How is it that people can offer a discount on items and sell them on ebay? How do they make any money?
2006-07-09 15:59:55 · 5 answers · asked by joecool148192 1 in Business & Finance ➔ Advertising & Marketing
There are several ways:
1. Buy bulk liquidation items such as those at Liquidation.com. The capitalization may be big, but the idea is to sell the items individually and profit from it. Or buy lot items on eBay, and break them up individually.
2. Find manufacturers of items you want to sell and buy discounted items from them
3. Make deals with retailers in your area, and offer to buy their unwanted items for deep discounts. jayandmarie - the most successful ebay seller - made deals with music stores where they will buy the entire inventory in the discounted bins, and then sold the items on ebay for 1-cent starting bid.
4. Look for possible partners on the Web, preferably outside of the US. Import items from them and sell them on ebay. There's huge profits to gain from this approach. For example, I import freshwater, Akoya and South pearls from Asia. I can get freshwater pearls for less than $1 -- and then sell it on ebay for starting price of $19.99 and they usually end around $30-50. That's very good profit.
2006-07-09 16:09:36 · answer #1 · answered by imisidro 7 · 5⤊ 0⤋
They buy closeout lots so they are paying much less than normal wholesale for the items they list.
They do take a risk of selling something below cost, but that depends on the seller. Some pad the shipping (which reduces the fee they pay ebay which is based on selling price) so the starting bid might be low, but the extra shipping covers the cost of the item.
Anyway, I sell on ebay but don't do resale stuff. Most of the time I get at least what I want for something, and sometimes I get a lot more. Every so often, I'm basically giving it away, but oh well, that's how the cookie crumbles.
2006-07-09 23:05:04 · answer #2 · answered by Lori A 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Some of what you see at eBay are stores moving overstock, out of season seasonal, "fire sale" items, and excess inventory that may not move for anything in their local markets.
A lot is just average people seeing what they can get for something they had around the house. Unless you're in the retail business, you might be surprised at just how much stock doesn't get sold in your stores. A merchant with a cash flow problem can reduce past the point of loss just to cover a short fall in revenues.
2006-07-09 23:13:53 · answer #3 · answered by Michael Myklin 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I make my $ on shipping and handling fee
2006-07-09 23:03:42 · answer #4 · answered by Mopar Muscle Gal 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
shipping is usually overpriced.
2006-07-09 23:04:14 · answer #5 · answered by daniel_97202 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋