Boobs = interest = sale = $

Firstly, let me say a sincere thank you to those lovely readers who gave me suggestions to get me out of my book-rut.


Carol, yes prices of books are plummeting.    Great as a buyer, but not as a seller.   Fishpond is like a very basic version of Amazon.  I can't sell on Amazon as they won't make payments to Australian bank accounts (the last time I looked).


Maggie, I like your idea of keeping your store stocked with lots of different items.   Then I can open my shop to a new range of customers.  At the moment, I hardly even get a sale on Fridays/Saturdays.  I'd like to change it - and have my store selling 7 days a week.  After all, it is open 7 days a week!


Yvette, thanks, the idea of just starting with exercise outfits / accessories is also excellent one.    Being allergic to exercise should not harm me there.  *I* will not be the intended victim.  And as you say, they are very easy to wrap and post.   I'm already with Ebay Underground (the BEST place ever), and will also join Thrifting with the Boys that you mentioned.


Miss Maggie, your idea of asking the op-shops to keep videos aside for me and paying them money, if they no longer wanted to stock them, is a fantastic idea.  And one I will try out this week.   One of my op-shops that cleared out the videos are now re-stocking them.  I think they must have just wanted to clean out those that had been sitting there.    (Ms Maggie I must reply to your kind offer on Ebug).


I'm going to try looking at clothes tomorrow.  So I'll show you what weird things I pick up.


No shoes though, I have a thing about touching other people's used shoes.


OK, so I went shopping for stock last week.  I told myself that I would no longer buy piles of crime/romance books because they are only 20 cents each, and I have this magical idea that they will sell in bulk lots.   No more, none of that.   I decided to only look out for unusual / sure sellers.

I found boobs were popping up a lot this week in my ebay world.    And I don't mean I was staring in the mirror, poking my own naughty pillows and giggling like a mad thing.   Oh, I did come across an arse too - I hope I've still got the photo.   ;-)

It's a good thing I'm easily amused.

I poked around at my local op-shop and came across a couple of interesting books.

This one was my favourite, I almost squealed with delight when I looked at it.  I thought it might have been a vintage cookbook - but it was even better than that.

The title is hard to read - it is "The Fabulous Feminique Program For Developing a Beautiful Bust."

Printed in 1969 - it's a rip-snorter.  Loookeee - one of the exercises is lifting a raw chicken in a tray.  So the next time you're making a roast - be sure to do a few lifts and you'll be looking perkier in no time.

I also found this one:

This was printed in 1979.  It's huge with over 320 pages of photos of model farm toys and their value then.  A truck collecting nerd will love this.  It's a US-based book, so I'll be sure to include international postage, but it's going to cost a fortune to post overseas.

Then I hit my local junk/$2 shop to get a birthday card and was confronted with this item.  I took a photo with my phone, but I was laughing too much and it was blurry.  Fortunately I found a photo of one on the internet:


What do you think this might be?

It's a breast massager.  

I kid you not.  For a whole $5.   Between this and lifting my roast chicken in and out of the oven, I could have norgs so perky I could rest my head on them.


Then on to my mid-week op-shops, my eyes beheld these.  

Lovely shorts.  And only $2.   These stayed on the rack when I left, but came home on my new mobile phone!  This was the first photo I took with my new phone.  How long can I uphold this high standard of living?


I visited one of my op shops that had thrown out all their videos.  They had 2 cardboard boxes full of recently-donated videos sitting outside.  A lot of them were TV shows that had been recorded onto blank videos.  I trawled through them and got some video gold according to my "Golden Rules of Videos."


Evidence # 1 - Crappy B-grade horror movies - mostly rated R.  Even though one had a rental sticker describing it as "Art House", I was not fooled.   Nobody in their right mind would distribute these on DVD.  Check.

Let's turn them over and do a quick tittie check.

Bingo.  One comes up trumps here.


Evidence # 2 - Not Rated R - but quirky titles are a plus - how could I pass up "Blacula!" and "Stuff Stephanie In the Incinerator."   These make me feel all warm and fuzzy.

Evidence # 3 - The idea of even looking at these movies makes me want to eat my own head.

Check.   Check.

Well, I'm off to put a roast chicken in the oven multiple times.

Goodbye books :-(

I have had to come to a painful decision this week.


My ebay shop is approximately 85% books.   I worked hard to get 1,000 items in my store.  For the past few months I have been slogging away, keeping my stock at above 1,000.   I was very proud of myself.


Now I look at my sales figures and realise the harsh reality - books don't sell.    My sales are actually decreasing.  I thought having a magic big number of items in my store would bring the buyers.   My items are very reasonably priced compared to other sellers.


But now there's too much competition - from many fellow ebay.au sellers selling the same books as me, to overseas sellers - mainly from ebay.uk - flooding the Aussie market with cheap second hand books - to cheap brand new imported books from the US.     Don't even get me started on e-books.


It breaks my heart.   I love books.   Since I was a child, I spent all my time reading - I was (and still are) very much a loner, and an introvert, and prefer to spend time with a book than a human being.  Books have always been my companions, and they can take you to places you can only dream about, or you can learn about new things.  

So I've gone through my books in stock - I have about 2,000.    I have culled many that I am sick of the sight of - they got taken to the op shop.    I have now sent about 300 off to the Fishpond warehouse to sit there and hopefully sell.  At least I won't have to look at them anymore.


What I have left, I will either send to Fishpond next month, put up on the free Quicksales website or sell as bulk lots.  Only the rare and very popular shall stay.


My bookshelves are looking emptier now.   I have more space, but I don't know what to fill it with.   My ebay store is now hovering around 900.   Once I cull more books and send more off to Fishpond, it will get even lower.


In the past year I was looking for more cheap items to stock my store with.   I found board games - and the good ones I bought have sold, but I still have ones sitting around for over a year - and far too many of them that have parts missing.  I'm getting better at picking which ones to buy - but they are not filling much of a $ void.


Then I discovered VHS Videos - and they have added some much-needed extra income.  They are hard work - they need testing and cleaning.    Then my 2 favourite local op-shops that were the source for most of my cheap videos - THREW ALL THEIR VIDEOS IN THE BIN.  They no longer sell them.   I have very few places to pick them up cheap anymore.  Bang goes another source of stock.


I tried selling bulk lots of children clothes - and they seemed to sell in the beginning.   I thought they were going to save me - but now the sales have dried up, and I have lost the drive to keep buying more clothes just to have them fill my closet.


I feel like I am going backwards now.   I look around my unit which has stock lining the walls, and all I can see is money & effort spent for nothing.

I have had some sales with my other selling venues.


Fishpond.com.au -  When my 3 parcels of books that were picked up today reach them - they will have 300 of my items in their warehouse.   This is great because they take care of the shipping, emails, etc. to customers, and they pay pretty quick.   I have even noticed (obviously they get a good deal on shipping) that sometimes I also get a little extra from $1-2 extra which is a refund from the set postage of $4.99 that the customer pays.  Pretty good.  These items don't sell for much, because you have to undercut all the others selling the same item - but it is money in the bank.


So far this month I have made : $59.


Quicksales have also given me some sales.   I have been madly cutting and pasting across from ebay, and so far I have 320 items on their website.


In the past month and a bit, I have sold:


1 x video  $8
3 lots of Mills & Boons   $33
bulk lot of Clive Cussler books   $15
2 x board games    $20


So at a total of $73 - that's not too shabby.   The fees from all those sales have been less than a dollar in total.   I will definitely work harder on Quicksales.


I thought that I might try magazine lots - they're fairly cheap at only 20 cents, but we shall see.
I also try to pick up any vintage knitting pattern booklets.


Does anybody have any idea on some other items I could branch out into, that are low in cost ?????


I have no idea about clothes.
I will not even touch a pair of used shoes.


I'm in serious need of some ideas.   I'm finding it hard to get past not selling books.


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Now I'll put down my tiny little violin of pity that I'm playing and show you some sales I got this week:


These 2 x Diet Books only took a few days to sell:


Sold For:   $29.99
Paid:     50 cents

I always pick up horse/pony children's books when they're cheap and sell them as a bulk lot.  It's school holidays here, so I hoped these would sell.    There are 17 books in this lot.


Sold For:  $21.99
Paid:  about $3.50

I picked these books up on a whim to fill a bag of books for $5.   I have never heard of them before, and they were published in 1985 - so a bit vintage.  I had 3 and put them up separately.  They sold the next day to the same buyer.


Sold For:   $15
Paid:   50 cents

I've had these up for a couple of months.  I always pick up Tae Bo videos.


Sold For :   $18.99
Paid:    $1.00 (probably less)

These took a while to sell, but I was happy to wait because Linda Howard is a popular author.


Sold For :    $18.99
Paid:    $1.00

Due to my dwindling income, I am now on a vicious hunt to cut my expenses - both business and household.   I'll share some of my tips with you next time!

Shoot that poison arrow .... through my TRS ...

Yes, shoot that poison arrow through my Top Seller Rating.


Nothing gets me scooting off to write a blog quicker than being shafted.  In fact, I think I got a bit of whiplash getting to my computer so fast.
So be warned: there is whining ahead with some lashings of sarcasm - but there are also some book BOLO's at the end to keep you reading.  :-)


I have never been a cup-half-full kind of person.  I go around with a permanent look of the downtrodden, constantly waiting for somebody to kick me in the teeth.  I think that doesn't help - I think sometimes that encourages the bad karma.


This morning I got up, made my morning cup of tea and turned on my computer to read my emails.   I feel like crap - my sinuses hurt, my eyes itch and my fingers have swollen into sausages.   Already a pretty nasty sight at this time of the morning, today in particular, I was enough to make the milk sitting in the fridge begin to sour just a little.


I click through my emails with an indifferent finger -


CLICK


No new eBay sale notification emails.   *sniff*


CLICK


I've won that $250,000 Reader's Digest prize AGAIN!!!!   *bwahahhah*


CLICK


Your seller status is no longer Top-rated.      *hmmpphhh*


CLICK


Brain starts to catch up.    Screaming backtrack.   What !!!????


I'm not ashamed to say that I cried like a baby.

I pounded my chest.  I tore at my hair and I wailed like a banshee.   Why meeee?   The world hates me.   I don't know why I even bother anymore....   I'm a fat ugly failure ......


Etc... Etc... you get the idea.


I hit Facebook and eBay Underground and got some much-needed support and advice from my on-line friends.  I really appreciate their help at times like these, as I have nobody else to turn to.  


Things weren't that bad.  The world wasn't going to end.   The milk in the fridge heaved a sigh of relief.   The wine began to shiver in anticipation of the evening ahead.


I looked at my DSR status and found that somebody had jumped in and given me a rating 1 or 2   - 3 times!!!.   No wonder my rating did a belly-whacker.


All my feedback has been glowing.     I have my suspicions on who did leave me these dings - and I'm not sure if they did it out of spite, or just because Ebay lacks any kind of education to buyers on this thing.    I know I provided a good service - I know it wasn't because of anything I have done.  I need to stop kicking myself up the arse and move on.


So I decided to have a look at what I was missing out on by losing this Top Rated Status.  Surely there are lots of huge benefits, discounts and bonuses for having this high standing (other than having a pretty little badge next to my user name) - why else would I be flogging myself over losing it?


I go to Ebay information and find this listing of the huge benefits that I had been awarded for being a good little girl.

Wow - look at that long list of benefits and discounts I was being awarded.   I'm SO PRIVILEGED !!!


Just for a hoot, lets look at the information on what bells & whistles I get for my "improved search standing".   

Do note the note.  The note is very note-worthy.  It's basically telling me that I get bugger-all.   I would get better increased exposure by taking ebay photos like these.

I am now better educated on something that I valued, because I thought it was a reward for my good work.     


The DSR rating system is a farce.    My DSR page noted that I could look at what my low ratings were for and use it to improve the way I work.    How can I friggin' do this if anybody can ding my stars without me getting any communication on what I have done wrong, (if anything).


~~~~~  END OF RANT  ~~~~~~~~~~


In my last blog, I promised some BOLO's  for books.   There's only a couple here, but these are things to look out for.


Cowboy Books.

No no - not THOSE kind of cowboys. 


I mean the real ones - the manly ones with hair on their chest.  They smoke cigarettes, shuffle cards,  and tote guns.  They love fast women and drinking whiskey.  They're so tough, they probably fart bullets.

When I had my book exchange - the men would come in rabidly looking for these books.  I used to call them "Mills & Boons for Men".


Here in Australia, they are rare as hen's teeth.   My friend Sue rang me one day and said she'd just bought 230 Westerns at a garage sale for $20.     


I looked them up and saw that one lot of 20 had sold at auction for $25.   Really?  That's crazy.  These aren't even full-length novels.  They're just little books and they only have about 95 pages. 


I sorted through the books and threw quite out a few that were water damaged.    The remaining ones were not in great condition, and I made sure to mention that they had a slight musty smell.
I put up 9 lots - BIN at $26.   I still have enough for 2 more lots and maybe a couple of lots of more damaged ones at a lower price.


They sat for a couple of weeks so I did a 5% off sale. 

So far I have sold 5 of these lots and still have 4 left.  So that's $130 so far (even sharing half with Sue) - still a good profit.

The other BOLO is Weight Watchers books - especially the supermarket guides that allocate points to different food items.


When someone goes on WW, they want all the bells & whistles to help them achieve their goal.  Those books are expensive to buy brand new.


I found my first one a couple of weeks ago.  This book is not a ProPoints book (which is the current WW Points program), but I checked the completed's and decided to give it a go.  This book costed me 25 cents.  It sold within an hour.

Then last week I found these two.  These are current ProPoints books.   They costed me 20 cents each.  These also sold within an hour.

So now I make sure to keep an eye out for these.


Do you have any quirky little books that you have any BOLO's for?


Now I've got all that off my chest, I will go and have a nice cup of tea - using my new fresh bottle of milk.   :-)

Who listens to the radio ?

The radio.   Back many hundreds of years ago, families sat around the radio staring at it intently, listening to radio dramas in plummy accents, and lots of olde tyme songs, whilst drinking a lovely cup of tea.


Now my sole interaction with radio is the one in my car.  It involves me swearing it at it, and constantly hitting the change station buttons as I try to avoid atrocious ads, unfunny commentary, and hip-hop music.  I am forced to listen to the radio, as the CD player died in my car over 2 years and I don't have the moulah to fix it.


This week I got to see the radio from a different angle.   You see radios have bits inside that make them run, and the lovely old ones are very collectable for those who are rabid about the subject.  Tube radios?  I only knew about YouTube.


I know men love a hobby.    If it involves some hands-on work for those that are that way inclined, then all the better.   They can make the casing look good again, and play with the circuits inside, and all those knobs!!!   Men love having "a bit of a fiddle" with knobs.

So when my friend Sue bought me a pile of books on radios,  I thought it sounded interesting.   Some of them were more modern books for the collector, and some of them were skanky old Radio Service Manuals from the 1930s, 1940s & 1950s.   I was excited about the former, and not so sure about the older books.  We have a system where she buys the items, I cover the selling costs, and we go halves on the sale price.


I found out how VERY desirable these items are.    I had these books sitting on the kitchen bench for a few days, and then decided to put them up.   There wasn't a great deal of other books to compare these items to, so I started with the two newer books.


The first two sold within 20 minutes of me putting them up - to the same buyer.


This one I knew would sell as it lists a catalogue of all radios made in Australia since the 1920s - just not that quickly.  Of course, I should have asked for more.   I got $23.00 for this one.

This is an old book from 1955, that is part of a series.  It is full of circuit diagrams.  Pretty riveting stuff. There was another copy (unsold) that I could compare this to, so I put mine up with a BIN price of $29.99.   Whoosh - it was gone along with the one above!

This is a similar book to the first one, but it lists a lot of New Zealand radios as well.   It sold within 2 hours for $25.

There were 2 other books similar to the blue one above - both full of riveting circuit diagrams - one from 1939 and one from 1940.   These were in terrible condition - sticky-taped, stained and well-used.   I didn't know what to price them at, so I threw them to the great Auction Monster to see what it thought.   Pricing them $9.99 and $10.00, one with a BIN of $29.99 and the other without a BIN price.

Within an hour both had been bidded on by the same person - so were at $9.99 and $10.00.   (Don't ask me why there is a 1 cent difference, I must have been drunk :-))


Then that evening I got an email from the one and only bidder so far on the two books.   He was requesting an invoice.  He wanted to buy them both for $30 each (+ postage).   He was a pensioner, member of radio club, yaddah yaddah.  Can I send him an invoice and he will pay promptly?    Ummm, what?   


Then another man jumps into the circus.   He wants to know how much I want for both books.  He's a member of his radio club, and has other diagrams books on CD and wants to add these to his collection.    He will send me copy of his circuit books on CD!    Can I send him an invoice???


Well the crazies were out in force and they wanted those books!   Much as I was tempted by the offer of a hundred circuit books on CD (ooh, think of the great plot-line and dialogue in those!!!), I was reduced to telling the silly buggars that these were auctions and they were more than welcome to bid, but I couldn't pull the auction for them.  


There are 5 people watching these 2 books, and fact that my traps snared these two loonies so early on could mean that they will go for a lot more.    It could also mean that nobody else will bid, but I'm taking the chance.  So far both are still sitting at the first bid.  I have thrown my bait in, and I'm waiting for more bites.

Links are here for the 1940 book listing and the 1937 Book Listing, if anybody is interested.


Do you think I'm crazy not taking the offers?   We shall see when the auctions finish in just under 7 days.   


So if you see any of these old circuit diagram books lying around when you are thrifting - be sure to grab them.  You too, can be circled by radio-mad loonies!

Some Sales For the Week + More on Videos

I had a mish-mash of sales this week from every category, which was nice.


I sold this bulk lot of Girls Size 1 clothing (30 items) for $49.99.  The buyer paid straight away, and it costed them $20 in postage to get it there.   Yay, some more space in my wardrobe to fill with more kiddies clothing:

 <<<<<< WARNING : Whine of the Week >>>>>>>>>


Then there was this second lot of clothing - Girls Size 6 Clothes (29 Items) - this actually sold on the 31st of January for $49.99.    I was very happy with this sale in an otherwise terrible sales week.

 The buyer contacted me one minute after buying it and said "Can I pay on pickup - I only live in (somewhere less than 10 minutes from me).   I replied yes, and told her I'd be home that day until 5pm.  

Nothing.   Then on the 3rd, she phoned and said "Can I pick it up on Wednesday 9th?  I'll be there at 9am."  I thought that was a bit long to wait, but I agreed.


Waited home on Wednesday.  Nothing - no email, no phone call, no twit customer.    On Thursday I sent a "Where were you, if you no longer want these please let me know so I can cancel it."   
It's now Sunday morning and still nothing.  I HATE that I have to wait 5 days until I can relist these.  I hate that the seller gets punished for having a twit customer.  I hate that if she does ever get back to me, it will be with some sob story about her grandfather dying or her husband getting assassinated by a ninja.  


I got rid of the pickup option on all my items except the clothing , but I will be removing it them as well, as the inter-state customers pay quickly and are no trouble at all. 


<<<<<<<  Hic!  That was a nice glassfull ! >>>>>.


I have a friend from years ago when I had a bookshop - she would trawl garage sales and op shops for books during the week, and I would buy them off her.   It worked well for both of us.


Fast forward six years or so, and she still visits me every couple of months at home to bring me more things to sell - we have branched out from books with other things as well.   We go halvies on these items.   These three books sold within a day of me putting them up.


Military History always sells well.   I try to buy any military history books I see - especially ones that are related to a  certain platoon/unit/etc.     This book was signed by the author and a couple of members of the AWWC.  I got $25 for this one.    

I nearly kept this one just to identify the contents of my back garden.   I got $45 for this book on Weeds.  Who would have thought?

I always laugh at this book, because it was the one I used when I was forced delighted to do the Home Economics class in high school.  Everybody wants this book (except me).  It's a nice quick buck or two.   I got $25 for this one.   The older editions can go for up to $80.

And now on to videos.   Do you remember my blog from last week about the video haul I got?


I've already sold 3 videos from this lot.   These only costed me 10 cents each.


Gary Busey and his teeth score!   $10.00 for this trashy beauty!

This one was in pretty bad nick and was an ex-rental.  It played well, and I debated whether to list it and put it up for $8.   I forgot about the allure of a fugly man on the front cover!   Yes!  He sold within a couple of days.  I must remember that fugly sells (as my friend Tina always says.  ;-)    So remember to add Fugly to your Video BOLO list.   Fugly + Rated R = Irresistible.

And this one links to my next Video BOLOs :


Ah, Denise Austin.  I remember trying to do these videos years ago, my parrots watching me from their perches with something bordering on disgust.    Yes I "squeezed my buttocks" with the best of them.  Lovely Denise never mentioned that it would make my butt bigger.    What's the deal with that???


This is a very early one - probably the first she ever made.  It's so old, it should be a silent movie and I wish it was.  As I tested the movie, I winced listening to her perky voice rabbiting on about hips, thigggghsssssss & buttocks!!!!!    I got $10 for this one.

Exercise Videos - although they make me break into a sweat before I've even taken the video out of the cover, they are big sellers where I am.  Of course only certain ones sell.


You can get anything from $10 to $20 for these.    My BOLO List for Videos are:


~ Any Denise Austin
~ Any Jane Fonda
~ Any Cher   *bwwwwwahahahahahhahaaa*  sorry, I nearly choked then.
~ Any Richard Simmons
~ Any super-model workout (eg. Rachel Hunter, Elle MacPherson)
~ Any ex-actress/singer workout  (eg. Jennie Garth, etc ...)
~ I also pick up any Aussie Fit series


~ Any Billy Blanks / Tae Bo videos - I did these for a while.  They're fun because you pretend you can kick someone's butt.   However I kept getting distracted by the very dishy Mr. Blanks lovely *ahem* package.   Sometimes lycra is a *good thing*.   

  Sometimes it isn't.  :-(    (hint:  Richard Simmons)


Have you had any success with selling exercise videos?  Do you have any others you can add to the BOLO list?