eBay Sellers: Beware of Dropshipping
Dropshipping Doesn't Pan Out on Ebay
Battered but not broken, I picked myself up from my Ebay failure and tried again. Garage sales were my next stop. I actually did make a very small profit going this route. I bought things cheap at local yard sales and listed them for sale. My spirits were buoyed by the few dollars profit I made after paying Ebay fees. It was also a great way to get some positive feedback, which is your reputation on Ebay, and very important.
Next I began tearing through my house and garage, searching for anything that might sell. I did find a set of dishes that sold for a lot, and this is how I made the most money. It was a great feeling to know that whatever my items sold for was completely profit. Unfortunately, my tap of sellable goods quickly ran dry. (My husband put a stop to the madness when I started rifling through his closet.)
Now I was back to square one. Garage sale items were making me only a few dollars, and I decided that I wanted to use Ebay to make some bigger income. I started researching, and found that dropshippers were touting their services as a way to do just that.
The idea behind dropshipping is simple: you start by finding a dropshipper that sells items for wholesale price. They have pictures and descriptions on their websites, which they allow you to use for your Ebay listings, and you set your price higher than theirs. Then when someone buys and pays you for the item, you simply go to the dropshipper's website, buy it from them, and the difference is your profit. They even use your return address when they ship it to the customer, so that your buyer is never any wiser. Sounds genius, right?
It sounded great to me too. I spent hours researching, trying to find just the right dropshipper. When I found one, I went to Ebay and started listing. At first I was so excited by the variety of items that I was able to list for sale. I chose name-brand products and things that I would like to have. I marked the items up slightly, and waited for the money to start rolling in.
My listings have all ended, and I'm still waiting. I really did give dropshipping a fair try. I listed the items under 'Buy it Now', which means that your customer pays a set price and doesn't have to wait for an auction to end. When that didn't work, I tried listing items as auctions. Still no luck. I tried different types of products and relisted others at lower price, with only a marginal profit for myself. Overall, I have listed over 200 dropship items for sale. I have sold only three.
Keep in mind that it's not free to list items on Ebay. Depending on the starting price and pictures you choose to list, it cost me between ten cents and three dollars for each item I listed. The items that I sold made barely enough to cover the fees that I was charged, leaving me with a grand profit of...nothing. If you take into account the hours that I spent researching and listing, dropshipping has actually left me in the red.
So, back to the garage sales I go. I have resigned myself to the fact that I will probably never make any kind of sizable income on Ebay. I try to keep my head up, though, and focus on the bright side. It's more fun than work, and I do make a little money. In fact, I'm already planning how I'll spend my next profit. With my next ten sales, I think I'll take my family out to dinner.
Published by Jessica Dye
My name is Jessica Dye, and I am a professional proofreader and editor. I was an English major at Xavier University, and have been providing proofreading and editing services to professional and amateur com... View profile
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11 Comments
Post a CommentJessica seems to be trying to make a case against dropshipping, but she falls way short. The reason she didn't sell anything much had nothing to do with who her supplier was, she simply failed to do the most basic research. On eBay you can search for an item and limit the search to only completed auctions and sales. When you do this you can then get a good idea very quickly as to what items actually do sell and for how much money. If Jessica had taken this small and simple step she would have been able to determine which items in her chosen dropshipper's inventory had sold well in the past; if few of them had done well she would then have known it was time to find a different supplier. But nothing in this article gives any reason why dropshipping itself is a bad idea, it only shows that Jessica didn't exercise due diligence before jumping in.
According to ebay rules of having to have the items you are selling yourself, I doubt it's legal or ethical. Don't bid or buy PRE-ORDERS either, that is not legal, ethical and MANY times it takes forever to get your item or you get a sudden refund with a note from the lousy seller saying the item is no longer available for sale or some such. Be careful!
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On my other goods I do make about $20 per sale average but I am stocking $250000 of inventory and doing all the packages and unloading of orders.
I know $1500 per year is not good but that is only 50 items listed. If I can list 1000 items it might do better.
So, you can't listen to one person about something. Normally sellers and people in general will not give you any specific info or real numbers. They all generalize which does not prove anything. I tried to put things in to real terms everyone can use to make a judgement to see if something is worth their time to do.
I repeat, $1500 per year is not getting rich but most people work for $10 per hour. These people I am sure would like to make $10 typing someone's address in to a drop shippers web site.
The trick is to grow that 150 sales per year to much more obviously.
Thanks for your time.
P.S. I recently found another drop shipper of the same goods with lower prices so that will also boost my p
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The drop shipper offers 20000 different items but I tried 50 that were in my field.
Basically I make an extra $1500 a year after all fees are paid and all I have to do is log in 150 times per year to the drop shippers site to enter the shipping address to the customer. I sell about 3 items per week from the drop shipper so that is how I came up with the 150 times per year. If you do the math, I make average $10 per sale doing nothing more than typing an address and paying my credit card bill at the end of the month.
I know some sellers that do NOT make $10 per sale!
I have a full-time ebay business since 1999 on ebay. When I started I made around $90000 per year. Sales dropped way off since 9/11/01 and for the last few years I make around $30000 to $40000 on ebay. I sell new products only.
Recently I got hooked up with a drop shipper. He was pushy so I gave his items a try since it costs me nothing. To me it looked very grim that I could make anything at all because I took item numbers and search other auctions. What I found was other sellers selling the same items for the SAME or LESS than the drop shipper is offering the same good for.
Knowing this normally I would say "screw it" as I have before. The pushy drop shipper called me a few weeks later and I told him the truth that his prices are TOO HIGH. He told me to try it anyway because he is SURE some items will sell.
I listed 50 products in the 30-day good til cancel format so I only pay 35 cents per listing each month. The drop shipper offers 20000 different items but I trie
So Glad I Read About Dropshipping. Saved me alot of headache. Much Appreciated!
R.L. Wright
Professional Portraits Painted
(www.rlwrightsprofessionalportraits.com)
great article :-) I buy LOTS of things on ebay. Perhaps I should write an article about it LOL. There are some things i find that do seem to go for a lot of money. used DVD's often sell for more than new prices - go figure. and i buy a few little kids stickers cos my grand daughter loves them and these go for a relative fortune - and cost much more than they do in the 'real world'. good perfumes too which have had some used already seem to fetch good prices - too high for me to buy them. and quite often popular childrens books and even adult books - the 2nd hand ones go sometime for higher prices than new ones. also lego would you believe. you can pay a fortune for that too on ebay. hmmm - what ese LOL. anyways good luck :-)
Well you have one thing correct....selling is not easy and it takes time and education to be successful selling on eBay. You are doing a good job of educating yourself. My advise...stick with something you know and like (maybe you like thimbles, or jewelry, or cocktail shakers). Check out what sells on eBay in those categories by researching closed auctions over several weeks. Also read the auctions with high dollar ending amounts to see what they stressed in the auction copy and how they pictured the item and what there terms of sale were. All this is part of learning. Then when you think you understand go out and buy a collection of the thing you are interested in so you get the best pieces and the worst pieces.(Try a local auction or estate sale or advertise for this item in the want ads or your local newspaper or shoppers guide.) Break apart the collection you buy and sell it in individual pieces or small groups. You will find your rarer pieces do great and you should still
Have you thought about selling children's clothing on eBay? There is a really good article on this website that explains how to do it well.
Technically yes, dropshipping is legal; it works on the same principals as dollar stores, where wholesale items are bought in large quantity and offered at a huge discount. The problem is that there are a lot of people out there, offering the same product. The trick to Ebay is finding something unique that is in demand. If you can craft/paint/sculpt, I've found some wonderful opportunities available, but just selling the same thing everyone else is will get you nowhere.