Posted By:
Aaron M."3) If you're willing to disclose the reserve price to everybody and in the auction listing, why not just start the bidding off at that level and save the ebay fee."
If you are trying to get an accurate gauge of the market value for the item. That way you aren't bound to the sale if it doesn't reach a high enough price (basically people disagree with your reserve) for you to be happy selling the item at that particular time.
Pretty much, you can't lose. If the reserve is met, great, item sold. If the reserve is not met and the item doesn't sell, then you have a better idea of what to set your minimum bid and expectations for a sale if you decide to relist. Plus, there's always the opportunity of making a sale in between the high bid and reserve price off-E-Bay with the high bidder (or even one of the under bidders). I've had that happen several times in both directions.
"4) Although not technically wrong, Aaron's method of reserve identification goes against the spirit."
And selling those paper cutouts as bona fide collectibles, while not technically wrong (at least in the eyes of E-Bay), goes against the spirit. Do you think that's a practical and useful stance given the circumstances?
As a regular user of E-Bay, in a field of collecting literally infested with fraud and deception, where E-Bay offers little to no protection to the buyers, then I think we as buyers are entitled to use whatever tools are at our disposal to help level the playing field.
"5) I've always failed to understand why what you have paid for an item has any relevance to the price you're willing to sell at, unless you only have the item on consignment."
Uhhhh, so you don't take a loss on the item? Especially for those of us who sell excess pieces of our collection with the intent to put the proceeds back into our collection. It helps keep your hobby money self-contained and prevent you from using money that's earmarked for other purposes (like bills, etc.).
"Don't get me wrong it's always nice to sell at a profit, and overall, if you're in business you better be making money, but on any individual item/sale the price you paid for it is irrelevant."
Man, I wish other dealers though like you. Why they're out there trying to make money, I have no idea. They should just be happy to take a loss, knowing that they've made people happy. Kinda like charity.
On the serious side, those individual transactions add up to your overall business model. In plainer terms: if you build your business with the thought that it doesn't matter if you make a profit on an individual sale, how then do you ensure that you make a profit on your overall sales?
"However, you should however be trying to get market value or better."
Yeah, I think that's the general idea.