[Method] Local Drop Shipping

Asayus

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Decided to drop a method for my 200th post. Well, more of a theory really because I do not do this, but there is no reason that this would not work. This does require some investment, but it is super simple.

Word of warning: You may end up in a situation where you end up with dead stock if you cannot find buyers, or receive defective inventory. All I can say is choose your products and sellers wisely, and assume that every investment opportunity comes with a risk.

I also want to apologize in advance as this method will most likely not work outside of North America and similarly established countries as people in these countries can afford to pay for convenience and useless products.

The Method
1)
Purchase products that people would not necessarily go shopping for, but may pick up anyway if they were cheap enough, ie. wireless charging pads, from Aliexpress and the like. Aim to spend between $1-$10 per item.

2) Set up a craigslist ad, and post in local Facebook groups saying something along the lines of:
"I ordered a couple of these wireless chargers to set up at home and in the office, but did not realize that they were running a promotion on these so I ended up with 4 in total. Now as much as I would love to have a wireless charger in every room of the house, I would much rather have some extra cash. How does $20 each sound for the extras?"

The backstory is believable and makes it sound like you do not care too much about what you get for them.
The $20 price tag is good because people will bargain down to $15 and you are still making at least a $5 profit on each sale, and $20 is one of those nice round amounts that people feel comfortable spending. Of course, this only applies if similar products are being sold for more in the stores in your area. Such as if the cheapest wireless charger in a local mall was $30, suddenly $20 looks like a good deal, and $15 is a steal, especially since the buyer feels in control of talking the price down.
The reason you want to say that you have more than one for sale is because some people may want more than 1 for whatever reason (Maybe they want a wireless charger for each of their cars? Maybe one for the office and one for home? You get the point.) and what kind of salesman would you be if you left money on the table?

3) Profit!

Now I know what you are thinking:

Is that all?
Yes. Yes it is. Making money is that simple.

Why not just drop ship?
Why not both? Honestly though, by doing this, you are getting customers who would not easily trust an online business, and you get paid in cash right then and there.

What is up with all this talking the price down stuff?
Psychology! The more power and control the buyer feels, the smoother the transaction.

Give me a twist to make more money?
If you can without incurring extra costs, say you will deliver for an extra $2. $2 is such a small amount to pay for convenience that people will take you up on it, and it adds up quick. Especially if you are dealing with $10 items and that $2 is an additional 20% profit. I would suggest that if your city has a subway line just say that you will deliver to anywhere along the subway line, otherwise meet at the local mall.

Anyways, if you have any more questions please post them below! Happy earnings!
 
Won't you have to meet up with them to process the transaction? Wouldn't that cut into profit per transaction and make it not worthwhile in terms of time for like $1-2? Or give them your address but that doesn't feel safe.
 
Won't you have to meet up with them to process the transaction? Wouldn't that cut into profit per transaction and make it not worthwhile in terms of time for like $1-2? Or give them your address but that doesn't feel safe.
With craigslist it is normal practice to meet people in a public area. You can always give them the address to a local park that is a few minutes away from your house if you want to save time, but you get less sales that way because not everyone can or wants to go out of their way to pick something up.
 
I am actually doing this, buying from Aliexpress and Alibaba, and selling via FB marketplace and groups. Evergreen things to sell are iPhone charger cables (they brake all the time). And also teeth whitening products are hot right now.
 
I am actually doing this, buying from Aliexpress and Alibaba, and selling via FB marketplace and groups. Evergreen things to sell are iPhone charger cables (they brake all the time). And also teeth whitening products are hot right now.

and do you meet your buyer then or do you ship it to them?
 
I've been trying to find a larger ROI niche item that sells decently.
 
and do you meet your buyer then or do you ship it to them?
Usually, I ship it to them via local shipping options( costs an additional $2-3 for the buyer). Sometimes I meet with them if they live close to me.
 
Usually, I ship it to them via local shipping options( costs an additional $2-3 for the buyer). Sometimes I meet with them if they live close to me.
How do u take payment? Paypal or venmo?
 
How old are you? @Asayus
That is a very personal and irrelevant question. Buy low, sell high. Children as young as 12 do this in school by buying candy bar packs from department stores and selling them to their classmates for $1 each, and retirees in their 60s built their empires on this system. What are you getting at by asking me my age?
 
That is a very personal and irrelevant question. Buy low, sell high. Children as young as 12 do this in school by buying candy bar packs from department stores and selling them to their classmates for $1 each, and retirees in their 60s built their empires on this system. What are you getting at by asking me my age?
I found it very interesting kids method :)
Thats why i asked, very creative.. good post
 
I tried this but does not work that well. They reply with the standard tag "Is this available", when I reply that I ship US wide for free and payment is by paypal, no further reply from them.
Also if you sell something on marketplace they can see your personal fb account, so in this case, they see I am not from USA and ship US wide for free, so they think this is a scam. So I would need to make a fake fb account from US I suppose.
 
I tried this but does not work that well. They reply with the standard tag "Is this available", when I reply that I ship US wide for free and payment is by paypal, no further reply from them.
Also if you sell something on marketplace they can see your personal fb account, so in this case, they see I am not from USA and ship US wide for free, so they think this is a scam. So I would need to make a fake fb account from US I suppose.
I believe you have missed the point. The reason this works is because you are selling to locals. Very few people are on craigslist to order items that will ship. With this method you want to buy inventory and sell it to people in your city.
 
I believe you have missed the point. The reason this works is because you are selling to locals. Very few people are on craigslist to order items that will ship. With this method you want to buy inventory and sell it to people in your city.

I was referring to Slim K's method where he says he ships to them and collects payment via paypal. If I have to meet everyone in person this is very time consuming and also only works for people living in bigger cities. also you buy and pay in advance for inventory and do not know if you can even sell it (all).
 
I was referring to Slim K's method where he says he ships to them and collects payment via paypal. If I have to meet everyone in person this is very time consuming and also only works for people living in bigger cities. also you buy and pay in advance for inventory and do not know if you can even sell it (all).
Ah, without a quote it seemed that you were replying to the thread in general.

To save time you can bundle a bunch of sales if you ask people to meet you at a local mall on a weekend and just go from one end to the other to meet different people and make a bunch of sales in one location.

As for the inventory issue. This is true, you may end up with dead stock. That is simply the cost of doing business and the reason why you have to choose a decent product. Pretty much every physical product business out there has this issue, but they still make money. The only businesses that could potentially avoid this are made to order businesses, which are generally more expensive to run because you are still paying for the parts, location, and staff even when you have no orders to build.

This method is basically putting together IM selling with regular warehousing or whatever you want to call importing cheap goods and selling them at local prices.
 
Ah, without a quote it seemed that you were replying to the thread in general.

To save time you can bundle a bunch of sales if you ask people to meet you at a local mall on a weekend and just go from one end to the other to meet different people and make a bunch of sales in one location.

As for the inventory issue. This is true, you may end up with dead stock. That is simply the cost of doing business and the reason why you have to choose a decent product. Pretty much every physical product business out there has this issue, but they still make money. The only businesses that could potentially avoid this are made to order businesses, which are generally more expensive to run because you are still paying for the parts, location, and staff even when you have no orders to build.

This method is basically putting together IM selling with regular warehousing or whatever you want to call importing cheap goods and selling them at local prices.

Yes this would be a quite good idea, however, this only works in bigger cities. Where I live there is very small population, the next bigger cities would be 50 or even 100 km away, so only to make back cost for gas I would need to make quite some sales.

It would be way more easier to just collect payment via paypal and then ship the items out, or even better have them dropshipped. There are plenty of US warehouses on aliexpress, so it could be shipped US wide for free. Also it is convenient for the buyer because he does not have to go out and search for an unknown person at a mall or somewhere. So basically just dropshipping but not with fb ads or instagram shoutouts, but ads on marketplace.
Also I see quite some people doing this (asking for paypal and saying item will be shipped), not sure if they get any sales. The problem with the original method is also, if you are selling e.g. a charging cable and meet at the mall, maybe the buyer sees the charging cable for almost same price in the mall and decides to buy it there.
 
Workable method to get some profit, but cannot be scaled up easily as many manner work. Thanks OP's sharing.
 
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