Why all the overpriced dreck on E-Bay? I can't speak for others so....
jkrk
Posts: 996 ✭✭✭✭✭
I can only answer as a person whose wife has a store....
It's because total costs of selling are so high.
We were offering a coin for $1899. Buyer counters at $1700. Selling costs come close to $200 thus we would net $1500. If we melted the coin we would receive around $1530. Thus it's a no brainer. No deal.
Then again, If we were selling at a show... $1700 cash works. The buyer gets his/her price and we have a sale.
We're not complaining since the costs are what they are. I'm just amused at how many sales could be negotiated if a few seller promos were offered. Two years ago, we must have sold 2-3 X the number of coins (with promos) compared to the number we sold last year (without promos).
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Like all things under capitalism, shareholders always want more.
For most part I don’t do big ticket coins on the bay. Some I been doing there but keystone markup (low pop material). Because of forced low margins due to market on big ticket USA material do them mainly at shows. There I am only fighting setup costs. The other problem is many coming in door at shows broke, little money for coins. In Houston $1500 a weeks check if they even get that. Tough sledding if your trying sell a lot of big ticket material here.
I would not sell that at a loss unless you need the funds pay living expenses.
It takes cost plus about 40 pct make it in the coin biz. There is no such thing as dreck. It all adds up and if you can make higher margin on smaller ticket stuff hey that’s a win. Just find that winning angle.
You never know what is going to sell. I have had sales on Bay which scored 50-100 pct profit. I am highly diversified in US, World, Mods, Currency. A target margin of around 30 pct need for the bay. Some may not make that but others that make 50-100 pct make up for it. Don’t let them talk you down. I sat on this world coin for 2 years before I made my keystone target profit for it.
10 c on the dollar GM does not cut it in this business.
Problem is not ebay, it is your margin.
When one buys at $25 and sells for $150, 10% for ebay and paypal fees, takes it from $150 to $135, less purchase price of $25 means a $110 profit on a $25 item, or over 400%,
Have the item in inventory for 2 months, make 400%, I am Very OK with that.
Pay too much on the front end means buried at the back end.
The problem IS eBay. I don’t care what anyone says.
BHNC #248 … 130 and counting.
Then don't go there. Problem solved.
eBay is a plus it is the worlds largest coin show.
Wrong. Don’t sell there. I can go there all I want
BHNC #248 … 130 and counting.
Agree, but good luck buying $150 coin for $25.
Anyone who wants to be a "dealer" should do what you do: deal in something that has reasonable margins. Selling is selling. People who want to be coin sellers are really coin collectors. That's fine, but they need to realize that thin margins are the rule.
To that end, and the OPs point, eBay is meant to be a retail marketplace. The whole cost structure is incremental: it costs nothing to list, but you pay a percentage of every sale in fees. That model will NOT sustain thin margin items because there is never an economy of scale. In a B&M, the cost model is fixed: your rent and bills are constant, no matter how much you sell. In that case, selling gold for a 3% profit is just more sales against fixed costs. On eBay, that same gold coin is more sales and more costs.
All comments reflect the opinion of the author, evn when irrefutably accurate.
Most of the coins I see on ebay are priced near current markets values. A lot of good material there and I very pleased with my purchases.
Hmmm...you say the problem is eBay but you want to go there?
eBay has an incremental cost model. If your thin margin market can't sustain incremental costs, then it shouldn't be on eBay.
Bullion doesn't belong on eBay. It costs 9% to sell on eBay. Gold bullion can be scrapped at 97 to 99% of melt. No one wants to buy bullion at 110% of melt. It is always better to scrap it.
Even widgets have a bid ask spread of less than 9%. Bag price on common date Morgans in VF/better is around $22 each. Retail price is $24 or $25. Why not just scrap them out at bag price?
All comments reflect the opinion of the author, evn when irrefutably accurate.
Ah the comfort of being a collector and not a seller/dealer...
I do not have to worry about fees, margins or the market. I just buy what I like for the price I consider fair ..... 
Happy collector here... Cheers, RickO
It’s not rocket science. Its a great service for buying things, so yes I’ll continue to buy things there. I’m not a dealer, so when I sell one or two coins, I’d rather sell them elsewhere rather than incur their fees + PayPal. When I’m selling a $1,000 coin, the $130 in fees is more important to me because it’s likely all I have to put toward another coin,
BHNC #248 … 130 and counting.
I sell occasionally on eBay if I can eat the fees and still make a decent profit. Aren't fees for a store less than the 10% generally charged? If you want millions of eyes looking at your coins it's still a good place to list. I'm not sure why eBay always singles out "Coins and Currency" on promos.
eBay is not for slim margin material (it’s variable selling expense structure).
It works good for small operators trying supplement their income dealing coins who struggle clearing a show table fee who can retail items here and there at a margin which will work for them. They have the expertise buy low / sell high but possibly not the big money it can take to say travel the show circuit. They know how look at / grade coins. They may buy on the bay, online auctions, and shows but pick off material can make 30 pct margin or more. Goal is low pop material the big well off dealers don’t have usually. Armed with that decent retail profit is possible. Or if it’s some outstanding PQ or CAC coin they picked up then hit a homer with.
Competition at shows can be formidable, You could be setup next to a big wholesaler (boxes of slabbed coins) at say 5 pct back of bid for most part busy all the time. I may look at a couple boxes of coins buy a couple for retail / online store.
Where do prefer to sell $1,000 coins? GreatCollections, Heritage, Stack’s, Etsy, BST?
Yes... fees for us are still 6%. With paypal and shipping we run a bit over 10%.
From our perspective, For generic double eagles none really work well.
Our goal is to sell around 24 coins /yr (we sell double eagles and Indian $10). The expectation was that we would move items mainly during promos when the buyers receive a subsidy.
We've only had the store since Sept. We sold 13 items in 2019 in 4 months. So far in 2020 we sold 2 but in fairness we were closed 3 weeks due to a vacation. Thus, our goals, to date, have been met. I have no issues with E-Bay as I receive more views than I could anywhere else and their fees (with E-Bucks) are cheaper than almost any other outlet.
We only buy around 50 or so Double Eagles per year so if we move 20-30 on E-Bay it balances our gold needs and we're happy. If I need to sell a larger quantity, there are local dealers who take up the slack.
I impulsively posted after a conversation with a potential buyer who thought the particular coin he was interested in was overpriced. It dawned on me that yes, if I was at a coin show his buy price was spot on.
However, with fees, I couldn't go to the price he needed. I'm not complaining as everyone needs to take their cut. as that is the business they're in. I was only pointing out how many times I've read about overpriced items on E_Bay and I'm just illustrating one small example of why that could be.
For big ticket material over $1000 prefer selling from my table at shows for most part.
One may want shop around bourse at show in selling these. An analysis should be performed what your getting vs bid or MV after deducting auction house juice. Then knowing that you can see how shopping around bourse at show compares.
Yes. That's my next step.
I've never been to a coin show. I was going to attend the NY show in Jan (even though world coins) but babysitting got in the way.
Thus, in NY I'm left with regional shows / NJ etc but I'm planning to give it a go this spring with the hopes that someone might be able to pay a somewhat better price than I can receive (net) on e-bay after a couple hundred dollars of fees? If not, all is good here as E-Bay works so my expectations are low.
"Why all the overpriced dreck on E-Bay? I can't speak for others so...."
Are you related to Laura?
There's overpriced junk at pretty much any sales venue, why would eBay be any different?
Sometimes BST boards can be good for moving items.
Usually a member you have some familiarity with, and no real chance of fraud/returns.
As a business model, I try to limit most of my Ebay items to profitable flips or easily sold items.
The fees are cheaper than traveling, a B&M, etc...
BST: KindaNewish (3/21/21), WQuarterFreddie (3/30/21), Meltdown (4/6/21), DBSTrader2 (5/5/21) AKA- unclemonkey on Blow Out
Clearly not.
She's the one who has money.
Overpriced coins can be at any sales venue lol. Why all this picking on the bay? Did some here get kicked off?
"Why all the overpriced dreck on E-Bay?"
Because all the underpriced dreck gets bought right away?