with a design on band and matching socks with design on them as well.

the rompers and hats are made from
100% cotton jersey with ribbed knit neck, cuffs and leg bands, gripper bottom. Snaps on inside of legs. completly non toxic, and washable.

The designs include things like (but only limited to my imagination) balloons, gireaffs, polar bears, unicorns, and toons such as the rainbow fish, big nutbrown and little nut brown hare from Guess how much I love you books, birds , flowers, trucks and so on..

I can paint classic pooh chars but dont know if I am "allowed" to or would get into trouble selling them.

these outfits are really cute...

I have read your posts about looking on ebay to find similar items and prices...but there are none listed...to make a worth while profit I would need to sell these sets at about 23-25 dollers for the complete set. The baby clothes I see on ebay are generally under $10..most under $5 and a very very rare $15-20 item..and many are sold in lots

SOOO ..being that these would be more expensive then whats generally posted...do you think people would actually bid? I have made them for friends and they have loved them but I have never really sold anything... and I dont know what people would deem "worth it" for a hand painted item.

in fact is hand painted a good or a bad thing..oh .. I just dont know lol


So....if you could offer any advice or insight I would greatly apprciate it. thanks bunches

Try searching the keyword "Boutique" There are several sellers that hand decorate (paint, sew, etc) children's clothing. And my feeling is, the only way to know is to try! Make up 1 or 2 sample outfits and try listing them and see what happens! Good luck.

Lori

 

[strasfamily]

Hi Issa,

I sell hand painted vintage "shabby chic" items on E-bay. Right now it is kind of slow for those items, but my garage sale type items are doing really well. I would suggest 1 or 2 outfits and see how it goes. Make sure you put "HP" in your title as a lot of people use that to search for hand painted items.

Good luck and let us know how it goes.

Tracey in AZ

 

[Mrs. Snowgod]

I've been busy, busy, busy listing stuff! Between the FLD & SD98, I sold a couple of things, but nothing overwhelming. 2 BINs this week, and that's good.

I have been frequenting the Sparedollar forum as mentioned earlier, and one of the members posted about a vase she bought at an estate auction, for $1. She listed it for $9.99 and it didn't sell, then she took a closer look at it and found the signature. Upon further research, found it to be by an artist whose works have sold for between $2,500 and $78,000, usually through Sotheby's. She decided to take a chance listing it at a bold starting price on free listing day (saving herself a few bucks there!).
Check it out! It ends tonight.

Sure does remind me of Jennymouse's crow. Gives us all a dream... or at least a pretty cool eBay fantasy!
_____________________________________

Doris, thanks for the Baconbuttie info... I stopped using it a while ago, but I have a couple of repeat listings that might have remnants of the old script in them. I'll take a look.

I started using Sellathon instead, and still find it helpful. A couple of people here PM'd me for my Sellathon referral link, and I was notified a few days ago that someone actually used it - but it didn't identify who! So, whoever you were, thank you! Hope you find it as beneficial as I do.
______________________________________

Nuke, glad to see you back. Wow, your son grew! He's a good looking boy.

 

[jennymouse]

Originally posted by Mrs. Snowgod
I've been busy, busy, busy listing stuff! Between the FLD & SD98, I sold a couple of things, but nothing overwhelming. 2 BINs this week, and that's good.

I have been frequenting the Sparedollar forum as mentioned earlier, and one of the members posted about a vase she bought at an estate auction, for $1. She listed it for $9.99 and it didn't sell, then she took a closer look at it and found the signature. Upon further research, found it to be by an artist whose works have sold for between $2,500 and $78,000, usually through Sotheby's. She decided to take a chance listing it at a bold starting price on free listing day (saving herself a few bucks there!).
Check it out! It ends tonight.

Sure does remind me of Jennymouse's crow. Gives us all a dream... or at least a pretty cool eBay fantasy!
_____________________________________

Doris, thanks for the Baconbuttie info... I stopped using it a while ago, but I have a couple of repeat listings that might have remnants of the old script in them. I'll take a look.

I started using Sellathon instead, and still find it helpful. A couple of people here PM'd me for my Sellathon referral link, and I was notified a few days ago that someone actually used it - but it didn't identify who! So, whoever you were, thank you! Hope you find it as beneficial as I do.
______________________________________

Nuke, glad to see you back. Wow, your son grew! He's a good looking boy.

That auction is awsome, Joy! Kinda makes even my crow find look shabby!

It was me who began using Sellathon from the link you sent. I used it in my FLD auctions and I don't know what I've done wrong, but it's not showing all my hits...just a few. I also am using SD counter and the SD counter shows tons of hits, but the Sellathon counter is just showing a couple each. Some of my items have bids and Sellathon isn't showing hits or bids or anything. I wonder if it's because I'm using the SD counter as well? Anyway, I haven't had much time to fully investigate it. I've been meaning to email you about it but I don't know what I've done with your email addy.

I've got several things ending tonight from the FLD and have many have sold. I've got more things ending Sunday night too. Now, I find out my DD is having outpatient surgery Monday (tubes tied, thank goodness.LOL) so I'm going to have a time getting stuff mailed off.

issa-If you haven't bought or sold on ebay before you might sell a few things, low cost things, to get your Feedback rating built up before you try your handpainted outfits. Don't start of with the outfits as they might not sell because of no feedback rating and you'd think that people just didn't like the outfits. But, I definately think that you'd be able to sell some of those. Especially if you can personalize them and even gear them towards seasons or holidays. I know there are lots of moms and grandparents out there, myself included, who are suckers for cute things like that for kids and grandkids!

 

[jennymouse]

Originally posted by iNTeNSeBLue98
Happy New Year all!

JennyMouse - We plan to be in WDW for Thanksgiving as well.

Cool! Maybe we can meet up!

 

[kayeandjim00]

Well my auctions have ended and I am SHOCKED to say that for the four items I put up with starting bids for $5.00 I ended up making $42.75!! I have listed more of my cookbook collection and 5 had bids within 10 minutes. Who knew it could be this easy??!! So if you are trying to decide if you want to give this a try let me say if I can figure it out anyone can and it's without a doubt worth the effort! I would have never gotten $42.75 for this at a rummage sale!

 

[iNTeNSeBLue98]

I did manage to sell off a handful of things in the past week, nothing stellar dollar-wise. I sold a couple of sweaters (I would never sell a sweater for $5 at a yard sale and sold two with BIN this week), two pairs of books, a set of rubber stamps and a CD-ROM drive that we used in our old computer.

No bites on the personalized bracelets, yet. I looked at other listings today and there's not much going on with them. I probably missed the holiday traffic by not thinking of them sooner. I relisted one of each size again tonight and revised my description to see if it gains any buyers.

I pick up my grandad's Rolex from the jeweler tomorrow. Based on what it requires to be refurbished, I may be listing it. (I found a Rolex forum and so far other posters believe it to be authentic and worth a few hundred bucks).
Then there's the Singer 221 I still haven't made a decision about listing. As much as I'd like to repair the cord and actually use it, I don't know that it's worthwhile to me. I haven't sewed since Junior High.

 

[jgates]

AGH!~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Holy Cow! Why can't I find something like that at a garage sale!!! Actually I think it is a beautiful vase & I would have purchased it for the $9.99 had I seen it - course i never would have known it had a higher value!

I did have my full set of Time Life books end at around $96. That's good I guess. (Course when you figure what I originally paid for them........) But better than collecting dust! My partial set did not sell, but 6 out of 17 postcards have a bid and the antique eye glasses did. So that FLD was beneficial to me! I plan to spend time when DH is at job training photographing the postcards and saving auctions for the next free listing day. I don't care if it is 7 months away......I will be ready!!!! I'll take the cards to Florida with me and mail from there if I have to!!!

 

[ekmdisney]

Well, so far so good. I am up to about $90.00. With a few more things to end tonight. And that big lot (that will help me by my AP)I might be selling off ebay, if I can get the person to agree to the price.

But now I have a problem. On New Years eve, my computer decided to be a pain in the bee-hind. So I had to erase everything on it and rebuild the system.

But now I can't get on paypal.com or my e-mail account for this message board Go.com. And I need to get on paypal, because someone over paid me for an item. So I need to refund the difference.

Is anyone else having this problem, with paypal? Or is it just me?

I have never had this problem before, so I have no idea what to do. If anyone can help, or if you have an ideas of a place that I can get the right info to help me with the problem. Please let me know.

Thanks!
Elissa

 

[Mrs. Snowgod]

now I can't get on paypal.com

That's got to be really frustrating. Apparently your browser is working? I assume that since you are able to post here. I can't offer much assistance other than the info below, from within the PayPal site:

Customer Service Center

PayPal Customer Service Agents are available to help you 24 hours a day Monday to Friday, and from 4:00 AM PST to 10:00 PM PST on Saturday/Sunday.

Call us toll-free at: 1-888-221-1161

We may only discuss an account with the account-holder. Please have the following information available when you call:
Your telephone number
Your email address
The last 4 digits of your credit card or bank account registered with PayPal
For security reasons, we must verify the above details before discussing any account-specific information.

I hope that helps you at least a little!

Joy

 

[Mrs. Snowgod]

Hey, Jenifer, thanks! I felt bad not knowing who to say that to!

You know, I have noticed some inconsistency between hit counts in Sellathon and on Sparedollar, and I believe they are programmed with some different criteria available. For example, I have my Sparedollar counters set up to ignore my home IP address, so if I go in and look at my listings, my hits don't register there. On Sellathon, they do register, but I see in the detail that it was "only me". I haven't really found it troublesome, as my focus on the Sellathon data is for keyword use.

I like to look at the detail of what people are searching on, and then edit my titles based on the early stats. I'm also inclined to list in two categories, and Sellathon is giving me data back to ascertain whether or not that is beneficial.... if I find that 90% of my hits are from keyword searches and the hits from people browsing are in one category over another, then I can safely eliminate that second category.

I've definitely come to stop using connecting words and MIP, NIP, NWT, etc. People just don't search on those terms, so it is a waste of space to use them (for my items, at least).

Oh, and BTW, Jenifer, if I don't find your email address in the next 24 hours, you'll probably have mine soon anyway as I hope to win one of your auctions!

 

[purplebelle]

Hi. I just set up an account on eBay, thanks to the encouragement on this board, and I'm about 2 or 3 days into my auctions being posted. I started off with a few items and am selling them for pretty cheap (too cheap maybe?). Does most of the bidding happen when there's only a day left? Some of my items have one or 2 bids and others have none. I've bid before, but I never really pay attn to how much time is left--which is probably why I don't win cuz there's 5 days left. Is it better to post them for only 3 days or less? I'm trying to pick up quickly on the tricks-of-the-trade for eBay. Thank you.

 

[jennymouse]

Originally posted by purplebelle
Hi. I just set up an account on eBay, thanks to the encouragement on this board, and I'm about 2 or 3 days into my auctions being posted. I started off with a few items and am selling them for pretty cheap (too cheap maybe?). Does most of the bidding happen when there's only a day left? Some of my items have one or 2 bids and others have none. I've bid before, but I never really pay attn to how much time is left--which is probably why I don't win cuz there's 5 days left. Is it better to post them for only 3 days or less? I'm trying to pick up quickly on the tricks-of-the-trade for eBay. Thank you.

IMO When you're first starting out, you can never have your items too cheap. With no Feedback record, folks are a little leary in buying so to encourage bids you have to sell cheap. Then, when you develope some feedback you can start selling higher priced items. And yes, lots of bidders wait until the very last minute or even seconds to bid, so you might sell your other items yet. Now, on your winning bids, give good communication, ship fast and make those customers happy so they'll give you positive feedback and you're on your way! Good luck, we're wishing you lots of green!

 

[jennymouse]

Originally posted by Mrs. Snowgod
Hey, Jenifer, thanks! I felt bad not knowing who to say that to!

You know, I have noticed some inconsistency between hit counts in Sellathon and on Sparedollar, and I believe they are programmed with some different criteria available. For example, I have my Sparedollar counters set up to ignore my home IP address, so if I go in and look at my listings, my hits don't register there. On Sellathon, they do register, but I see in the detail that it was "only me". I haven't really found it troublesome, as my focus on the Sellathon data is for keyword use.

I like to look at the detail of what people are searching on, and then edit my titles based on the early stats. I'm also inclined to list in two categories, and Sellathon is giving me data back to ascertain whether or not that is beneficial.... if I find that 90% of my hits are from keyword searches and the hits from people browsing are in one category over another, then I can safely eliminate that second category.

I've definitely come to stop using connecting words and MIP, NIP, NWT, etc. People just don't search on those terms, so it is a waste of space to use them (for my items, at least).

Oh, and BTW, Jenifer, if I don't find your email address in the next 24 hours, you'll probably have mine soon anyway as I hope to win one of your auctions!

I'm definately doing something wrong as it's just not showing hits. I'll figure it out!

I'd say you'll end up with the auction as those don't usually go very high. Good luck!

 

[maggiew]

Well I am back in action! I broke my digital camera over Christmas (Nikkon Coolpix). I dropped it in the parking lot after we went to see Santa at the mall. But I brought it back to Best Buy where I purchased it (with the receipt) last March AND THEY GAVE ME A NEW ONE!!!

My bedroom is filled with items I removed from my girls rooms to make more room for the new Christmas gifts!

I will begin listing again tomorrow!

Maggie

 

[C.Ann]

Well I'm back too! Loving my new digital camera - now that I figured out how to use it well enough to at least get things listed on eBay..

My sales were pretty good this week - many things sold for the opening bid, but that's fine with me because I basically use a price that I would be happy in receiving.. Some things went a little higher - and that's always good too! I have to admit that I'm surprised at the number of people who are bidding and buying - but I'm sure as heck not going to complain about it!

The bad news is that I just came back from the store and my windshield wiper motor finally coughed its last cough.. Called my son-in-law - he called around for a replacement - and it's going to cost $66 for the motor.. Ugh! However, the good news is that he can do the job himself, so at least I don't have to pay for labor..

Hmmmmmm...what might I have lying around here that I could get $66 for ???

I was going to take the money I made this week - combined with a little I had leftover in my Paypal account - and buy one adult Park Hopper Pass but I guess it's going to have to wait - again.. It was a toss up between buying a pass or putting money down on a hotel for our trip but seeings how the passes are going to cost more than the hotel, I wanted to get that out of the way first.. It's such a large chunk of the expenses..

I think I'm going to list again today - as well as listing tomorrow.. People really seem to be spending, so I want my stuff to be "out there"....

Here's wishing everyone LOTS of green for the coming year!!

 

[ekmdisney]

Originally posted by Mrs. Snowgod
That's got to be really frustrating. Apparently your browser is working? I assume that since you are able to post here. I can't offer much assistance other than the info below, from within the PayPal site:


I hope that helps you at least a little!

Joy

Thanks Joy,

I couldn't even get the help page up to get the number.

It looks like all the sites that have that little lock in the lower left hand side of the computer. I can't get on. But I'm still working on it. Wish me luck!

 

[Jon99]

Just curious, you people that are listing 100's of items, is this all stuff you had in your house or are you hitting garage sales, auctions etc and hoping to resale at a profit???