How to make good profit selling $1 items without wasting time on S/H ???

[purse_of_the_legionary]

I am very curious about the "DOLLAR STORE" way to sell on eBay. After more than a year with PS status on eBay, I can't understand how can you guys make good profit without wasting most of your time on S/H ? Do you have a cheap labor employee to do the S/H job ?

Why not offer lots of 10 identical items at $10, instead of one at $1 ? Wouldn't you save time on handling time and shipping material ?

Once eBay took its final value fees + PayPal fees on your item, how much remains in your pocket ? You are making what, 50 cents profit and then it takes 10 minutes to prepare order and ship ? That is cheap labor from my point of view, a life of slavery for a few bucks.

For my part, I try to make at least $20 profit per listing. And this is not because I have particularly low price from my wholesellers, it's just strategy. I don't have the opportunity like you to just click RELIST, as my items need a specific picture for each listing (no stock photos on my listings). It takes ten minutes to take the picture and prepare the HTML description, then an average of ten more minutes to prepare package and ship. $20 for twenty minutes, that means $60 per hour. Seriously, how many hours do you have to work for 60 bucks, selling $1 items on eBay ?

I am not criticizing your way to do it, far from it, but I am very curious to see how profit could be interesting doing that.

[dipmicro]

I am just a small seller, February was the first month I went over $1000 in sales. Most of my stuff is $1 or little over. But most of the orders are multiple, average order is between $10-$20. There is no money made on shipping at all.

You are right, it's a slavery for the money I make right now, but coming from engineering, eBay allows me instantly test and tune different marketing strategies and the market response.

How to make money with $1 items ... the only way, you have to sell them in quantity. In order to generate $1000 sales you have to sell $1 item either to 1000 buyers or 1000pcs to single buyer or between.

Another "secret" I am recently exploring relates to how often people stumble upon your $20 listing? From every 100 store $1 listings that alone get 5-10 views a month, there is total 500-1000 visitors for mere $3 - price that beats AdWords campaign any time. Carefully selected auctions get 30-60 views in 7 days. On $0.99 item and $0.15 listing fee that's $0.002-$0.005 per lead.

I don't care if that auction sells. eBay listing fees are allocated from marketing budget. The goal is to have something interesting and show it to as many people as possible in $1 auctions. Auctiva window and eBay cross-sale seems like a suitable showroom for now.

[dipmicro]

Anyway a better example than me is this guy:

http://myworld.ebay.ca/exdwh

He is my friend, competitor, one of suppliers 🙂

He buys off eBay, sells to eBay. Buys big, sells in small quantities. His material cost are between 20-30% of his retail. He practically sells junk, but there is plenty of buyers willing to pay for cheap junk. I will not disclose his sales, because that's not my information, but he can comfortably live on this with profits way better than a salary he was making as an engineer. If he was better organized, he could run this gig part-time.

[ameroindustries]

Ya there is money in reselling some stuff on ebay profit is not that big though takes alot of work buying and stuff . I Personally rather buy from manufactures and large discounters .

But good way to start off buying and selling off other ebayers if you dont have much cash there is money out there just harder to make with canada post and there dumb 20mm er over has to go as parcel Kills alot of ideas fast . Just murders them LOL

[dipmicro]

centralmetalcorp, I just went through your sold items today and your sales went to $3,900 in single day! you must be some god of eBay!

Cosnidering the amount of shipping you do, what do you use for a carrier? Don't tell me CanadaPost I am already getting the clerks nervous sometimes with my 5-8 packages, what would happen if someone brings 100 packages every day ...

[numero_1]

also keep in mind put a "combined shipping discounted please view my other auctions" so the guy that bought the $1 item, might see something else he likes on your listings and get that $20 item as well. i always look at what else the seller has available when i purchase something of that guy, and if price is right i buy 2, 3 or more items as well