Nice Day for a Walk...or in My Case...a Gimp

Yesterday was one of the nicest days around here that I can remember for quite a while. It also happened to coincide with the Wednesday flea market in the next town. I've been frustrated most of the summer with a severely sprained ankle, and yesterday was just too much to ignore.

I bravely strapped on my ankle brace, got into the car and headed to the flea market. Apparently, everyone else in the local area had the same idea. The place was jammed! Usually this early in the morning, traffic is very light, but this morning I was lucky to have a place to park. Swell...that much more of a distance to walk on this bum ankle. Nevertheless, the day was gorgeous, and I had some cash to burn, so off I went...slowly.

One of the things I noticed almost immediately was the prices on the items for sale. I may have been out of commission for June and July, but that wasn't enough time for inflation to hit the country THAT fast! On many of the items that held my interest, the prices were at or above retail! I couldn't believe it! I think too many of these good folks watch Antiques Roadshow and believe that the items they're selling are rare, and therefore worth lots of money. Trust me...most of the stuff is quite frankly, junk. If yesterday was any indication, the days of finding a real bargain at the flea market might be coming to a close. I'm not ready to give up...but it certainly was disheartening.

While I was there, I stopped and talked to a few friends that I know and haven't seen for a while, but after a couple of hours, I decided to call it quits and hobble on home. No luck. Not even close, but it was sure a nice day for a walk.

Be Informed When it Comes to Shipping

Unfortunately, shipping costs are a fact of life in running an on-line business. It's also a given that these costs are not going to remain static for long periods of time. When I started selling on the internet 7 years ago, it was not uncommon to be able to ship a fairly large package for under 10 bucks. Since most of the items I sell are fragile, my packages tend to weigh a bit more and be a bit larger than normal due to the extra cushioning material I use. Double boxing doesn’t help either. Since shipping costs now depend on both weight AND volume, not to mention the price of fuel for the delivery trucks, I've seen my costs go up significantly over the last few years.

This, of course, makes little difference to the casual on-line buyer. I say casual because people who tend to buy often on-line are fairly knowledgeable about what things cost to ship. This is not necessarily the case with buyers who only make the occasional purchase.

Shipping breakable items means extra cushioning, and added size and weight to any package. Anything less, and the seller is taking a huge chance with his reputation, and therefore his or her business. This means it now becomes common to have packages that cost between 15 and 20 dollars to ship. Packing and shipping art work can easily run up shipping costs of 30 dollars or more.

Of more concern are the less expensive items. Most people cringe at buying a $10 dollar item, and paying more than that for shipping (I know…I’m one of them). This might be fine if the item is hard to find; not so fine if the item can be obtained locally with a bit of effort. This situation may cause many sellers who specialize in less expensive items to rethink their on-line selling strategy.

In any case, if you buy on-line, you need to be aware of the expenses your sellers incur to get their goods to you in a safe and timely manner. If you think the shipping costs really are too high, don’t be afraid to ask the seller why they charge what they do. Most sellers will be more than happy to explain their costs to you. Be an informed buyer.

Best Laid Plans

This was the end of my last year in the teaching profession. As June approached, I could feel my excitement building regarding the prospect of starting all over again. I have been looking forward to concentrating on doing my on-line collectibles business full time. Finally, I could spend the time I had, doing what I wanted to do, not what someone else wanted me to do.

Selling collectibles on-line requires a lot of time going to auctions and flea markets, something that I really enjoy. However it also requires a lot of walking, something else that I like to do. What better way to spend time than to put two things together that I enjoy doing? Well...as fate would have it...a few monkey wrenches have been thrown into my plans.

Two days before the end of work, I somehow got my foot caught up in a footstool (bit of irony there), and injured both my ankle and calf muscle. Not all that much pain involved, but it prevented me from being mobile for a while. After about 5 weeks of rehab, things were getting back to normal. This is about the time my stupidity kicked in.

I had to go down to the basement to do a load of wash. I always put my shoes on when I do this, but this particular time my foot was feeling really good, and I was in a hurry. Bad move. Walking across the basement floor, carrying a load of wash, I stepped on the only remaining clothespin within a hundred miles. Of course, it was with my previously injured ankle. Of course this caused me to lose my balance, my foot twisted, and viola...a severely sprained ankle!

So once again I'm in the rehab stage...Probably another 3 weeks or so before things get back to some semblance of normalcy so that I can walk. In the meantime, I'll just have to be patient about getting my "new life" going...again...and try not to do anything stupid. My wife has her doubts.

Defying the Laws of Physics

I've been a science teacher for the last 38 years. As of the end of June, I decided to retire and pursue other interests, such as my favorite hobby, on-line selling. I've been looking forward to this for quite a while, as the on-line selling part always had to take a back seat to teaching...and rightly so. Now however, that's all changed.

My plan was to reorganize my home office to reflect the fact that I would now be spending all of my free time building my business. Of course, the first thing I had to do was clean out the office before I started reorganizing, and I figured I could accomplish this in just a few short days. Boy was I wrong! I didn't realize a room that small could hold that much! In fact, it appears that the room is actually defying the laws of physics in that the more I throw out, the more I seem to find! I don't know where all of this stuff is coming from, but it appears to me that "stuff" is being created faster than I can clean it out.

So much for being done and ready to go in three days. As I start my second week of clean up, I have hopes that I might be able to finish by the end of the weekend. I'm probably safer not making any predictions, but I can guarantee the trash and recycle guys aren't going to be too happy with me this week! Back to work!

Proofread Those Listings!

I'm usually pretty good at proofreading my listings, but every once in a while something slips through. Recently I had to raise the prices I charge for shipping due to increased operating costs, and so I had to go through and make changes in many of my item descriptions.

Recently I made a sale to a customer who pointed out, and rightly so, that it said "in the description" of the item that the shipping cost was $5.00, even though this customer was charged $10.00. Well I was pretty sure that $10.00 was the actual shipping charge, but when I investigated, I found that I had indeed forgotten to change the wording in the description of the item. Since it was my fault, I only charged this customer $5.00 as in my opinion, arguing the point was not worth the bad feelings that would have been created.

The bottom line is, I am once again combing through my listings and looking for errors. A second pair of eyes would have been a big help, but as we all know, that's not always possible. Even though I've been doing this for a few years, incidents like this remind me to slow down a bit and take my time. Lesson learned...until the next time.

Trying to Sort Things Out...Not Having Much Luck

I haven't written very much as of late. It's been a very busy last couple of months; more so than usual. As of this Monday last I have retired from 38 years of teaching science. I didn't know how I would feel about that when the day finally came. Now that it's here, I'm still not sure how I feel about it. It's kind of an odd sensation. On the one hand, it hasn't really hit me yet that come August, that little packet of information that always arrives in the mail from the school will not be in my mailbox. It just seems like the start to a normal summer break. On the other hand, I know that this won't just be any normal summer...how I'll react to that in a few months will also be an unknown.

I do know I've been looking forward to being able to spend more time building my on-line business. It's still going to be a few weeks before I can really dive in. I'm cleaning out almost 40 years of educational material from my office, and reorganizing. It's a bigger job that I thought...no surprise there I guess. In any case, I hope to be up and running in just a few weeks. See you then.

Once upon a time, there was a fledgling auction site called eBay

Once upon a time, there was a fledgling auction site called eBay. The site became popular very rapidly because of a number of reasons...mainly, because you could sell just about anything and have fun in the process. Ebay insisted that it was simply providing a place where a buyer and seller could come together and make a deal on just about anything. If there was a problem, well they couldn't get involved..it wasn't that type of site.

It soon became apparent that eBay had very little competition out there in the online world. It became apparent to eBay also, because soon the rules began to change. Changes happened slowly at first, and then accelerated rapidly. As change occurred, so too did the amount of money eBay charged to do business on the site. People began to see what was happening, eventually, but it was too late. Today eBay is the overlord of the online auction world. They call the shots...they charge the fees. Don't like it? Go somewhere else...and many people did. But the fact remains that no one generates buying traffic like eBay.

Now let's take a quick look at another online giant, Google. Google seems to have partaken of the same cool aid as eBay. Like eBay, it appears Google is getting too big for its britches. It's the only game in town at the moment, and therefore you'll play by their rules..or you will "disappear" altogether from the internet market place.

The implementation of this latest requirement of "unique product identifiers" is going to cost sellers hours and hours of labor trying to get compliant. If for some reason you "get it wrong", they'll tell you, but you won't get the details. You'll have to figure it out for yourself. Oh you can always file an "exemption", but no one really knows what that means. An exemption for each item? An exemption to cover your entire feed? There's still some debate about that, apparently.

I've been reading the forums on other sites, and the good folks who have literally thousands of items apparently have to change each one individually. Personally, I don't think it's worth it.

I don't think I have many items that need product identifiers. I sell mostly collectibles, which I understand are exempt. Question is, do I have to file for that exemption, or do I have to do anything at all? I've been reading some debate over that point also.

Bottom line for me is this...as I add items for sale; I'll add product identifiers when I can. I have no intention of spending hours and hours trying to research items to find their identifiers, if indeed they have any in the first place. Last time I looked, there were other search engines out there that, as far as I know, are not making folks jump through these hoops. So I'll continue to submit to Bing and the like, and let Google crawl over my site for the organic feed. But for a seller like me, a part timer, I just don't have the time or the inclination. Sorry eBa....I mean Google.