Resale Unlisted Podcast
The Resale Unlisted Podcast is where three longtime resellers get past the listings and talk about what it really takes to make money selling online. Trish, Vikki, and Chuck bring decades of experience from different corners of the resale world — from eBay and cross-platform selling to clothing, collectibles, technology, live selling and everything in between. Expect candid opinions, practical advice, industry insiders, occasional bad takes, and plenty of lessons learned the expensive way. Whether you’ve shipped 10,000 orders or you’re still figuring out where to buy your first roll of bubble wrap, pull up a chair. The stuff that matters in resale doesn’t always make it into the listing.
Resale Unlisted Podcast
Resale Unlisted Ep. 2: Are Shipping Costs Killing Your Reselling Business?
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Shipping costs are climbing, profit margins are shrinking, and resellers are feeling the squeeze. So what's a seller supposed to do?
In this episode of The Resale Unlisted Podcast, Chuck, Trish, and Vikki tackle one of the biggest headaches facing online sellers today: the rising cost of shipping. With three different business models and three very different approaches to shipping, the conversation gets into the real-world decisions sellers are making to stay profitable.
From free shipping versus flat rates to comparing USPS, UPS, and FedEx, the hosts share what's working, what's not, and why those seemingly insignificant shipping expenses can make or break a business.
But as usual, the conversation doesn't stop there. The trio digs into knowing your numbers, deciding when cheap inventory isn't worth selling, finding the balance between passion and profit, and whether resellers should feel guilty about making money from someone else's unwanted stuff. Spoiler alert: they shouldn't.
They also touch on eBay's evolving shipping programs, international selling challenges, and the important role resellers play in keeping usable goods out of landfills.
Welcome everyone to the Resale Unlisted podcast. This is episode number two. Um, if you didn't catch the first episode, definitely download and check it out. You'll learn a lot about the three of us. My name is Chuck. I'm a former eBay employee and now um a full-time eBay seller. And uh these are my co-hosts, Trish and Vicky. How are you guys doing?
SPEAKER_04Good, Chuck. How are you?
SPEAKER_00Doing well, doing well. Yeah, absolutely. So um I've got an interesting topic for us today. Um, I think we'll we'll all have some uh maybe different or interesting perspectives on. Um so shipping costs have been going up a lot. I think you guys have probably noticed that.
SPEAKER_02Uh we have.
SPEAKER_00We're seeing you know, primarily uh USPS. Um, as they've and it's not been a clean adjustment either. It's been this sort of like thrashing and prices going up, prices going down, prices on heavier things being cheaper than lighter things, cats and dogs living together. Um, it's been kind of chaotic and it's settled a little bit down. But I'd say in the last six months, I'm seeing um for let's say a one-pound item, one pound or under, I'm seeing a significant increase, something that would be have been under five dollars before is now in the worst case scenario. If it's going to the farthest zone, if it's weighing um it's going to the farthest zone, it's going to a rural uh zip code, it can be you know like nine dollars. And that's a significant um impact on my business. So I wanted to I wanted to talk about that with you guys today. Um maybe a little bit about how each of us is reacting to that and uh and go from there. What do you guys think?
SPEAKER_04So um me personally, I I don't know how you guys do your shipping. If you do calculated, if you do flat, if you do free, I do a flat rate shipping, um, but it is absolutely subsidized by me. Um so anything under a pound, um, they pay six bucks. Anything over a pound, they pay eight. So it doesn't matter where it's going, what it weighs, if it's under or over, that's the weights at the moment. I may change that because of how difficult the shipping is getting, but I have been really hesitant since going to eBay open, the last largest one. So last time we were in Vegas 2025. Um, and I went to a talk that eBay did with Google, and they talked about how if you're using um calculated shipping, you do not get um found in Google shopping because Google wants to show a full price. They don't want you to have to click out of Google to find out how much it's gonna cost to get you the item. So that Google is only showing things that are either flat rate or free shipping. And before that, for a long time I had free shipping. So for me, the calculated has always seemed like not a sales tool. So I've tried to build my business in a way where I thought I could capture the biggest market, right? I'm in use clothing, it's very saturated, and I always felt like I needed the biggest um the biggest edge I could get on my competitors, and for a long time it was free.
SPEAKER_00So yeah, so you're doing flat rate um six and nine, you said, or or under a pound and over a pound.
SPEAKER_04That's it.
SPEAKER_00Okay, and flat rate.
SPEAKER_04Oh, six and no, six and eight. I apologize. You were asking money. Yeah, six dollars and eight dollars.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, okay, okay. And that were you subsidizing costs for your buyers before, or is that something that happened only because the shipping rates went up and you're just trying to soften the boil for your buyers?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I mean, I think before I would subsidize maybe a quarter of them, right? Like before it used to be that most would fall. I was at um the six dollar level and about started for a long time, 25% of them I would subsidize. Then it went up to 50% of them I would subsidize. And now um it's very rare that I have something under six bucks anymore, no matter where it's going. And, you know, now with the zones being um with the rural part getting um that extra fee, you know, sometimes you can pay the nine bucks for it to go three states over, but because it's being delivered somewhere rural, um, you know, you get that extra fee. So it is become a completely different game.
SPEAKER_03Um, I feel the same way. I do, I'm I do something similar to what Trish does. I've done the free shipping thing back when shipping was lower and free shipping really gave you a huge benefit. I'm not sure that's the case anymore. Um, but like Trish, I'm in the used clothing, even if it, even though it's mostly vintage, it's still used. Um, so to stay competitive, I do the same thing, partly because I'm on almost a coast. So when you use calculated shipping, if it's anything using calculated, a lot of times your person on the opposite coast is going to see an enormous difference in the price.
SPEAKER_00They get priced out of your inventory loans. Right.
SPEAKER_03Right. Because it's it looks so high, even if that's not realistically the price that they're going to pay or that you're going to pay, because I don't pass my discount on to the customers, I have to be honest, because most of the time I'm subsidizing it. So why should I? Um so I they should they're charging, you know, they would be charged retail. And if you're looking at that retail price of a one to two pound item going to Alaska, say, or you know, somewhere else on the East Coast, if I'm shipping something to Trish or she's going to buy from me in the Boston area, it's going to look like it's a $15 charge when it's really not. So are you doing calculated? I no, I do flat because of this. I do a flat shipping, just like you do. Um, I charge anything under a pound, I charge $7.05. Anything over a pound or one to three pounds, anything I think I can fit in a poly mailer or a smaller size of uh shoes or something like that. Um, I charge $10 and five cents. Now, is that enough anymore? Not necessarily. I'm not subsidizing as much as Trish, but I am still subsidizing quite a few packages by a dollar here or 50 cents there. Um, it's far better than free shipping. Um, yes, I know there's no free shipping. We work it into our prices. However, you need to stay competitive. So we gotta, you know, figure out the nuances. And then with heavier items, I do have other flat rate categories. I have like $15.95, $29.95, $49.95, depending on if I've got something really big and heavy and or bulky or oversized. But, you know, that like you said, it used to be, you know, if if it were going to California and it was under a pound, it's $5.48, is what it used to cost me, no matter what it was under a pound. Depending on where in California it is now, it can be as high as seven and change for under a pound. And that's the next state over. Going to the East Coast, $10.40, one to two pounds if it's a rural area. That's insanity that it has jumped that much in under a year. There have been what seven increases in the last year, something like that? 18 months, seven increases.
SPEAKER_00Well, and the the interesting thing about this rural uh rural thing that's happened is I'll ship something you know to zone whatever, zone eight or the farthest zone, and then it'll happen to be in a rural address. So not only am I paying so much more to ship this item, and I do free shipping, and I'll talk a little bit about that. But um, and then eBay, because of the way they charge final value fees, I'm actually paying even more on top of that because now I'm paying the final value fee. If my shipping is $10 for an item, then I'm selling for $20, which obviously that's not sustainable, and I've had to change my business model to accommodate that. But then um I'm paying the final value fee on that ten dollars, um, and it's 13%. That's a dollar thirty. Like, come on, you know, it's it's so much now. Um, the the shipping price is putting so much pressure on the bottom end of my business and causing me to have to really rethink um the kinds of things I sell, the price points I sell them at. Um the only exception to that being um that I do a lot of music media. I think by volume, at least half my sales are music media, and I can take advantage of the USPS media mail, which thank God for that.
SPEAKER_03Because even that's gone up a lot in the last year or two.
SPEAKER_00It has, but it's still like five bucks. Yeah, yeah, it's under five bucks for uh under a pound. And so um, you know, if if I have two objects and uh you know, I'll hold the a C sam a C D and then this toy, and they're both for sale for the same amount of money. If I sold the the uh CD for eleven dollars and I had less than five dollar shipping and I'm into it for a dollar, and the eBay fees are you know a buck thirty or something like that, I'm still making three bucks. I mean, that's that's pretty good. And then as people add more to the card, it it pays off more. Well, if I sold this for $11 and then it cost me $9 to ship it, like I'm in the hole.
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_00Like it's that drastic of a difference that I can't um sell an object at that those kind of prices anymore. In fact, I recently went through and eliminated um anything under 20 bucks that wasn't uh shippable by media mail. I it just I can't do it anymore. Either I'm bundling it or just eliminating it entirely from my inventory um and moving on. Um, maybe that's and I've started to kind of come around to maybe thinking that that's healthy for my business to raise my average sale price up by eliminating all the cheap stuff. What do you guys think about that?
SPEAKER_03I mean, I think we have to, I mean, that's a good conversation to have too. Like, yeah, how are we gonna combat this, right? We can't control the USPS, we cannot control all these changes and these things that you're gonna do.
SPEAKER_00I feel so powerless in this situation, right?
SPEAKER_03Like if you are someone that operates under really tight profit margins or you're selling small items, or your average sale price is really low. This is where, you know, something that Trish always says, but you really need to understand your numbers. You really need to be dialed in to where your profit center is, what your buy price is. That's that's the thing we can control, right? Bottom line, you can control your cost of goods. That's where you think that's the only thing. You make your money on the buy because you can't control anything but you cannot control anything but your cost of goods. You can control what you buy, how you buy it, what you spend on it. And I'm not saying it's an easy pivot for people, right? If there's somebody that's been used to selling, I don't know, rubber stamps for three dollars a piece plus plus three dollar shipping for 20 years and they're doing fine because they have a high volume business, they're screwed right now. Those people are out of business.
SPEAKER_00There is no unless I mean they can only bulk up, you know, 10 items together and try to sell that or whatever.
SPEAKER_04That's even that it's it's that's a hard sell. That's a hard pivot to go from these onesies, twosies. It really depends on what you sell.
SPEAKER_03And right now, that's the only thing you can control. So I think being able to bring your cost of goods down is really the most important factor, depending on how you purchase. I don't I used to spend a lot more on goods than I used to, than I than I do now. I used to when my average sale price was higher, when you know, the good old days of 2020 and 2021 and 2022.
SPEAKER_00Oh, it was a miraculous time, wasn't it?
SPEAKER_03It was a wonderful time to be an eBay seller. And you know, I think back in those days, I didn't think twice about spending $10 or $15 on an item that I knew was going to sell for $150. Right. Now that $10 or $15 buy is maybe going to sell for $50 and it's going to take longer to sell. And it's going to cost me a lot more to ship. And my final value fee and the promoted listing halo attribution fee and all of that stuff is going to factor into my bottom line where I'm like, all right, it takes a lot for me to spend $10 now.
SPEAKER_04But okay, so if that's all we can control, we need to make sure we're doing the best we can do on the shipping that we get, right? Which brings up the idea for me that I never used to ship anything off platform. I always use eBay labels and I always just used USPS. And now there are daily, there are times every single day that FedEx is cheaper. So now, now it could be 50 cents, it could be 11 cents, but sometimes it's dollars. But even if it's 50 cents five times a day, five days a week, that's real money at the end of the month.
SPEAKER_00Yes, I do like 30, 40 items a day. And if if I can save, I think I kind of like 50 cents is my number. If FedEx is 50 cents cheaper, my incremental cost to go to the FedEx and USPS is like nothing, they're right next to the number for me.
SPEAKER_04But Chuck, once you do one 50 cent package for the day, you should all do them all, even if it's five cents. Because you're already going to be.
SPEAKER_00Oh, right. No, you're right. As soon as one package triggers me going to FedEx, right? At that point, I just if I can scrape a few pennies off of FedEx, I do it.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_00Um, I mean, there are different things with FedEx that you know, I I've I've heard from some sellers that they're more stringent about um your weight and size being off and charging. I haven't had that problem, but um, but you're right. I think um it's I used to be a USPS guy all the way, and I'd even pay up a little extra just so I have that one trip, everything's going to the same place.
SPEAKER_04Me too.
SPEAKER_00And this is this situation has caused me to um I mean I haven't yet done three carriers in one day. I've only done two, FedEx and um in USPS, but you know, I could see that day coming if if shipping becomes really competitive, uh, you know, there's carriers are competing with each other. Maybe that's what we'll we'll have to start doing. And uh yeah, we'll see.
SPEAKER_04Well, I mean if they start competing more, the only people that will benefit is us. Right. So let's hope that happens.
SPEAKER_03So for me, I I don't ship natively within um eBay. I think that's different from both of you guys. I ship using Pirate Ship and I have forever. Pirate ship it for those who don't know, it's a free service. Um, you just need to sign up an account. And I started doing it years ago because you could use your credit card and I wanted to get the extra points for miles for flights. And you know, again, make sure you pay your bill every month. Don't don't incrue interest on it because that makes no sense. That negates that. But that's my financial advice for that. But if you're disciplined enough to do that, for me, the benefit was even though it's usually almost exactly the same cost as eBay, there are several differences where it's better. Um, a couple of things. eBay doesn't do um doesn't do cubic weight shipping through uh USPS on in their native. So if you're doing cubic weight, which is a small box or um box in a bag or a bag itself, a poly mailer itself, there it's a it's a discounted rate off of the regular ground advantage or what used to be first class. That's one thing. The other thing is I also don't use eBay's international shipping, I ship on my own. So because I ship on my own internationally, because I always have, right? Back back even when we used to hand write customs forms and have to take them to the post office. So I've been doing it for 20 plus years. I never saw a reason to opt into eBay's. I understand there's benefits, that could be a whole other conversation, but for me, the benefits didn't out. I've never I don't have any issues shipping internationally. I never have. In in all the years I've been shipping internationally, I've had maybe one lost package. So for me, it, you know, and I don't accept, you know, international returns. eBay may force it once in a while. It that also has happened. Maybe I can count on one hand in 20 something years. So for me, the savings made more sense. But in any case, because I use Pirate Chip, Pirate Chip is only USPS or UPS, not FedEx.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, they don't have a FedEx integration.
SPEAKER_03Right. I have a daily pickup for USPS at my house. That's just a standing five-day week pickup. My mail lady is fantastic. She scans every package at my door. I know that that's an anomaly. I have a great mail lady. I tip her well, I appreciate her. But because of that, it needs to be more than one package for me to get in my car and drive down the street and go to UPS because otherwise I'm not putting pants on and leaving my house during the day. Like it's got to be more than one package saving 50 cents. Now, Katie and I both ship, right? So, and she feels the same way. So I know that we've both started talking in the last few weeks that UPS is cheaper a lot of times. And again, maybe it's going to be 10 packages in a day and it's a total of you know four or five dollars between the two of us. Well, four or five dollars a day every day, that's a lot of money. It adds up. And before getting in the car and driving half a mile down the street, it's not far. It's just 10 minutes out of my life. Um, if it were far, then you get away gas prices, time, all that kind of stuff. But it's not far.
SPEAKER_04But the other issue to keep in mind also is that um, you know, there's VQU, I think that's how you say it. Um that yeah, which I'd never heard about until we were talking about it the other day.
SPEAKER_03So I need to look into that now.
SPEAKER_04So that's run by, I believe Amazon owns it, but it's um it's the same thing as Pirate Ship, and it does integrate with eBay, and it also does have FedEx. So if you're somebody who wants to look at a third party, yeah, this might be one to look at because it does have FedEx. Um, and instead of they give you cash back. So you for how much money you spend with them, you get cash back, kind of like a rewards program.
SPEAKER_03So that right there is pretty great. I mean, we can ship a lot, right? So that's another discount on shipping. Put it, apply it to your account, use it to pay for shipping, right?
SPEAKER_04I mean, that's yeah, so it may be worth looking into. Um, maybe we can put the what it's called in the display.
SPEAKER_00I'm trying to remember how to sell it, even it's called V VQ or V Code or Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_04I saved it.
SPEAKER_03Hold on. Uh I saved it the other day.
SPEAKER_00So we can tell the listeners how to find it. It's basically Amazon put together like a logistics and shipping service that's yeah, it's very comprehensive.
SPEAKER_03V-E-E-Q-O.com.
SPEAKER_00V co. V Q, yeah.
SPEAKER_04So look at it, look into it. It may be worth, but for me, the other issue has become the idea of how do you balance time versus money versus all those things, right? I unlike you guys, I don't do this full-time. So I have a full-time job. So I mean, I do have a full full-time business, quotes, full-time business, but my daughter most of the time runs it. So, you know, I'm paying her to run it. So now I have someone else in the mix. When becomes it, when is it important to say to her, yeah, you got to stop going to FedEx every day, right?
SPEAKER_03Well, I think she's already a paid employee. I was gonna say she's already a paid employee. That becomes a thing. Not immediately my would it take her away for a long period of time from doing it?
SPEAKER_04But you know where I live.
SPEAKER_03I do.
SPEAKER_04Okay. I think it would take her a half an hour to get to the FedEx place. Oh, that's uh not an hour that I don't mind paying her, but it's an hour taken away from something else that we would be doing. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Here's my uh difference. Yeah, in my world, uh my son works for me. Um, you know. What the heck, man?
SPEAKER_03Why isn't my kid working for me? I'm getting screwed in the I might get the child too.
SPEAKER_00You need to hire it, it's nepotism, baby. You gotta get on it.
SPEAKER_04Nepotism works.
SPEAKER_00So my son, you know, my son earns about 20 an hour, and he the way I looked at it was if I ship 40 packages and I can shave you know a couple bucks off of half of them. I mean, that's what I pay him to do the shipping in two hours. So it's basically like um, and for me, my FedEx isn't a half an hour out of the way, it is literally like I'm so lucky in that regard. I have a USPS distribution center right nearby. I have FedEx and UPS in the same strip mall. And so for us, it becomes less of a big deal. Like he we just went out yesterday and did it together. Went out, got lunch, dropped the postage off, just did a loop, came back, it was super quick. So for me, I mean, I think this reinforces that for uh sellers, you need to look at your own individual situation, and but think about all of these factors like um oh, I'm only saving a buck by doing this. And I know some people like to do the thing, same thing every time, they don't want to ever change it up, but um that would make me when you when you repeat cycles over and over and over, that's where you suddenly are realizing that there's significant savings to be had. Um, and uh, you know, I don't mind. I I I think I I try to always look at the business from this, you know, a fresh set of eyes every week, or you know, at least every couple weeks. And where are ways that I can make little adjustments where my cycle time gets reduced, or um, you know, my per transaction cost for something is different.
SPEAKER_03But I mean that's the smart way to look at a business. You're looking at a business like a business person. This is not a hobby, right? And a lot of people treat this business as a hobby, or and and it can be for a lot of people, right?
SPEAKER_00Well, I've been forced to do it, right? By all these prices going up and all these costs going up.
SPEAKER_03But if you if this is your business, if this is how you earn your living, if this is a full-time gig for you and you're you're making money intentionally to support yourself or your family, you have to look at all these little micro costs that add up to bigger issues. Like I was saying, I may not have the kid working for me that I can send to drop stuff off. But between Katie and I, if we start implementing a lot more UPS, which I think we're going to, especially heading into Q4 and having more packages, um, it makes sense for us. What if it, what, so what, we take turns dropping it off one every other day? You know, five days a week. We take turns taking the drive half a mile down the street. If she's leaving the house anyway, or I'm leaving the house anyway, which is more rare for me to leave the house. But if I'm leaving the house anyway, then why not? It's for for me, it's a half a mile down the street. It's go in, drop off on the counter. They're super accommodating, just UPS. FedEx is another story. I would have to FedEx is like three to five miles away. I don't know inside of a Walmart. No, Walgreens takes it, I think. They do, but they don't always send it out the same day. Oh, okay. Or scan it the same day. So yes, I do have the Walgreens, but I don't trust it.
SPEAKER_00Okay, I feel so lucky. You the way you guys are describing your setups, like I'm mine's right down the street. It has a I don't even have to talk to anyone. There's a scanner there and a giant metal box that I throw it all in. Yeah, and I'm in and out in 30 seconds.
SPEAKER_03It's so see for FedEx for me, is I have to park, it's in Walmart, it's in a big plaza, it's a pain in the neck because the plaza is always crazy. So it's a big to-do, and then you have to wait in line at FedEx. Right. They don't inside the Walmart, and you to drop off, you have to wait in line. Yeah, and I'll do it if it's a big enough savings or big enough package or whatever, but I I don't like FedEx. So for me, UPS is it does make sense for me to do it now. So I think I I am gonna start paying more attention to it. We've been talking about. It Katie and I both for like the last week or two seeing the difference like okay, we really need to so not just that in the one package.
SPEAKER_04I just want to throw this out there. We are not going to discuss it because I don't think any of us do this, and I don't want to pretend that we're knowledgeable enough about this to talk about it, but I do want to put out there that eBay does have these rate tables, right? And you can do flat rate according to a rate table so that you could charge different zones. Um, and then within that zone, different things, um, so that you can actually have a flat rate that would probably or almost always cover your cost. It is quite intensive, it's quite intense to do it to figure it out. It's not an easy business policy, like not easy to set up. But if you have a big enough business, if you are somebody who is really needs to be really tight on your shipping costs, that may be something that you should look into. Um, and I do think that the larger players at eBay have been using these rate tables for years. The we have been able to escape by without them because of the way that the shipping has worked and how we do things, blah, blah, blah. Yeah. The floor is coming down or they're going down, we're going up, and it's becoming more even. And I think we a lot of us are gonna have to start looking at this probably in 2027.
SPEAKER_03I think it's gonna be an important thing and um for sure. I mean, here's the thing we know that eBay's shipping is complicated. I think that's something that we've all talked about, we've taught about it one way or another. That if you can master shipping on eBay, you can handle any platform. If you can master listing on eBay, you can handle any platform.
SPEAKER_00Do you think it's eBay shipping is complicated or just shipping is complicated?
SPEAKER_03Shipping is complicated. I don't think I think shipping is complicated, but also eBay shipping is complicated. If you're thinking about doing flat rate or business policies, that's not easy. It's not intuitive to figure those out.
SPEAKER_00There is a learning curve on that. I don't think.
SPEAKER_03If you just click off, you know, calculated shipping, sure. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Anybody can do that. But dialing into shipping and making sure that you are the most competitive by understanding business policies in one way or another, I think that is the most complicated thing about eBay as a platform in general. I don't think any other platform makes it difficult. I think they make it so that uh Poshmark being the perfect example.
SPEAKER_04Okay, but we can't compare. I no, they're completely different. This is the thing about this. We get into these discussions, and I don't mean you personally, Vic. I mean we as in resellers get into these discussions, and people say, why can't they just do what X does? Right. And recently eBay changed their terms of service, right? And they put a caveat in that said something about that you may get put into this shipping program, this new shipping program. And I run a mastermind class, and and they all came in and they're like, Did you see this? This is gonna be, they're gonna go to Poshmark shipping. And I was like, No way, no way they're ever doing that, right?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, you're talking about this new thing they have called ship with eBay.
SPEAKER_04Ship with eBay, and so I went on my high horse and I was like, they're never gonna do this, blah, blah, blah, blah, which I still don't, I still think I'm right. But then it came out the ship with eBay thing came out, and a whole bunch of people had to eat your words. Well, I don't think I did. They thought a couple of them thought I had to eat my words, but it's so narrowed down, it's for brand new sellers only. Oh no, I think I don't see how they can do it across the board, Vec.
SPEAKER_03I don't see how they can force people into the new shipping. I think it's gonna be voluntary.
SPEAKER_00I think at this point it's it's only a value add for the platform, it's not required. It's in fact, no one that we know is gonna qualify for it. I mean, so many things eliminate you from it using business policies. Using seller of, yeah, those were all um those will eliminate you from from that program. I think it's at this point, it's clearly just a way to be more attractive to new sellers who are just learning, getting on the platform. And I think that's great. Um I'm definitely not one of these sellers.
SPEAKER_03I think it'll bring some of the sellers that think so much easier and they think shipping is intimidating on eBay. I don't I don't disagree with that.
SPEAKER_00Well, and eBay having acquired Depop, I mean, I think that um that's the way things are gonna go. If if younger and newer sellers are gonna come onto the platform, clearly that model. Um, I mean, you said it, Vicky, shipping's complicated. Shipping on eBay is complicated, and making that easier is um as I recall in my time working at eBay, the number one complaint of customers of potential sellers, why aren't you selling on the platform? It was always shipping, the complications of shipping. And so I'm excited that they're doing that and experimenting with it. Um, I know the biggest fear a lot of sellers, and Chris, you can probably testify to this because you talk to so many sellers. Their biggest fear is that eBay's gonna make a change and force it on everybody, they're all gonna have to do the same thing.
SPEAKER_03Everything, everything eBay does, they think it's everything is gonna be forced. You own your business, eBay is a vehicle to help you run a business.
SPEAKER_02Yep, period.
SPEAKER_03Like, I understand they think everything's forced, they don't they don't control you. Come on now, have some autonomy, you don't have to do it.
SPEAKER_00So, hey, let me um before we move on, I wanted to talk about you both shared that you're doing a flat rate um shipping, and I do free. So I just wanted to talk a little bit about that and why I do it that way. Um, and then see if you guys have any thoughts about it. So I do free shipping on everything that I sell. It's a risky model because um it forces me to set my prices to accommodate the cost of shipping, and when shipping is volatile like it is right now, then um it puts me more at risk. Um, some adjustments I've made uh on my CD market where I use uh uh media mail, I my minimum sale price was 999 before I made it 1099, so I added 10%. Um, and so that's kind of covered me there. Um, and then on the items that require me to use uh um eBay uh ground advantage, or I don't really use priority, but or FedEx, um, I have shifted upwards the the floor of the value of items that I will sell. And I've also had to look at my margins um and make sure that I'm not overspending at the low end. And this is another thing I want to kind of get your take on is this idea of um I wrote this down here so I wouldn't forget the thought. The danger of looking at gross margin instead of the dollars earned. So, in other words, um back in the day, I would say, hey, ten cents on the dollar, I'll spend 10 cents on the dollar, and that seems like a safe bet. So if I buy something, if I sell something for 10, I need to buy it for a dollar, and then if I sell it for a hundred, I could buy it for ten dollars. But I've realized now, especially with the volatility of shipping, that I can't think that way anymore. That the ten dollar if I sell an item for ten dollars, it has to be free to me. Like, I can't even spend a dollar on it, even a twenty dollar item, I can't spend two dollars on it. Like it's not I just you know, there's so many other things eating out off of my dinner plate now that I have to think about it that way. But when I sell a hundred dollar item, I'll spend like 40 bucks to make that $100 because my transactional cost to me as a business is the same. I'm doing the same amount of work, I'm cleaning it the same, I'm storing it the same, I'm packing it the same. So that cost doesn't go up at all. So um the only thing that does go up is my risk. Because if I sell if I pay 40 for something and then the transaction goes sideways, now I'm I've lost $40. But, anyways, I wanted to ask you guys what your thought is, why you don't do free shipping, if you think I'm crazy or super risky or um, yeah, just what do you guys think?
SPEAKER_04I did free shipping, I did free shipping for years and years. That was my model. Uh-huh. Um, and I thought at the time it was needed in my category. I am gonna say to you, Chuck, that I am somebody who believes that some of these things are category specific, right? Yeah, if everybody in the CD category has free shipping, or the majority of everybody in the CD shipping had I mean, CD category has free shipping, then you got to do free shipping to say to stay relevant, to get up and search, to get all those things. Um, free shipping was the norm when I started in used clothing, it slowly changed.
SPEAKER_00Um, it's the Amazon Prime effect, right? Correct Amazon Prime came out, and all of a sudden now it's the default. Like, well, shipping needs to be free because it's like you can buy it over here for free.
SPEAKER_04Exactly. So that changed, thank goodness. So when that changed, I waited too long and I did something stupid. So I'm gonna give you my don't do this, Jack. Okay, I changed everything in a day. I went from free shipping to paid shipping in one day. And you tanked the algorithm. Tanked my store like you cannot believe drastic changes. eBay does not like drastic changes. So now if somebody comes to me and asks me advice for this, for that, I say to them, do like five percent of your store, wait a little while, do another five. Like I would do it very slowly, or one small category within subcategory within clothing. Um, I did it all at once, and it was a very bad decision, but neither here nor there, I just couldn't sustain it. I wasn't making, I was losing money every day. Um on free shipping. On free shipping.
SPEAKER_00Was it because that that you were not good at estimating the amount it would cost you to ship? Or was it because shipping prices were going up and you weren't adjusting your prices?
SPEAKER_04Neither of those, I think. I think that um people in the used clothing um weren't looking at the total cost. I don't think for whatever reason, I don't know how you guys feel about this, but I think left-hand navigation wasn't being so they were just looking, and it was like plus shipping or whatever, but they were just looking at the cost of the item. And so even though mine included the shipping, I just couldn't the prices I couldn't when I went up, I wouldn't sell. So there was like a floor, and if I went above that, I mean a ceiling, and if I went above it, I wasn't selling, whether it's free shipping or not.
SPEAKER_00Do you think that there is a per there are sellers out there who are because they're not good at business, and I'm trying to be as gentle as I can here in how I say this. Um, and they so they don't manage their profitability as much that they drag the whole marketplace down. Like when you put your free shipping price where it needs to be for you to make money, there's still people that are going to be like 20% below that that you know are not making any money, but they just not good business people, yes. And and so now you have to compete with that with people with other people's sort of, you know, at least until their business flames out because they're not making anything.
SPEAKER_04I think there's a lot of people. I mean, I I Vicky says I say this all the time about numbers. I'm always like, Well, what did you buy it for? How much did it cost? What are you doing? What do you mean? How much did that cost to sell? People don't know these numbers.
SPEAKER_03They don't. I'm not kidding.
SPEAKER_04They don't know these numbers.
SPEAKER_03There's a lot of people that don't understand their numbers, they don't know them in in and out. And then they're surprised when they do their taxes. Um, you know, these are the same people that I do as I say, not as I do, but these are the same people that I say, you need to settle your books weekly or monthly. If you don't know what your numbers are, you need to be on top of accounting until you learn what your numbers are. Now, I'm one of I'm the person that does my taxes one day a year. I don't do anything all day long, all the all year long. I dread it. And then I hold myself up, which is by the way, is tomorrow. Um, I hold myself up. I I follow for an extension every year. I hold myself up for an entire day and torture myself for six or eight hours and do all my accounting in one day. Now, is that the right way to do it? Hell no. But that's my way because I'm not sure. And I've been doing it that way for more than a dozen years. And she knows her numbers, right? Like, that's what I'm gonna say. That's what I'm gonna say. But I know my numbers, I know where my bottom line is, and I'm really close all the time. I I don't have to account, you know. I've been doing this long enough. I know where my profit lays, I know how much money I'm making, I know if I need to change something about it. Now, if you're someone that doesn't really know those numbers, you should be doing it, like I said, weekly or monthly, or or trying to figure out where your numbers are. And even if you don't do it forever, I challenge you to do it for 90 days. 90 days. If you don't know where your numbers are, you need to do reconcile your weekly numbers every week for 90 days, and that's gonna give you a much better picture of where you stand financially than if you're just saying, I bought this for a dollar and I sold it for 20, I'm winning. Right. You don't know.
SPEAKER_04No, and I agree with you. And I also think there is this sense of when I say things like, What's your what's your str? What's you know, what's this, what's that? They don't even know what these words mean. They don't know what those words mean, right? What's the gross profit compared to your net profit? All those things, you know, and I know we're getting kind of off the topic of shipping a little, but all of these things get into the shipping, right? So how much money you spend on shipping can end up being your biggest cost, like I think you're kind of figuring out, Chuck, that it's now become way more of a cost than just the item is, is what you need to ship it. And I think free shipping is difficult for a couple of reasons. I think it becomes a psychological thing, right? Where they don't, they really aren't thinking about the shipping, they are thinking it's free. I honest to God don't think some people, and I mean consumers, not resellers, think that the ship, oh, it's free shipping, somebody's paying for it.
SPEAKER_00Yes, when you hide it, when you obfuscate it, I think in the back of their mind there's a little thing like someone's got to be paying for it. But no, you're right. I I have this, and the reason I know this is because I have buyers who will make me an offer, and I'll write back to them, I'll say, look, my shipping cost to you is going to be this. So I'm willing to like basically not make any money on this, but I need at least this amount, and they'll come back all like either I don't believe you, or I never knew it was that much, or you know, it's like it never occurred to them that there's actually some money that I have to pay to some courier to get the item to them.
SPEAKER_03They also and by they I mean the general public, they have zero idea what shipping costs are. Nobody has any clue.
SPEAKER_00I think a lot of sellers have zero idea what shipping costs are. I agree with that too.
SPEAKER_03That might be true, but a general consumer, the person that buys occasionally online but usually uses Amazon Prime, no, that's that's the majority of the phone.
SPEAKER_00If you want a real wake up call, go go to a post office just as an average Joe and put a three-pound package on the counter and try to ship it across the country and see what the retail rate is on that. Holy cow.
SPEAKER_03So that's what I tell people. When I have somebody that sends me a message and they're like blah blah blah blah blah, they want this for this price, and I'll say, Listen, here's the thing. I'm gonna want, here's my zip code, here's your zip code. Would you please go to USPS and put your in put the information in this is a two-pound package going from me to you, and you tell me what the shipping cost is. Yep, and a lot, and every time they go, Oh.
SPEAKER_00Yep.
SPEAKER_03I think they're their theme of detail rate, right? They don't know that we're getting it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and I I mean, I'm sort of being uh a little bit hyperbolic about you know how I have with my buyers that reach out to me, but you know, I try to be understanding and I try to educate them and give them a little knowledge. Um, and the other the other side of that also is just communicating a lot of times communicating to them that I'm a small business, right? I'm not I'm not Amazon. I can't have a warehouse full of like pallets of return garbage that I can sell to people to like recoup my investment, you know. And sometimes that'll wake them up a little bit. You know, I do put a decal on every one of my packages that says thank you for supporting my small business. It's just another way to sort of plant that seed, like, oh, okay, this isn't a corporation that I'm screwing if I like return this item.
SPEAKER_04I think you're 100% right. I don't think a lot of the people they think eBay is one giant thing. Same thing with Amazon. They think Amazon's all one thing when we all know it isn't. Well, we know it isn't because of what we do for a living. Not everybody understands how this works, and so some of it I think is true about the postage too. They don't understand how expensive it is, they're just used to getting it in the mail, and so they don't understand that.
SPEAKER_00So and a lot of the new platforms that are popular now, like whatnot, I think obfuscate a lot of that from buyers too. So they um, and boy, I'm susceptible to this. I'll go on to a whatnot show and buy something, and then all of a sudden shipping's free now.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Because I bought, you know, now I've it's like sunk costs.
SPEAKER_03You bought so many things, yes.
SPEAKER_00You bought a couple things.
SPEAKER_03You're like, I'm committed, I'm just gonna buy everything now.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Regarding shipping, it's going up. It's caused me to rethink what my minimum amount is that I would sell something for. We'll call it minimum viable transaction. Do do each of you have like a uh a minimal, a minimum viable amount of money that you would sell an item for, either with or without shipping? Does it vary by category? Um, I'll go to Vicky. What do you think about that?
SPEAKER_03So for me, I my lowest item price used to be around $25.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_03Um, and that was when shipping was more reasonable. I haven't increased it. In fact, I've actually kind of what you're doing of clearancing out or getting rid of your lower priced stuff. I've clearanced out a lot of old stagnant items and I drop it to $15 when it's that. I don't go below $15. Because when I run a sale, 15 plus shipping or $15 plus. Okay, I just want in some yeah, $15 plus shipping. And I, you know, that way when I run a sale, even if it's as high as 30 or 40% off, which I will do in category every once in a while. I'll do a uh a weekend sale trying to move um items, you know, at least I'm still making something. But when I'm when I drop it as low as $15, listen, that's that's the bare bones for me. I'm gonna donate it next because it's you know, I'm not gonna sell something for a $2 profit or a no profit, you know.
SPEAKER_00If you do that, if you drop something to force a sale to $15, is that a break-even scenario, or do are you making anything on it?
SPEAKER_03In some cases, if I paid a buck or two, I'm making I'm making a little bit. Usually this stuff is long is old enough when I get to that point that I've also paid a three-dollar listing fee to have it listed because I don't I don't use a lister anymore because you know, cut in costs, volume isn't what it was, so I do it all myself now. But I used to pay a lister $3 an item. So if I'm paying $3 an item plus the cost of goods, oh that's huge. And then you've got your your fees and everything on top of that. So it made sense when I was doing more volume and higher sales and higher average sale price, of course. I wouldn't have done it if it didn't make sense. But on those items now, I probably have a minimum of five dollars invested in it. So if I sell it for $15, take off all the fees, it's probably just over break even. I'm maybe making a buck or two. It's just let get it out. You know, maybe I've recouped my money, but I'm I'm recouping a hanger in my, you know, my storage or a a square inch in my bins or something.
SPEAKER_04And you're also you're also paying the three dollars that you you're getting the initial investment. Right. I'm recouping back my initial investment, is really it.
SPEAKER_03I might not be making a profit, but it's hey, this this thing's not moving, right? I need to get it out one way or the other. So I have you know more capital to buy better inventory.
SPEAKER_00I don't pay anyone to do like there's no sunk cost I have where I paid labor that I now have sunk into the item. So I tend to like be real snap decision to like uh eliminate things from the inventory. I usually buy it's so low because I'm garage sales, estate sales, this kind of thing. Um, I just took I filled the entire car and took it to Goodwill yesterday. Um, I decided not to have a garage sale or whatever because I I just the call at the time uh the opportunity cost I would lose of spending a day doing a garage sale was so high that for me. I just um and I didn't need to get three dollars of listing feedback from anyone.
SPEAKER_04So I just you know I I I sell stuff really cheap all the time. I I do. I sell stuff really cheap all of the time. But your buy cost is really low. My buy cost is less than usually 25 cents.
SPEAKER_00Um you say really cheap, like at a loss or just like barely making anything.
SPEAKER_04No, I I make money. I mean, I have I ever lost money, yes. Of course, I have, you know, but no, and I mean in general, but I just wanted to clarify your statement.
SPEAKER_00Like, you're not in the habit of regularly doing like loss leaders to drive to drive like cash flow or whatever.
SPEAKER_04No, um, but I will but I will put everything on sale and take way less than I probably you know would have the week before. Yeah for a couple of reasons. A, I'm almost at 11,000 items. I mean, almost at 10,000. I would like to be down to five or so thousand items. And to be between the three of us, not that anyone's ever gonna hear this, I don't want to sell used clothing anymore, right? So I would like to be out of this um, out of this uh niche. I wouldn't I want a new niche. So for me, if I can make two bucks on something and it's out of my house, I'm good. Do I want that? No, that isn't my preferred. I prefer when I make yesterday I sold a jacket for 150 bucks. That makes me very happy. This morning I sold something for eight bucks plus shipping. That doesn't make me as happy, but it's out.
SPEAKER_03I think it's just really gonna depend on what your goal is with your business. And and I think Trisha's definitely in flux right now, trying to figure out what she wants to do and how she wants to do it. And I'm I'm settled with where I am, but I will say I have definitely expanded over the last couple of years. I've I'm not just um a vintage niche seller anymore because the market changes, right? And I need to have more, a little bit more velocity, which means I needed to add more variety to my categories. Um, not because I necessarily have a great interest in other categories because I don't, but I have great interest in paying my bills.
SPEAKER_04No, see, and it's funny because Vic is driven by the things she loves, right? Like the clothing and the vintage, and she loves it. And it tells her story and it makes you happy. Right, makes her happy. Katie, the same thing. She loves the t shirts. I'm not driven by any of this, I'm driven by money. She would sell forks. If I would sell forks if forks are gonna make me a millionaire. If the double bikers are gonna do it, I'm selling them.
SPEAKER_00Like I have no that's yeah, selling widgets. You're just it's the the object is not as important as it is to correct. And there's something to be said for both of those models.
SPEAKER_03I agree. I agree. My brother is a big Amazon seller. My brother is he doesn't care what the he's a widget, it's all he's a widget seller, it's all numbers.
SPEAKER_00He's just data, numbers, like whatever is gonna there's some arbitrage there to be had. Yeah, no, and I get that. I would probably my personal style is that um the passion for the things that I sell keeps me from getting burned out.
SPEAKER_02Same.
SPEAKER_00So I that's why I uh stick in certain categories, and uh I like to buy and sell in areas where I have knowledge. Um, I I feel like, and this is probably dumb, but I feel like a maybe like a fraud if I am in a category that I don't know much about and I know there's money to be made, but I'm not authentic or whatever.
SPEAKER_03Well then that's I realize this is probably totally stupid, but uh I don't think that's fraudulent at all, but I get what you're saying about wanting to I I the burnout thing, wanting to be in categories that you feel knowledgeable about and that excite you, because otherwise this is just a jobby job, right? And it's the burnout is a real thing that happens no matter what, I think, uh occasionally.
SPEAKER_04So I you know I'll tell you a quick level then I'm a total fraud because Vicky knows me, someone needs to tell me what to wear because most of the time I don't know. I'll say to her, Does this look okay?
SPEAKER_00Oh, believe me, I'm not calling anyone a fraud. I'm saying this is my own personal uh thing that I struggle with.
SPEAKER_04I wasn't insulted, I'm just saying it's that imposter syndrome.
SPEAKER_00Like, I'm not well, I'll tell you a story is um I realized that I go to a lot of yard sales that have yarn, um, skeins of yarn, and I've learned that a thing of yarn is called a skein. And I would go to these sales and there'd be a whole binful, and I'd I realized there was money to be made there, so I started buying yarn when I could, and then man, these sewing ladies would sniff me out. They're like, You're not buying this for you, you know. They and so I forced myself to learn all this stuff about like the different needles and the different kinds of crocheting and and knitting and all these different things, so that I could at least be like, Oh no, I know about that. And I so you can lie better at garage sales. No, I'm not, I wouldn't say lying is the way, and to be fair, if anyone ever asks me if I'm selling the things I buy from them, I say yes. I say yes 100% of the time, even when it's super uncomfortable and cringy to do so. I still do it, I don't lie to anyone. But I don't actually had some really great conversations with people, and I like to learn new things, so it's um uh it's fun to find a category, there's money to be made, but also, oh now I'm learning about what all these different things are, and uh had some really interesting conversations with ladies about knitting, so it worked out.
SPEAKER_04I I don't care about that kind of stuff, none of their business. None of their business. If as long as I'm paying or Vicky's paying what they ask for, I don't feel like it's none of your business what I'm doing with it.
SPEAKER_00So if they say, Are you selling this? What do you say?
SPEAKER_03No, I'll say eventually.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I'll usually say, Well, sometimes I'll be cagey, like, oh, I collect, but you know, I gotta fund the hobby, right?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, but it's true. I'm not sure. Not untrue, but I'm not I I mean, I'm not gonna lie straight out where if someone were to ask me directly. They don't ask very often, to be fair. Um, but I would say, you know, I'm like, no, I'm a reseller, or I have a resale shop, or if they're gonna if I'm gonna sell it eventually, eventually is my good answer when someone says, Are you gonna sell that? Eventually. I try to use it first. You interpret that the way you want. Yeah, it's gonna sit in my car for five minutes, and then I'm gonna sell it.
SPEAKER_00There you go. Hopefully, I'm gonna enjoy it for the drive home until I get home, and then I'm gonna take a picture of it. I try to channel my inner Kevin, like Commonwealth Picker, because when you watch his videos, he always says he's selling the stuff, he never lies. He's like this compulsively honest guy, and he even when it's super cringy, but he's also disarming and folksy. So I think that people are like, okay.
SPEAKER_03I'm not disarming or folksy, so no one's gonna tell me that from me. Okay, that was really funny, but I'm abrasive and obnoxious. Yeah, I also think I'm like, Do you want my money or not?
SPEAKER_04Exactly. Exactly. Vicky and I are kind of like, what do you mean? You want a buck? I'm giving you a buck. What's this available?
SPEAKER_00I thought this was a transaction. I give you money, you give me a thing. Like, exactly. What are we talking about here? Why is it? I mean, some people die on the sword for that. They love the concept that their old thing is going to some good home. And I hear that term good home all the time. I'm glad it's going to a good home. And I'm like, oh, they think I'm in love with this item.
SPEAKER_03Um, listen, I'm not adopting your child or your dog, exactly.
SPEAKER_04But here's the thing about that. For me, if I tell people I'm a reseller, I'm not one of those people who hide it. No, I'm not gonna hide that part. Yeah, so in the sense of that Kevin tells everybody he's a reseller, so do I. So if you ask me what do you do for a living, I say I'm a reseller. Like that is not something I hide. And there are a lot of resellers who don't.
SPEAKER_03No, there's a lot of opportunities that come from being honest about that important factor of being a reseller. You can be a reseller. We got a lot of hard rap out there, resellers in general. I don't, I don't think you need to be a scumbag to be a reseller. You can make good money doing this business and doing it kindly and ethically agreed.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I I had uh I think early on I I got the confidence to understand that I'm providing value to this um uh product life cycle that exists, right? Yeah, you know, I the work I do as a reseller adds a lot of value. Um, when people say something to me like, oh, I'm glad this is going to a good home, I just sort of smile because I'm like, it actually is going to go to a very good home. It's gonna go to somebody who's willing to go on eBay eventually and pay full price for it because it's that valuable to them. And then I know that I'm a good seller and I'm they're gonna get a quality product that's gonna be backed up and it's gonna be truck for sale and all, you know, they're gonna get it and be um over uh I'm gonna over-deliver. So, you know, I don't sit around all the time feeling guilty ever about being a reseller. I I think uh when people say uh, oh, you know, filthy resellers or they're ruining everything. I you know, I just don't think they've really fought through that. We all live in a capitalist system. Agreed. And do you go into Walmart and say, wait a minute, you mean you guys paid a nickel for this ear of corn? Why am I paying a dollar for it? What the hell?
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, nobody's doing that.
SPEAKER_03No, we have an awful we have a we have a big responsibility in a circular economy and um and preserving resources. And overall, resellers are a huge asset to that. Um not it not a detriment to that. I I think without resellers, we have so much refuse and waste in this country and in many countries, but in this country specifically, that um I think the world would be inundated with so much more crap in our in our landfills if we didn't exist.
SPEAKER_04Watch watch that Brandy Melville um oh documentary documentary. Oh my, that is atrocious. Makes you want to do this even more.
SPEAKER_00What is that that one? Just briefly.
SPEAKER_04It's a it's about a store. Um a terrible store, but it's on the store. It's on Netflix, it's about the store. Brandy Melville, it's a store, and it's about how they treat their workers and the girls who work there. But as like a side thing, it's all about what happens to their clothing after it's done. And so it has all of this textile waste in it. And so while the documentary itself isn't really about reselling at all, it has this huge component of this textile waste, and so you realize how important it is to keep this stuff out of the landfill, and because it ends up going to most of it ends up going to third world countries where it just polluting their beaches and polluting oh yeah and trash and it shouldn't be United States in general, shouldn't be happening, yeah. But it's it's it's it's an interesting documentary if anyone hasn't seen it. And that the Brandy Melville part is whatever, it's not good, but but the textile stuff is really interesting, and it kind of opens your eyes to how big it is of a issue.
SPEAKER_02Good.
SPEAKER_04All right, so to bring this back to shipping for one second, I just want to say that there was an announcement that came out by Pirate Ship yesterday, and Pirate Ship sent this out to their members or to people who use their service, but it it does affect everybody that USPS has announced that they are saying that UP USPS Ground Advantage is now going to 10-day handling, you know, 10-day ship time average for outside of the continuous, contiguous United States, thank you, Alaska, Hawaii, Guam, US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, so on Marshall Islands, so on and so on, that now shipping could take up to 10 days to get there. Um, so it doesn't affect anyone within the continental USA. I'm not saying that word anymore. Um, but that just to be aware for fourth quarter, if somebody writes you and says, Why haven't I received this? Just so you guys know.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. I I I actually stopped shipping to those places.
SPEAKER_04Um wait, wait, yeah, you don't ship to Hawaii?
SPEAKER_00No.
SPEAKER_04Oh, what is it?
SPEAKER_00Because it's just so much. Here's why. And I'm not an anti-Hawaii or whatever. Anti-Hawaii. The cost, the premium to ship to Hawaii and Alaska and Guam and Puerto Rico is so high now. And because my shipping model is free, I it's such an outlier for me. The more that um, what what tends to happen is because I have free shipping, it effectively means that the people that live farthest away from me are getting subsidized, and the people that live closest to me are subsidizing me. And it strikes a balance, and it's usually that balance is fine, like there's some give and some take, but those outliers now are making it so like pushing that so far towards the loss side for me that rather than go through and raise all my shipping, my uh total sale prices for everything. Now I'm what happens when I do that is now I'm subsidizing Alaska and Hawaii, and those people then gravitate to me because now they're getting a subsidy to buy from me that all my other closer buyers are paying. That's why I turned it off.
SPEAKER_04So if you go to a either a calculated or a flat rate model, you are not opposed to shipping outside of the continental US.
SPEAKER_00If I was doing calculated, it wouldn't matter at all. Although, um, I'll go back to what Vicky said at the top of the podcast, which was uh those people ain't gonna be buying anything from you because the shipping is gonna be so high. Calculated shipping from me in Portland, Oregon to like Puerto Rico or even New York State is insane or a one-pound item. And if they can find somebody close to them, I mean I'm I'm not even probably gonna show up very high in the search results because my total cost with shipping is going to be so high that I just won't I won't even be shown to those kinds of buyers.
SPEAKER_04And um well, the reason I asked is because you guys all must remember when people would be like, I will not ship outside the continental US, and they would have these big things on their eBay, but you know, and it was all in different colors. You remember all this?
SPEAKER_03Yes, yes, and people would be like, and I would be like, Why do you hate why do you hate Alaska? What do you mean? No hate for Alaska from from Chuck. I understand the reasoning behind it with the way that you it's the financial decision.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, um, I love shipping to wherever I can. I mean, I I used to ship internationally and then EIS came in, eBay international shipping. Um, I still ship through EIS, not nearly as much as I used to, and I think it's because of the tariffs are making it so expensive for those folks.
SPEAKER_03That's not many more.
SPEAKER_04Did you guys get that email from eBay yesterday about the the international shipping and what's changing and that the number about the EU regulations?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I mean I've been following it for a while anyway, because of eBay government relations. We knew it was coming down and coming down the pike. It doesn't really affect clothing sellers yet. Yet it's going that doesn't mean that it won't. Right. Um, the biggest, and this is a whole other conversation, but the biggest upcoming issue or possible issue is when it does start affecting um is is currently in talks and probably won't be discussed or or legislated on until next year is whether something is used or not. Country of origin is going to be the biggest issue because if you sell used items, country of origin is not always prevalent, especially used vintage items. You don't know where the hell something comes from. And you're either gonna have to lie to comply with the with forcing you to put something in there or not sell. And it's really going to affect us. But that's that's another conversation.
SPEAKER_04But that email I got yesterday, that email I think will affect Chuck quite a bit. I mean, he Yeah, the one about yeah, those three different numbers that you need to have to be able to send it outside of the different electronics. And the first number, I'll send it to you, Chuck. It's very, or maybe we can put it in the the description box.
SPEAKER_00It's just like anything else. Um, I try not to, you know, go to the dark place immediately when that was something like this changes. I what I do is just look at what is my cost uh to comply, what is my lost opportunity cost if I spend time now um versus if I eliminate my inventory from EIS and I don't worry about it at all, what would I lose by doing that? So I'll just have to figure it out. And uh, I mean it's been getting more and more stringent with the EU, um, especially with things that have batteries in them or chemical plugs in work.
SPEAKER_02Yep.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and like you said, Vicky, country of origins becoming more important, and sometimes I identifying that is a challenge just because either A, it's not marked, or B, the item is is constructed of items from many original locations, right? Different components are made to figure that out, you know. Right, right. You know, it's it's complicated. And I'm I do see more and more of my items. Um when eBay first rolled out EIS, I would get items, they would end listings because I listed them in EIS and it would say, in Germany, this item is not you know allowed compliant. So we're completely ending your listing. I like I can't sell it to somebody in Colorado because you and they've sort of fixed that a little bit. I think it's but um I'll have it'll be a wait and see game to see you know what impact it has on um on my time and uh whether it's worth continuing to sell into the EU. I think it's a real it's really unfortunate. I I get I think I the EU are pioneers on just protecting consumers, protecting the environment there, and I applaud them for that. But on the other hand, it's such a bummer when that market doesn't have access to cool vintage stuff from the US.
SPEAKER_04That makes no sense, you know.
SPEAKER_00Um, I don't know if you know this, but in um in the US, once a car becomes 25 years old, and you can import it into the US as an antique, as a sort of you know, so the US has allowances in the law for like people are importing these cool little mini cars from Japan because people in Japan take super good care of their stuff, so they can get a 25-year-old car that almost looks brand new, import it into the US, and it doesn't have to comply with all the like you know laws and stuff. It would be nice if there was some allowance like that, just fully internationally, where I could sell a cool vintage item and not have to worry about a lot of these details that you know at the end of the day, is it really hurt potentially to hurt? Is there potential to hurt anybody? I don't know, and it doesn't seem like it.
SPEAKER_04Agreed.
SPEAKER_00Big missed opportunity, anyways.
SPEAKER_04Agreed.
SPEAKER_00All right, well, I think we've hit the shipping thing pretty hard. Is there any other uh stuff we want to cover today? I feel like we've we've uh put a bow on this episode.
SPEAKER_03We went on the rails, we went off the rails about shipping. Well, bit, that's all right. I mean, I think that's to be expected, right? We have three different perspectives and personalities here.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely, and I'd like to know um from listeners as we develop this podcast, as you guys listen to us, what you like, what you don't like. Do you like when we go on tangents? Do you like to hear the more personal stories about what's going on? Um, you want us to stick to the script more? Um, because you know, at the end of the day, what I want to help sellers and uh and give them what they want here.
SPEAKER_03Agreed. And what kind of topics would you like us to cover? We have we have uh several ideas. I mean, how could we not? We all like to talk. However, we might want to hear what the listeners want to hear, not just what we want to talk about, right?
SPEAKER_00Absolutely.
SPEAKER_03Well, thank you guys. This is fun.
SPEAKER_00Always fun. We call it a wrap.
SPEAKER_03And that's a wrap on episode two.