Is Ebay Dead?

Hey Gang, I'm writing this post because I am a tad desperate and need some advice. I just got a call from my father, who was a successful Southern California Contractor for twenty years up until about two years ago when the economy blew up.

The Economy has absolutely devastated hard working Americans like my old man and I swear its getting closer to depression level status for them down there then ever.

I just floated my parents 200 bucks so they can buy some groceries. The house is already in foreclosure, The Fed puts out bullshit statistics about poverty being at 16% while the unemployment is at 9%. It's all bullshit and unfortunately its far worse then what the news says.

Anyway, back to the phone call from my father. He has a business license and wants to get into selling stuff on the web, as well as selling stuff at trade shows and conventions and stuff, wherever he can turn a buck.

The poor guy is desperate to earn an income and survive. You don't get unemployment for being self employed. General Contracting is dead. Even lumber yards have closed in his area. You couldn't build a house if you wanted too.

He hasn't the technical chops to start his own store front on the web nor is selling T-shirts going to cut it (his idea). I wish I could stop what I was doing and devote my full attention to getting his web empire off the ground but I just can't right now.

This got me thinking about Ebay. Is Ebay a good approach for my parents? Can two people, working full time, achieve enough income on Ebay to survive?

I plan on fronting them the money to buy products at whole sale prices until they can turn some money and get themselves off the ground. I'm not sure what they would sell, perhaps an expert can chime in? I cannot mislead them on this.

I don't want to throw a crackpot/pipedream idea in their faces and blame them when it blows up. I'll do everything in my power to help them get off the ground but I need to know if Ebay and dropshipping/whole selling is still a good idea?

Thanks for your Time,
Gene

Don't have a clue about eBay,but I'll bump your thread so some more people will see it.

Cheers!

Thanks, SpellZ. Your a great person...

genebadd said:

Thanks, SpellZ. Your a great person...

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Do you guys have any disposable income? Like to "create" something...


Check out quirky.com, pulse.me & bizchair.com, all made small investments, all under 30, all making million, all lived in poverty at some point. My point is... at desperate times, your brains starts working differently, and you come up with great ideas. eBay is not the only way to go... Just something to think about I guess?

SpellZ said:

Do you guys have any disposable income? Like to "create" something...


Check out quirky.com, pulse.me & bizchair.com, all made small investments, all under 30, all making million, all lived in poverty at some point. My point is... at desperate times, your brains starts working differently, and you come up with great ideas. eBay is not the only way to go... Just something to think about I guess?

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These are the idea's Im looking for... thanks again..

I know this may be a bit much but my brother was in the same position your dad is in. Brother lives in a market that all but dried up and I had him search out and really bargain down on some old cabinets and re-purpose as a bathroom vanity. Sell them on Ebay, Craigslist, your own free website and local newspaper. This stuff sells for big dollar and if your dad is a GC he probably has some carpentry skills.

Just a thought

Edit:

p.s. ... just to see if your market will bring any cash ... go to google like I did and grab some images and float some ads out there ... if you have some calls or emails then you know you "might" have something. Salvation Army, Goodwill, garage or estate sales may be the place to look for cabinets and watch a little HGTV and figure out what sink and fixtures are selling now.

jonnyquest said:

I know this may be a bit much but my brother was in the same position your dad is in. Brother lives in a market that all but dried up and I had him search out and really bargain down on some old cabinets and re-purpose as a bathroom vanity. Sell them on Ebay, Craigslist, your own free website and local newspaper. This stuff sells for big dollar and if your dad is a GC he probably has some carpentry skills.

Just a thought

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Brilliant Idea johnny...

Hello Gene, things can get tough now , and I have hit rock bottom also. Ebay is ok, but you have to have in Mind, that Ebay, will do whatever they want to your account. Selling New Items, you will have to go through the process with Paypal, with invoice checks and etc. Also make sure you do not sell any kind of Replicas, or else sooner or later your account will get frozen and they will hold the funds for 180 days.

I would stick with Used Items(collectibles,antiques from flea markets and garage sales) and China Only Made Products, Cheap Items that you can find at a low price and sell. NON-BRANDED ITEMS

Just be a little careful about Ebay, my account was frozen, because they said I have high Reversal Rates(refunds), which is a bunch of BS. 16 in the past 6 months...Like I said, they will do whatever they want, these little things raise red flags too them and it only takes a click for your account to be terminated.

What i would do , if i was you, is sell on Ebay for about 6-8Months, make some profit and then create your own webstore. This is what I am doing now also. You will have less headaches.

If you need Sourcing or Products from China. PM ME...I have a sourcing company in China.

techgr said:

Hello Gene, things can get tough now , and I have hit rock bottom also. Ebay is ok, but you have to have in Mind, that Ebay, will do whatever they want to your account. Selling New Items, you will have to go through the process with Paypal, with invoice checks and etc. Also make sure you do not sell any kind of Replicas, or else sooner or later your account will get frozen and they will hold the funds for 180 days.

I would stick with Used Items(collectibles,antiques from flea markets and garage sales) and China Only Made Products, Cheap Items that you can find at a low price and sell. NON-BRANDED ITEMS

Just be a little careful about Ebay, my account was frozen, because they said I have high Reversal Rates(refunds), which is a bunch of BS. 16 in the past 6 months...Like I said, they will do whatever they want, these little things raise red flags too them and it only takes a click for your account to be terminated.

What i would do , if i was you, is sell on Ebay for about 6-8Months, make some profit and then create your own webstore. This is what I am doing now also. You will have less headaches.

If you need Sourcing or Products from China. PM ME...I have a sourcing company in China.

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Thank you techgr, for the great advice. I am sending you a PM right after I submit this post. Thanks a bunch..

Gene

If your looking for an online presence then I would build an ecommerce store and use eBay to pull in traffic using a personal account. I certainly wouldn't use ebays eshop setup as it's a total rip!

Best of luck with what ever happens

Ya, I think I'll get them started on ebay until we find a product that converts well. Once a product has been established, then I'll have them jump ship and establish a real website. Seems to be the best idea... Perhaps We can nail down a product that can be sold on both ebay and craigslist... Fingers crossed..

Great ideas guys, keep them coming and help the man out!

Just PMed him with the product I'm selling at the mall.
I'm sure he can make a buck on it thru eBay.

I used to do ebay full time around 2002-2003 and was gfood then .....i did auctions and resold items on ebay. Just to not burst your bubble BUT it takes money to buy things to sell and then dont forget ebay's fees. If your parents are strapped for cash they may not be able to buy shit to resell......

What you could do to help them is build sites or do your OWN IM for your paretns.....Build a few adsense sites and put all the info in your dads name so each month HE gets the checks sent for your work. Just thinking if your good at IM then thay can help.....

Go to your local library and check out the business section. You'll undoubtedly find several books there about how to set up and market an eBay business. While you can find this information online, the books tend to have better quality advice, less scammy, and don't try to sell you shit you don't need. It's a good way to explain things to someone who is a newbie to eBay selling.

buy notebooks with little damage, sometimes they're dirt cheap, sometimes people just want to get rid of the thing and they don't know the price they should ask, fix them/buy working parts and sell the machines in parts/in whole for 2x the prize you paid, you can put them back on ebay/CL or sell them local

yes, it's require some skills/knowledge about notebooks, so maybe it's not for your father (you mentioned he's not too tech savvy)

but that's what a bunch of my friends do and they do pretty well

if you're buying at the right price, basically you can't loose money with this, if you can't repair the item/can't find working parts for it, you still can sell it in parts

eBay is still very profitable.

I started off on ebay just a couple years ago and built a six figure business outta it, all by importing products from China and rebranding them.

This is actually the subject i am most passionate about when it comes to making money online because it's how i got my start and i think it could do well for others to.

It can work with patience and proper market research.

People usually start off all wrong by selling products that they think will sell, and not knowing if it actually will.. they go off pure guess work.

If you find out what is selling first and know 100% what you can make per sale and know your conversions and see whats working for other sellers, then you will have a better chance of success.

I studied what was working for the top sellers in my market, kept a spread sheet of there daily sales for a few months and after entered the market with 100% certainty that i could sell the stock and make a profit, there was no doubt i would not succeed because i identified a profitable market beforehand and what was working for others.

Ebay is a good platform to get you going off to a quick start, but an ecommerce site should be the long term goal.

Ebay will f**k you over at the slightest complaint from others (normally your competition) + they are getting greedy with their pricing.

My dad was in the same position a few years ago and started selling on eBay. I got him an ecommerce site going in the background and he has never looked back. Relying on one source like eBay is risky, so get ebay and a website going if possible

Best of luck to your dad!

Hey Gene, no problem..Will help you more. Ebay can be tricky, they really do not care if you become a Gold, Titanium Power Seller, they will drop you at any moment if you have high reversal rates, if you are doing high volume.

Ill contact you, so we can talk more, Ill help you out in anway.

As the person said above, DO NOT EVEN bother trying opening a ProStore Account(Ecommerce), there fees are disgustly high. Start off with Ebay, then move onto a Professonal Ecommerce Store with your own Merchant Account.

For now use Paypal, build a little bank roll and then move onto your CC Processing.

With Ebay/Paypal your money/goals is in there hands, but with your own website its all your Power..........

Ill PM you tomorrow...

You Guys are all Terrific People!! Thanks so much for your invaluable input. SpellZ and I wrote back and fourth a few times and he gave me some good idea's about a stylish kitchen product he sells at his local mall in Toronto.

Techgr, I'm going to send you a PM if you don't mind and perhaps a couple of you Ebay guru's.

I have some IM money saved up, not much 3K. I think it's enough though to get them started.

My thought is that by using SpellZ's idea (he was nice enough to give me some contact information regarding the product he sells and out of respect for SpellZ, I'll leave it at that) I'll go ahead and purchase my parents $1000.00 or so worth of product, and have them give it a shot on ebay.

Although, I am interested in what Typlo had to say about re-branding Chinese merchandise and market research. I would hate for the product to belly flop on Ebay.

Typlo, I hope you don't mind but I would like to shoot you a PM about your ebay philosophy (primarily good research methods)

Side question: This may be a bit philosophical, but does a tangible product that sells well out town, say the mall for example, translate to selling well on ebay? Perhaps a Brick and Mortar business owner who also sells on ebay might be able to chime in?

You guys are great. I have a plan!!! I think this will give them a chance to learn the ropes and attempt to sell a product and keep the power on.

I think ebay will be a good testing ground for them and if they do a good job there, then we'll see about getting a booth in their local mall. I imagine it's less competitive at the mall and the traffic is a bit better, albeit the overhead just shot up exponentially. And I'll get them setup with an E-Commerce site along the way.

Okay, now to start some serious research and PM you guys...

Thanks Again Everyone,
Gene


SpellZ mentioned that he does a pretty decent job in the mall. With thatThey should be able to double their money if the product sells. I suppose this is where some additional market research advice comes into play.