eBay

towertreasuretrove · ‎01-23-2015

I'm pretty close to packing it in and relieving myself of the scourge of Canada Post. It is now, unbelievably,...cheaper to drive from Toronto to Niagara Falls, New York on a full tank of gas to mail an Expedited Shipping package over 2kg than it is to ship from home.

It is so ludicrous I can't help but laugh out loud every time I ask for a rate quote at the counter. I can't believe I'm still doing this! I've got to stop! I mean, I feel good that Canada Post is discouraging packages over 1.0 kg to the US so that their employees don't develop sciatica or something. What profit can you possibly make on an item after paying over. $30.00 in shipping? A 3D foam puzzle cost $30.00 to ship? Really? At least by driving it to Niagara Falls I can stop by the casino or the outlet malls. No...wait...What am I thinking?

I think I need help...I need to sell light stuff...thin stuff....Does Canada Post charge for shipping sub-atomic particles? Electrons? I'm sure they have a rate for that. Okay, seriously...maybe I can sell marbles......no too heavy....salt and pepper shakers?....salt and pepper?...plastic duckies? Yes...that's it...little, light, yellow plastic duckies. Everybody wants one of those...

reallynicestamps · ‎01-24-2015

If you are in Toronto you should look into ChitchatExpress in Mississaugua.

They will take your parcels across the border and ship them for you by USPS. There is a charge for this, but I understand they have many happy customers.

There is a similar business in Vancouver (bookstotheborder) and more recently one has turned up in Calgary.

By the way, do check the USPS rate cards. They use dimensional packaging too. Some inexpensive but bulky items are just not suitable for mail order.

cumos55 · ‎01-24-2015

Each of us learns to live with the reality of shipping ... postage... using Canada Post...

It is not going to get cheaper with each passing year.... and then add in tracking which appears to be more important with each passing year.

Eventually it could mean that the cost of shipping will make the selling of certain inventory on eBay and elsewhere on the internet... prohibitive.

Then take the exchange rate into consideration.

That is when you look for inventory worth a lot more than $15 each....much, much, more

Buyers making multiple purchases helps..... where the cost of shipping per item purchased drops....

Here is a link to the Canada Post' website....helps me sort out the cost of shipping....

http://www.canadapost.ca/cpotools/apps/far/business/findARate?execution=e1s1

I sell books... that can weigh less than 500 grams and then up to 3 kg and more.

Ship a 5 volume encyclopedia to Arizona...(Encyclopedia of Ukraine).... via Xpresspost... quite expensive..... but the buyer was happy.... No complaints..... They got it at a good discount price ,,, and I still made a lot on that one sale....

The cost of postage is something one learns "to live with"... first as a seller... then for each of your buyers.

My view of selling on the internet is

" If they want it ... really want it... They will pay the cost of shipping"

and... if you charge close to the exact cost for shipping... the buyer should have no complaint

towertreasuretrove · ‎01-24-2015

Books? I sold books for my first ten years and enjoyed it quite a bit. There is nothing like finding a 1st edition of John Banville's first book at Goodwill and selling it for $600 on Ebay the next day, Yeah...those were the days...Ebay was simple and kinda fun. But that party is over. Killed mostly by Canada Post rate hikes...and okay, Ebay too.

When it costs over $10 to ship something like a one single Hardy Boys book it's hard to make a nickel. I was eating these shipping cost for a while but that just made it worse, Charging the exact cost doesn't help. It kills sales to the point that you just don't want to do it anymore. And how often can you sell a 5 volume Encyclopedia of Ukraine.... It's sad. I loved selling old books. But no...got to move on. If I want to keep doing this I'm going to have to sell really light stuff...maybe the air bags and white peanuts I used to pack boxes with!

Canada Post is so bad now...so pumped up with bloated rules and regulations and price gouging that it will soon rise up and float over the horizon like an air-logged jellyfish...and it will probably charge itself an arm and a leg...

rose-dee · ‎01-24-2015

@towertreasuretrove wrote:

It is so ludicrous I can't help but laugh out loud every time I ask for a rate quote at the counter.

This caught my attention. Are you still paying for your parcels at the P.O. counter? I know it's not a huge savings, but if you use the Paypal label features, you can save a significant amount over the counter prices on parcel rates that may help you to be able to hold the line on your shipping charges to buyers. And there are always discount postage stamps (if you're well organized), especially useful for Canadian shipping.

If a majority of your sales are to the U.S., then Light and Small Packet rates are still relatively reasonable, and you will get those substantial discounts on Expedited and Xpresspost if you use Paypal labels.

I'm not saying I don't have my issues with Canada Post rates - far from it. However, there are some strategies that have helped me to manage to keep my shipping costs generally below the prevailing Canada Post rates. The lower Canadian dollar has helped a great deal too (I sell in $US and buy all my supplies and shipping labels in $Cdn). This is how I'm able to ship a lightweight, ca. 250gm hat in a box to the U.S. and still just charge the buyer $10-15 in shipping. Next year? Well, I'll worry about that then.

towertreasuretrove · ‎01-24-2015

Thanks for your reply..I did know about those 'savers' and used them often. I was referring to the end of my book-selling. Basically you can't sell a modern day hardcover book for less than $35 to make a profit. Roughly...it will cost $5 to get the book, $5 to box and package it, $5 to sell it and $20 to ship it!. You have to sell a $5 hardcover book for $35 just to break even!! It's insanity....

When expedited shipping was around $10-$12 it was okay....but not now...no way. Collectible books....those you can still sell for over $30 but they are a hard sell...

I used to be towertreasurebooks. I sold 1500 books over ten years and loved it. But it can't be done with Canada Post any longer. They are too heavy by their rates. I now find myself selling lightweight plastic children's toys...and guess what....they sell! Especially the discontinued ones... 😉

I'll still drop by a Value Village now and then to look for a good book to sell. I smile at all the amateur book scouts with their mobile phone apps and barcode scanners. They will soon find out that: a) good books don't show up on those shelves any more like they used too, and b) selling the book is one thing...wait until you try to ship it....

rose-dee · ‎01-24-2015

Yes, you're quite right about books, at least ordinary modern hardcovers. Soft covers, special-interest, or collectible books may still be possible to sell here because the price can offset some of the shipping cost (or in the case of soft covers, the lighter weight).

I would imagine 'cumos' manages to keep afloat because he has found a niche market and sells some very unusual and collectible books.

There is another aspect to this: people (especially those under 40) aren't buying as many physical books anymore, at least according to the CEO of Chapters. E-books apparently now make up over 40% of their sales. As the baby boomers either switch to e-Readers or fill up their bookshelves to satiation, I think selling books printed on paper, especially the hardcover types, and especially second-hand books, is going to become very difficult.

There will probably always be a market for rare books, first editions, etc., but of course those are ego-driven purchases or decorator items, not necessarily books to be read.

I used to sell a few used, special-interest books on eBay (history related, etc.), but stopped once the price of shipping hardcover books went above $10, since most of them couldn't be sold for more than about $15-20.

So you're right -- primarily because of Canada Post I've gone on to lighter items (and thinner than 2cm wherever possible!), or expensive enough to justify the shipping costs.

cumos55 · ‎01-24-2015

There is a place for those book that are not e-books.....

and ... I was at a local Chapters... yesterday.... could not find the e-Books...

But there were thousands and thousand more books published on paper...

If you find the right inventory people will buy and pay the cost of postage.

reallynicestamps · ‎01-24-2015

But there were thousands and thousand more books published on paper...

Yep. But like we say about Addall (or ABE or ...) if it is there it is not sold.

I'm surprised that in my new home in Victoria there are so many independent bookstores. I suspect some of them are hobby or retirement businesses. But when I go in to one, I'm not the only customer. Haven't found a good source for cheap used titles yet though.

When I was working in Ottawa, though, the readers on the bus were about half and half paperbacks and e-books.

webianostore · ‎01-26-2015

towertreasuretrove,
Man, if your items sell for less than $200, just go to Chitchatsexpress. I think they have 3 locations now. It would probably cost you less than $10 to ship USPS with tracking and it arrives much faster than bloody Canada Post.

rose-dee · ‎01-26-2015

@reallynicestamps wrote:

I'm surprised that in my new home in Victoria there are so many independent bookstores. I suspect some of them are hobby or retirement businesses. But when I go in to one, I'm not the only customer. Haven't found a good source for cheap used titles yet though.

Two tips from a long-time Victorian and book lover/collector:

1) Russell's (on Fort St. downtown, right around the corner from Douglas St., on the north side). If you don't mind paperback versions, check out the treasure trove upstairs. You have to actually go out the front door, through a short passageway and up the vertiginous stairway to get there, but it's fun browsing. He used to have the best prices anywhere on the Island for hardcover and hard-to-find books, but I think since his heaviest competition -- Wells Books down the street -- packed up and left, he will probably feel obliged to take advantage of the situation in his pricing. If I recall, ironically Wells went to Halifax.

2) SVdePaul on the south side of View St., further down. If you get there on a day that the book dealers have missed, there are sometimes some very interesting old hardcovers at very good prices.

3) Sally Ann on Island Hwy - hard to find/get to if you don't know the area, but less frequented than other outlets and they have a small but well-stocked book section. I've found some wonderful old hardcover books there. It's easiest to get to by going up the highway and taking the Helmcken exit. (Too much information??)

Sometimes I miss Victoria for the book hunting, but then we really don't need any more books. If we get the urge, there's a large used bookseller in Bridgetown and another in Digby, so one in each direction.

mr.elmwood · ‎01-26-2015

I have been using flat rate shipping for a decade. I am paying LESS for postage than I did three years ago. The swing on the exchange rate has lowered my costs over the last three years.

Set my rates in Jan 2012. Did not change them in 2013, or 2014, or 2015, will not change them in 2016.

Postage has no affect on my business than the cost of bubble mailers or gas to the post office.

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femmefan1946 · ‎01-26-2015

SVdePaul on the south side of View St.,

Found that Vinnie's by accident the other day. I was actually looking for an washroom -- and that definitely is TMI

The Sally Ann seems to have turned into a generic thrift store, if we are thinking of the same place. I was able to visit it before Christmas when we were coming back from visiting MIL in Nanaimo. But she died on Christmas Eve. (95 and lucid, not a bad life) so the next visit will be a planned trip visiting all the thrifts up that way.

I have a list of thrifts to visit today on Pandora. And there is a WIN with lots of totally disorganized books on Quadra.

pottery100 · ‎01-26-2015

You reminded me - perhaps your local stamp collecting store will sell you un-used stamps at a discount.

ricarmic · ‎01-26-2015

If you use older stamps, make sure they have full gum and are not "uncancelled" stamps, using uncancelled stamps is illegal. Make sure they are "full gum" or mint never hinged (MNH) or Mint hinged (MH). If you look hard enough, you can get valid postage these days in the 50%-70% of face fairly easily.

argosy33 · ‎01-27-2015

Yes, Canada Post rates are expensive.

What bothers me is that they charge so much more for tracking.

But with their IT systems, the direct cost, can't be that big.

Transportation rates are rising everywhere due to higher oil prices.

I highly recommend watching the Chris Martenson Crash Course

(AKA Peak Prosperity Crash Course)

And the documentary, Collapse, with Michael Ruppert.

These give a great overview of the many current issues, including energy.

BTW, the Crash Course, can be viewed online.

No expensive shipping required. 🙂

Anonymous · ‎01-27-2015

I was not happy with the huge increase for the light packet for 100g. It used to be $3.98 and now it is $5.00! That is $1.02 increase. I would think Canada Post would increase by 5 or 10 cents but no, they chose to continue to gouging us again and again and again!