stamp sellers please help

[Maelbrigda]

If i list a stamp at under 10p + 59p postage will it all be lost in fees between ebid gallery and paypal. i see similar stamps to what i have, listed at 2p, 5p and 10p but is it worthwhile?

[hurryb4itsgone]

If i list a stamp at under 10p + 59p postage will it all be lost in fees between ebid gallery and paypal. i see similar stamps to what i have, listed at 2p, 5p and 10p but is it worthwhile?

Part of it depends on what set up you have with PayPal ... there are different fee levels.

[Juliebabe25]

NO

is it really worth selling anything for 10p ?

The time taken to list it and take a pic etc.

You could not get an outsourcer to do it for that.

And I'm sure you would be saving ebid a whole lot of of money by not having to invoice you.

Why not bundle a whole lot of stamps together and sell them for a few dollars ?

Not only that but most collectors will probably already have the cheaper low value stamps anyway.

Was it worth my time writing this ? (probably not)

But us sellers are all a bit sick in some ways (mentally that it)

[somersethedge]

i see similar stamps to what i have, listed at 2p, 5p and 10p but is it worthwhile?

depends how you look at it..... we sell postcards but when we buy them at auction we sometimes end up having to buy stamps (either loose or in albums) with them.... the stamps then become dead stock in our eyes.... the problem is, over time, we end up with more and more stamp and due to lotting fees etc it is not worth putting them back into auction.

every so often we get sick of the sight of postcards and when that happens I turn to the stamps and list them here.... it hasn't cost us to buy them as we only bid for what we think the postcards are worth to us, therefore the stamp stock is bunce and we make our profit on the postage.

and in reply to Julie

A lot of collectors don't always have the cheaper stamps and we quite often sell 30 or 40 3p to 10p stamps at a time

[somersethedge]

Is it worthwhile part Two

is it worthwhile time wise... maybe not, but having got sick of postcards I can either stop listing altogether for a few days (that would be time wasted) or I can list something else instead.... so I list something else

[Juliebabe25]

and in reply to Julie

A lot of collectors don't always have the cheaper stamps and we quite often sell 30 or 40 3p to 10p stamps at a time

I take your point, but can you also see why Delcamp wanted to get rid of low value listings.
Sending you 30 invoices for 1p is not really a good way of doing business, its the old 80.20 rule

[stampsandcoins1]

If i list a stamp at under 10p + 59p postage will it all be lost in fees between ebid gallery and paypal. i see similar stamps to what i have, listed at 2p, 5p and 10p but is it worthwhile?

Paypal will take minimum of 26p. 60p to post it (first class) cost of envelope, q'ing at the post office. Does that answer your question?

[somersethedge]

Paypal will take minimum of 26p. 60p to post it (first class)

Agreed

cost of envelope

2p (bought in bulk @ 5,000 a time)

q'ing at post office

well I would have to do that whatever I am posting, and it would be for more than one item of post. You forgot eBids 1p FVF so total costs to me is 89p

my minimum postage is £1.00 (with large discounts given on multiple purchases) plus the item comes to £1.03p minimum.... profit is a minimum of 14p per sale..... Plus a happy customer who will (hopefully) come back and buy again and again and might buy my more expensive odds & sets.

One has to look at the overall benefits of listing cheap items than just the financial benefits of one sale.

I admit I wouldn't like to spend ALL my time listing very low value items but the odd days here and there does (IMO) pay for itself in the long run

[somersethedge]

As Pam (Maplegin) has just pointed out (having read over my shoulder) we can make more profit by selling 10 50p postcards than we can selling a £5.00 one

[kreativebargains]

You can cut Paypal costs by setting up 'Micro Payments'. Not sure how you do it, but I think from what I have seen in the past it is pretty easy.

And as has already been said, frequently with lower priced items you will get multiple purchases. One more advantage is that it increases your visibility, if you list as a bulk lot you would have one listing, if you list as 20, 50, or 100 separate listings you will have all those extra listings visible on search engines and eBid. If potential buyers do find you through low priced items they might buy more expensive items as well.

At the end of the day it depends on how much time you have to create the listings and whether you think that any benefits gained from listing them separately are worth the time you are putting in.